Backpacker's PantryFiesta Beef and Vegetable Bowl | Freeze Dried Backpacking & Camping Food, 1 Count

I live in Colorado so it's more involved to rehydrate backpacking meals. While there are instructions on here on how much water and how long to wait, I wish there was some sort of chart that gives altitudes and suggested times to make it easier. I keep a few of these in my car for emergencies and I keep the rest in my camping bag. I like the quick mess free clean up of these bags and these rehydrated very well without any crunchy pieces leftover. In general I hate sour cream but it was disguised very well so sour cream haters probably won't notice it too much with this meal. Very filling meal and I was able to finish the entire bag by myself. The calories, sodium, etc. are insane like some other backpacking meals I've seen from other brands. Will try other meals from this brand!

Backpackers Pantry makes pretty standard hiking food but, what I like about their food is their more flavorful vegetarian options. This is a good example. Yes, its is a rice and bean mean (pretty standard hikers; fare) , but it is flavored with Hatch green chile and and chipotle chile so it has much more flavor than typical rice and bean meals. With that being said, it is still hiking food and not something I would choose to eat were it not the lightweight and filling meals that backpacker's use. There are other more expensive brands that offer fancier recipes and taste somewhat better. But for the price, this is a good staple vegetarian backpacking food.

I prepared this at home just to get a better feel for the appearance, taste and consistency, and I'll say that something this convenient and flavorful would be pretty awesome to have in tow for a camping excursion! It's of course very hearty, but I wasn't expecting the taste and consistency to be what they were, considering this is dehydrated material. It was ever so slightly bland for my taste, and thus benefitted from a sprinkle of hot sauce (which I suppose would also be fairly easy to pack for the trail).

I have tried a large number of Backpacker's Pantry meals while camping and backpacking and find their overall quality and flavors to be good. I began by rehydrating this Fiesta Beef and Vegetable Bowl variety with 1.5 cups of boiling water, then wrapping in a towel and allowing it to sit for just over 8 minutes. This resulted in a well rehydrated meal with a bit of seasoned broth that was not fully absorbed. The meal contained a good number of small beans, all of which were rehydrated and soft.The flavor is mild and not spicy, which surprised me because the package indicated spicy chipotle chile as an ingredient. I also didn't really detect the sour cream that is listed. The flavor is fairly bland overall, but is really improved with a little packet of hot sauce, salsa, or other chili sauce. I think this could be used to fill a tortilla or served with corn chips to extend the serving size. Overall, I lowered my rating by one star because I didn't think this was a flavorful as other varieties. That being said, I have found that when hiking long distances, this type of rice, bean, meat and veggie combo really hits the spot.Pricewise, this seems to be priced comparably to many other freeze-dried meals. The cost is fairly expensive, but I think that this is driven by the overall quality of texture and the convenience of freeze-dried food.

This is a great pre-packaged meal. It prepares in it's own bag, which means you don't need to bring any extra gear for cooking it in (although you will need a source of boiling water). The flavor is very good, and it has a ten year shelf life. It's extremely lightweight, which makes it perfect for overnight backpacking or camping. It would also be great in an emergency kit or go-bag.When my wife and I are traveling on long road trips, we like to bring meals like this with us. We can pull into a motel late at night, and instead of worrying about what we're going to do for dinner, we can enjoy a nice hot meal in our room, and hit the road first thing in the morning. Recommended!

We did a camping night with our daughter and tested this. It was easy to rehydrate. The taste was okay. It was a little bland, but we were able to season it how we wanted. The package was really lightweight, which would be great to travel with. The portion size is big too,

Let's start with what I liked. It's very light weight and extremely compact. It has a decent amount of calories (if you eat both servings) and protein. And it's really easy to cook/prepare. Just add water.The bag itself stands upright while you're pouring water in which is a really nice attention to detail. However it is deep which means you'll need a long utensil or pour it out into a bowl to eat it easily.What I don't like is that it's advertised as 2 servings. ~250 calories is not a meal. The food itself is kind of bland. Bring your own seasoning. I followed the water amount to the gram and it was too much. Granted I was at sea level and it says in fine print that the instructions are for 5,000 ft of elevation. None of these are really the end of the world, just annoyances.As always test your equipment at home. I did this before my trip and there are definitely lessons learned.

This wasn't my favorite freeze-dried meal. Although the beef reconstituted very nicely, producing soft, chewable chunks, the rest of it had kind of a mealy texture, and though I added the prescribed amount of water and let it rest for 20 minutes, not all of the water was absorbed, leaving a bit of soup in the bottom.The flavor was good, but not a knockout. Great flavor from the beef and beans, and the cheese, but for a meal that boasts chipotle and sour cream, I didn't taste either of this, and the taste was a little bland. As is usually the case, I ate this meal for two by myself, and it filled me up completely. Split between two people, you'd want additions to the meal.That said, there was nothing objectionable, and this will certainly fill you up on a backpacking trip.