Chicken Couscous with Mixed Vegetables
Enjoying an easy to prepare meal that is made from scratch is a goal of ours when backpacking. With a little prep, it's pretty easy to make your own.
We want good food without all the "stuff" that is in prepacked dehydrated meals. Most of these meals will require a dehydrator, but they are fairly inexpensive and if you do a lot of backpacking, it will get tons of use.
Before our last outing, I spent a few days dehydrating all of the veggies and the chicken, then put all the ingredients in a vacuum sealed bag. This could last a very long time, but we ended up using it within a week. I think these could be shelf stable for months, but ours never last that long...
Here is my dehydrator at work. I'm doing peppers and onions in this batch, but you can prepare all of you veggies for this meal this way. Buying frozen veggies works just as well as fresh. I dehydrated frozen mixed vegetables and mixed with some fresh. They all rehydrated very well.
At home, I combined all of my dried ingredients.
I packed the dry ingredients and the chicken in separate bags.
On the trail, I cut open the vacuum sealed bags and put everything in a gallon freezer bag.
I set the bag of dried ingredients inside Chris' ingenious insulated "cooker". This was made at home from some insulated car window heat shield and duct tape. It packs flat and keeps the food hot while it's "cooking" in the Ziploc bag. Love it!
I added 2 cups of boiling water and folded over the top of the cooker and strapped it closed.
Let this sit for about 15 minutes. About half way through, I stirred it around and turned the bag upside down, but I think it would be just fine even if left untouched.
And here it is! Couscous at camp. And you may notice that in this picture, there is no chicken. I totally forgot to add it. OOPS! It was still yummy, even without the chicken.
Chicken Couscous with Mixed Vegetables
Ingredients
Assemble at home
1/3 cup regular, not pearled couscous
1/2 cup dehydrated chicken
3/4 cup dehydrated mixed vegetables
2 Tablespoon dehydrated, chopped onion
3 T dehydrated chopped mushrooms
2 teaspoons powdered sodium free boullion
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp dried sage
1/2 tsp dried partsley
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt (or more to taste)
2 cups water
Directions
Add all ingredients except the water to a freezer Ziploc bag or vacuum sealed bag. Store until ready to use.
On the trail: Add 2 cups of boiling water to bag, stir and allow to sit for about 15 minutes. Half way through cooking, you can stir again or turn bag upside down to allow water to get all the veggies that floated to the top.
After 15 minutes, stir and serve!!
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