Steak and Tomato Sauce Leather Spaghetti
Beef and sauce cooked down at home, dried into a leather, and rebuilt on the trail over noodles.
- calories
- 720
- weight
- 8 oz
- cal / oz
- 90
- protein
- 42 g
- serves
- 2, scales
- prep
- 45 min
- cook
- 15 min
- total time
- 60 min
- water
- 900 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
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Dehydrate ahead
- Shelf stable
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Sirloin steak | 3/4 lb | cubed small, about 1/4 inch |
|---|---|---|
| Olive oil | 2 tbsp | for the home cook-down, plus a little to carry |
| Garlic | 3 cloves | smashed |
| Onion | 1 small | diced |
| Canned sliced olives | 1 small can | drained |
| Canned tomato sauce | 2 cans, 4 oz each | |
| Jarred spaghetti sauce | 1 quart | any style, hot pepper or plain |
| Red wine | 1/4 cup | cooks off, adds depth |
| Spaghetti | 12 oz | broken in half so it fits the pot |
Method
- At home: heat the oil in a wide pot, add the cubed steak, onion, and garlic, and cook until no pink is left in the beef.
- Stir in the tomato sauce and olives, then the jar of spaghetti sauce and the wine. Simmer 15 minutes so the wine cooks off and the sauce tightens.
- Cool it fully, then spread it thin on dehydrator sheets or plastic wrap and dry until it lifts off as one leather with no wet spots. Tear it into pieces.
- Pack the leather in a quart freezer bag. Do this a week or less before the trip.
- In camp, morning of: pour just under a liter of cold water into the bag of leather, seal it, and let it sit in your pack all day.
- At dinner, boil water in the pot and cook the spaghetti until soft. Drain most of the water off.
- Tip the rehydrated sauce into the pot with the noodles, bring it back to a simmer, and stir until the sauce is hot and thick again.
Most freeze-dried pasta dinners are salt with tomato flavoring. This one is a real sauce cooked at home, dried flat, and reassembled in the backcountry. The dehydrator step is doing the heavy lifting: a pound of leather and dry noodles feeds two people who walked all day.
The soak matters more than the cook. Start the sauce rehydrating in the morning and by dinner it only needs heat, not time. Cook the noodles separately and drain them before the sauce goes in, or you end up with soup. Make the leather within a week of leaving, since there is fat in the beef and fat is what goes off first.
Packing
Sauce leather in one quart freezer bag, noodles in another. The leather bag doubles as the soak bag, so use a sturdy one and check the zipper before you trust it in your pack.
Variations
- Swap the sirloin for ground beef. It dries faster and rehydrates more evenly.
- Leave the beef out and the sauce is vegan, though you lose most of the protein.
- Instant polenta or couscous in place of spaghetti drops the cook time to a single boil.
https://camprecipes.com/classic-recipes/backpacker-spaghetti-that-tastes-great