Spiced Pecan Trail Squares
A dense pecan tray bake baked flat so it slices into squares that survive a pack.
- calories
- 330
- weight
- 2.1 oz
- cal / oz
- 157
- protein
- 4 g
- serves
- 12, scales
- prep
- 20 min
- cook
- 0 min
- total time
- 20 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Snack
- Dessert
- No cook
- Backpacking
- Day hike
- Thru-hike
- Bikepacking
- Car camping
- Vegetarian
- Eat in the bag
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Pecan halves | 1 1/2 cups | roughly chopped, keep some big pieces |
|---|---|---|
| Unsalted butter | 1 cup (225 g) | melted, not creamed |
| Light brown sugar | 1 cup | |
| Golden syrup or black treacle | 3 tbsp | |
| Plain flour | 1 3/4 cups | |
| Ground ginger | 2 tsp | |
| Ground cinnamon | 1 1/2 tsp | |
| Ground nutmeg | 1/2 tsp | |
| Eggs | 2 | |
| Sea salt | a pinch |
Method
- Heat the oven to 350F. Line a shallow tray, roughly 9x13, with parchment.
- Melt the butter in a pan, then take it off the heat and stir in the brown sugar and syrup until it looks smooth.
- Let it cool a few minutes, then beat in the eggs. Hot butter plus cold eggs is how you get scrambled batter.
- Fold in the flour, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, and pecans. Fold, do not beat. Air is the enemy here.
- Spread it thin and flat across the whole tray. Bake 22 to 25 minutes, until the edges pull in and the middle is set but still soft.
- Cool completely in the tray before cutting. Warm, it tears. Cold, it cuts clean into 12 squares.
This is a bake done at home, not at camp, and the whole point is the shape. Baked flat in a shallow tray with melted butter and no whipping, it comes out dense and low with no air pockets. Air pockets are what turn cake into crumbs at the bottom of a pack. Squares cut from a flat bake hold their edges for days.
The calories come from pecans and butter, which is fat rather than sugar, so it burns slower than a gel or a candy bar. The syrup and brown sugar do double duty: sweetness and moisture retention, which is why it stays chewy for a week instead of drying into a brick. Keep it under a week or the butter starts to taste tired.
Packing
Wrap each square in foil or parchment, then bag them together. Individually wrapped means you can eat one without unpacking the rest, and the wrapping keeps butter off your gear. Good for about a week at ambient temperature.
Variations
- Swap half the pecans for chopped dates if you want a faster-acting carb alongside the fat.
- A teaspoon of flaky salt across the top before baking cuts the sweetness on a long day.
- Black treacle in place of golden syrup makes it darker and less sweet.
https://www.baldhiker.com/spicy-pecan-tray-bake-recipe