Dehydrated Beef and Bean Burritos
Taco beef and refried beans dried at home, rehydrated in the bag, rolled into tortillas at camp.
- calories
- 520
- weight
- 5.5 oz
- cal / oz
- 95
- protein
- 26 g
- serves
- 8, scales
- prep
- 30 min
- cook
- 10 min
- total time
- 40 min
- water
- 700 ml boiled
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Canister stove
- Liquid fuel
- Campfire coals
- Backpacking
- Basecamp
- Car camping
- One pot
- Dehydrate ahead
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Lean ground beef | 1 lb | 90% lean or better, fat goes rancid |
|---|---|---|
| Taco seasoning | 1 packet | |
| Diced green chilis | 4 oz can | |
| Fat-free refried beans | 15 oz can | fat-free dries flat and hard, which is what you want |
| Instant Spanish rice | 1 packet | the heat-and-serve kind |
| Flour tortillas | 8 | |
| String cheese | 8 sticks | individually wrapped, day one or two only |
| Taco sauce or salsa packets | 8 |
Method
- At home, brown the beef in a skillet and drain it hard. Add the seasoning with whatever water the packet calls for, stir in the chilis, and simmer until the pan is nearly dry.
- Spread the beef across two dehydrator trays and the refried beans across two more. The beans need parchment or you will be scraping trays for an hour.
- Dry at 135 F overnight, until the beef crumbles and the bean sheet snaps rather than bends.
- Break the bean sheet up and package beef and beans together in freezer bags, one bag per two or three servings. Freeze them if the trip is more than a few days out.
- In camp, add about 350 ml of water per bag and let it sit an hour. This is the step people skip and regret.
- Tip the soaked mix into the pot, bring it to a simmer, and hold it there five minutes.
- Stir in the Spanish rice and simmer three more minutes. Pull it off the heat and let it stand five minutes to finish swelling.
- Spoon into tortillas, add a string cheese and a sauce packet, roll, eat.
The whole recipe happens in your kitchen. Browning and seasoning at home means the trail version is soak, simmer, roll — and the dehydrator is what makes a pound of ground beef weigh almost nothing. Fat-free beans are not a health choice here. Fat is what makes dried food go off and what keeps a bean sheet tacky instead of brittle.
The hour-long cold soak matters more than the simmer. Dried beef rehydrates slowly and unevenly, and five minutes of boiling will not save you from gritty crumbs. Start the soak when you get to camp, set up the tent, then cook. String cheese is the only thing here that will not last a week, so treat it as a first-night luxury.
Packing
Beef and beans go in the same freezer bag so they rehydrate together. Tortillas ride flat against your back panel or they arrive as chips. Rice packet, cheese, and sauce packets stay separate.
Variations
- Skip the cheese and this holds for a week-long trip without a cooler.
- Swap the beef for the same weight of dehydrated seasoned lentils or a bag of TVP.
- No tortillas left? Eat it as a bowl. It loses nothing.
https://camprecipes.com/classic-recipes/backpacking-burritos