Our Menu

Posted by on Jan 05 2021 in Hiking

OK, from the outset I should point out that our menu is twice as complex as it should be, because we're like Jack Sprat and His Wife: I've been on a Keto Diet for a couple of years (if you don't know what that is you can start at Wikipedia), so eat lots of fat and no carbohydrates, and Sandi has had her gall bladder out, so does not like to eat fats but majors on carbs. So, a challenge… but one that the spreadsheet is more than capable of achieving (if I've got the energy to add all the data points).

Itinerary Version	3
Itineray Date	2020-12-16

Our first long hike was The Bibbulmun at 998 km. I finished up losing way too much weight, weighing in (clothed) at 74.3kg after the walk. So, when we started planning for The Australian Alps Walking Track, I spent a lot of time on our diet, as we'd lost too much weight on The Bibbulmun, and the AAWT was a much harder walk. My reference point was some great pages put together by Brenda L. Braaten, Ph.D., R.D. that she called Pack Light, Eat Right. Brenda's work revolutionised my understanding of what the hiking diet should be, which in summary is (for us):

Energy Requirements
- Perry: 14,500 kJ — 21,000 kJ
- Sandi: 14,500 kJ — 16,700 kJ
Fuel Mixture
- 45-55% Calories from carbohydrate, including 20-30 grams/hour during walking hours (I called this Track Snacks)
- 35-40% Calories from fat
- 10-15% Calories from protein

AAWT worked out very well, as I only lost 5 kg and the hike was the most difficult we'd ever done with the Ascent/Descent being well over 33,000 metres for the hike and over half the days were in excess of 1,500 metres. Extremely enjoyable and very challenging.

Keto, why?

Short answer: I realised that on the AAWT that I was commonly in ketosis, even if the carbs were off the keto scale. We probably have a history of bio-hacking, so I wasn't opposed to the concept of doing something odd (certainly, I was, and am, concerned about the way our diets have been changed by Big Farmer)… so why not?

One reason would be that it's doubled the number of Food / Menu sheets in my spreadsheet (accommodating for both Sandi and myself) and it's already over 20 Mb, but heck, I'm up for a digital challenge most days of the week.

So our macro aims (Carbs / Fat / Protein) are:

Sandi: 45-55% / 35-40% / 10-15%
Perry: 10% / 70% / 20%

OK, to be honest, getting over 14,000 kJ into your diet is not the easiest thing to do, especially when you're attempting to limit weights. It involves a lot of working, then re-working and adjusting to get it right. We're convinced that a good menu is the best foundation for a long hike, so we do spend some time on it to get it as right as possible, and give us the best opportunity of completing the hike in good shape.

The Food / Menu development process is quite similar to the tweaking that occurs with the Itinerary.

Create a single breakfast, morning tea, lunch, afternoon tea and dinner (except in our case, it's two: one keto one non-keto).
Once there is one of each, I add those to the Food Sheet at appropriate rows (Itinerary locations / times)
Once the whole walk is done, the Menu will aggregate the kilojoules and macros, which gives a coarse first cut at the menu.
Wash and repeat until we've hit the targets…

The following meals are the result of #1 above.

Breakfast

	Keto Muesli	Non-Keto Muesli
Ingredients	FibreX Muesli, KetoLogic Meal, Moringa Powder, Acai Powder, Hemp Seeds	Carman's Granola (types), Dehydrated yogurt, Powdered milk
Kilojoules	2,351	2,393
Weight	122 gm	142 gm
Cost	$8.79	$3.27
Protein	34	17
Fat	38	23
Carbohydrate	12	74

Morning Tea

	Keto Scroggin	Non-Keto Scroggin
Ingredients	Mixed nuts and seeds	Mixed nuts, seeds and dried fruit
Kilojoules	2,488	2,1846
Weight	100 gm	100 gm
Cost	$1.96	$2.29
Protein	22	9
Fat	53	24
Carbohydrate	7	46

Lunch

You'll notice Sandi has two lunches, as one of her most often repeated sayings is "such-and-such was nice for a change"… she tends to get bored with her food. Actually on the AAWT I constructed a menu with 6 different lunches and 6 different dinners which had to be de-coded by the run sheet to figure out what we were eating. This walk will not be so complex.

	Keto Wrap	Non-Keto Salami Wrap	Non-Keto Tomato Wrap
Ingredients	Empower Wrap, Salami and Cheese Stick (2), Low Carb Bar	Mini Wrap, Salami and Cheese Stick (2), Fruit Leather, Muesli Bar	Mini Wrap, Dried Tomato and Cheese Stick (2), Fruit Leather, Muesli Bar
Kilojoules	3,064	3,179	2,470
Weight	181 gm	206 gm	161 gm
Cost	$4.81	$4.42	$3.29
Protein	36	27	19
Fat	60	40	24
Carbohydrate	10	67	67

Snacks

Sandi has opted out of the Track Snack regime advocated by Brenda L. Braaten, that we undertook on the AAWT, and I've converted my carbohydrate track snacks into FatBombs (the 15 gm servings below increase from 3-4 per day at the beginning to 12 at the end, to allow for increased energy requirements).

	Keto FatBomb	Keto Afternoon Tea	Non-Keto Afternoon Tea
Ingredients	Nut butters and Oil	Keto Bar	Non-Keto Bar
Kilojoules	373	777	931
Weight	15 gm	45 gm	50 gm
Cost	$5.00	$5.51	$0.95
Protein	2	9	4
Fat	9	14	9
Carbohydrate	1	5	30

Dinner

Dinner is somewhat problematic as it's a prepared meal, so me being so generous and kind of heart (yeah, right…), I opted not to insist on a Keto meal. But I figure that this one meal should be able to cope with the extra carbs with all the extra exercise we're doing. The Vegetarian option is for our Friday fasts.

	Keto Dinner	Non-Keto Dinner	Keto Vegetarian	Non-Keto Vegetarian
Ingredients	Bone Broth, BackCountry Meal, LowCarb Bar; Supper: LowCarb Chocholate, NoWay Hot Chocolate	Sesame Snaps, Dehydrated Soup, Dehydrated Cheese, BackCountry Meal, Dehydrated Desert	Tuna Dip, Seed Crackers, Vegetable Broth, BackCountry Meal, LowCarb Bar; Supper: LowCarb Chocholate, NoWay Hot Chocolate	Tuna Dip, Seed Crackers, Dehydrated Cheese, BackCountry Meal, Dehydrated Desert
Kilojoules	6,332	7,205	6,906	6,328
Weight	361 gm	380 gm	390 gm	326 gm
Cost	$29.97	$25.10	$39.18	$33.44
Protein	112	52	124	67
Fat	78	75	84	67
Carbohydrate	76	202	83	147