West Coast Trail: Exciting Food

Bringing the exact amount of food needed for the West Coast Trail can be tricky because it’s difficult to know beforehand how much food you’ll eat and if it will be exciting to eat it on the trail. The snacks and meals must satisfy a hiker without dedicating your entire pack to food weight. Here is a breakdown of the meals and snacks we brought and items we’d leave behind next time.

West Coast Trail Food We Thought of Bringing

Kris and I laid out our food on our kitchen table to see what meals and snacks we had for six nights and seven days for the two of us. The pictures below show what we brought individually.

Food Kris Planned on Bringing

Items Kris Planned on Bringing	Reason Why
muffins	The muffins sat well for Kris to eat for breakfast. Unfortunately, he got hungry quickly and they got squished after a couple of days. Tip: Eat what works for you, even though it might not be the recommended go-to food item.
2 hot chocolate packages	to warm up when cold in the rain
5 chocolate covered granola bars	he likes granola bars
2 chocolate chip CLIF bars	keeps him full for a long time
7 Honey Stinger organic chews	provides energy quickly that is fun to eat
1 Aero chocolate bar	a treat
1 big package of beef jerky	to eat for lunches
1 small package of beef jerky	additional jerky
1 bag of Crispers	to eat with his beef jerky
3 pre-packaged meals for supper	easy to prepare after a long day

My Planned Food

Items I planned on bringing	Reason Why
14 packages of oatmeal	2 packages to stay full until lunch
4 packages of hot chocolate and 4 cup-a-soup	cold mornings or warm up quickly in the rain
2 fish cracker packages	salty treat on the trail
20 sour candies	nice treat on the trail
1 pro granola bar	different bar to change things up
6 CLIF bars	fuels the body quickly
1 flavoured drink enhancer	makes our water flavourful
3 chocolate bars	treat
wraps + tuna package + pumpkin seeds + seaweed for lunch	filling and exciting West Coast Trail food
1 tube of tomato paste	to put on our wraps with cheese (makes a pizza)
7 Honey Stinger Organic Chews	provides energy quickly
1 hummus package	flavourful with crackers for lunch
1 package Rice Crackers	lunch
1 pudding package	exciting West Coast Trail food
3 homemade meals	suppers
1 pre-packaged meal	We needed one backup easy meal
1 bag beef jerky	add to the crackers for lunch
1 small bag of dried fruit	tasty on the trail
4 small bags of nut mixes	snack variety
1 small bag of almonds	filling to add to lunches
1 bag of Babybel cheese 1 small bag of fresh peas	keeps well in the plastic and it is filling juicy on the trail

West Coast Trail Food We Didn’t Bring

When weighing my pack full of West Coast Trail food and gear, it weighed forty-six pounds! I was falling backwards in my living room! That didn’t bode well for the strenuous West Coast Trail trip. We needed to trim some items. The items listed below in red are the eliminated items I left at home. It’s explained in the table below why they weren’t required for the trip. The items that don’t have an explanation were brought on the trail.

Items Brought	Reason Why I Didn’t Bring the Food
14 packages of oatmeal
3 packages (instead of 4) of hot chocolate and 4 cup-a-soup	lighten the load
2 fish cracker packages (eliminated)	it crumbled as I packed it
20 sour candies
1 pro granola bar
6 CLIF bars
1 flavoured drink enhancer (eliminated)	not necessary
3 chocolate bars (reduced to 1)	lighten the load
wraps + tuna package + pumpkin seed + seaweed for lunch
1 tube of tomato paste (eliminated)	too heavy
7 Honey Stinger Organic Chews	provides energy quickly
1 hummus package
1 small bag of dried fruit (eliminated)
1 pudding package (eliminated)	not necessary/too heavy
3 homemade meals
1 pre-packaged meal
1 bag jerky
4 small bags of nut mixes	too heavy
1 bag of baby Bel cheese 1 small bag of peas
1 small bag of almonds
1 bag of baby bel cheese 1 small bag of peas

Kris brought all the food he had initially planned.

West Coast Trail Food for Snacks

Below is the food we brought for snacks.

Kris’ Snacks

To keep us energized, Kris and I ate one Honey Stinger organic chew per day. We brought a chocolate bar to reward ourselves and eat it on a difficult day. We forgot about it and ate it one day to lose weight. It didn’t quite work out as planned. Kris ended up eating his when we finished the trail. He ran out of granola bars and grabbed some from my parent’s stash (they were happy to get rid of some weight)!

Tip: Keep the chocolate bar for the end of the trail as a reward for when you’re done backpacking.

Chelsea’s Snacks

The red thumbs-up and the backward red L are snacks I brought. As mentioned above, I reduced my three chocolate bars to one to reduce the load and I didn’t think I would eat that many on the trail. Sour candy was recommended as a backpacking snack to keep things interesting. It was nice to have a different taste on the trail but I could have brought five of them and that would have been sufficient instead of a whole bag when I also had the Organic Chews that provided me with more energy. I thought bringing different nut mixtures would keep my palate interested in the snacks. I never had enough appetite to eat all my nut mixtures.

Tip: One or two nut mixtures are sufficient for a one-week backpacking trip as you won’t eat many and they are heavy to carry.

Easy Breakfast

The Clif bars were useful when we had to wake up at 5 a.m. and leave the campsite by 7 a.m. It provided a quick breakfast without wasting time preparing an oatmeal breakfast and cleaning up.

Lunch

Almonds are filling to eat and add extra protein for lunch as long as you eat them. Otherwise, it adds more weight. I won’t bring them next time.

West Coast Trail Food for Suppers

Here are the different meals we had for supper.

First Supper

Our first meal was dehydrated chicken, corn, green beans and peas with lemon spinach couscous (spices integrated into the mix). It was a delicious easy option. The dehydrated items were rehydrated in a water bottle while backpacking. Doing it this way added a lot of weight. I don’t recommend rehydrating in a bottle while you’re backpacking.

Tip: Rehydrate your dehydrated veggies and chicken in a pot of boiling water with the lid on and set aside for half an hour. Add the couscous to the boiling water and let it sit for five minutes until the couscous is fluffy to eat. Mix and serve. If there is excess water, you can leave it for additional liquid intake as you’ll likely be dehydrated.

Second, Fourth and Fifth Suppers

We had a pre-packaged meal these nights. Boil the recommended water amount and add it to the package, wait twenty minutes, mix the ingredients and serve.

We used these packages when we didn’t want to spend a lot of time cooking and we were hungry immediately.

I didn’t find the meals super exciting and tasty but they did their job and filled us up.

Tip: Sometimes you must wait longer than twenty minutes to ensure your rice isn’t crunchy.

Third Supper

Our third supper was one that Scott, my brother and Catherne prepared us as a Christmas gift. It was an excellent, practical and delicious gift. It’s called Polenta Cheese Stew. We had to add parmesan cheese to the mixture to make it nice and cheesy. It took longer to cook but felt well deserved after a ten-hour day of backpacking. The third picture shows the dehydrated meal and the fourth picture shows it cooked.

Tip: When you have a cheese meal, constantly mix the ingredients in the pot, otherwise it will stick to the bottom (as we found out)!

Lunch (Day 5)

We ate a piece of halibut, margarine, and a baked potato. It cost us $37 each. We stopped at the Crab Shack on day five to eat this delicious meal. The fish is freshly caught and the meal is cooked upon arrival. They have crab available for $40. The prices are expensive but they cater to West Coast Trail backpackers and when you’re in the middle of nowhere and someone is willing to cook food for you, most people stop to eat this treat. They also have chips, pop, water, Gatorade, and banana bread, amongst other things. We spent $88 on our meal and snacks but it was worth it! Dwayne and Carl, who run the place are very friendly and chatty. We talked to them while waiting for our food.

Tip #1: Bring lots of cash for a meal and snacks.

Tips #2: We spent two hours at the Crab Shack including waiting for our food to be ready and eat it. The staff started cooking when enough people arrived. Plan accordingly to give yourself enough time to eat and finish the hike before nightfall.

Sixth Supper

Uncle Ben’s rice (spices included in the mixture) makes an easy grain to eat. We added dehydrated chicken, carrots, green beans and corn to make a healthy easy meal to cook. We boiled the water and rice. Once it is boiling, reduce the heat and cook the meal with the dehydrated ingredients for twenty minutes stirring occasionally until everything is rehydrated. We mixed everything and served it in bowls.

This is the rice, veggies and chicken meal cooked. It was delicious and filling.

Seventh Supper

We brought an additional supper in case we were slower at hiking one day and camped an extra night and required an extra supper. On the West Coast Trail, you don’t want to miss out on food! It’s better to bring an extra one in case of an emergency than run out and be in trouble.

West Coast Trail Food We Should NOT Have Brought

After we backpacked the trail, we knew additional items we should have left at home.

Items I Brought	Reason Why I Should Not Have Brought It
14 packages of oatmeal
2 packages of hot chocolate and 4 packages of cup-a-soup	I should have left 2 cup-a-soup packages at home to lighten the load
2 fish cracker packages (eliminated)
20 sour candies	I should only have brought a couple (organic chews gave me energy)
1 pro granola bar
6 CLIF bars
1 flavoured drink syrup (eliminated)
3 chocolate bars (reduced to 1)
wraps + tuna package + pumpkin seed + seaweed for lunch	Seaweed – got oily after a while, not pleasant to eat
1 tube of tomato paste (eliminated)
7 Honey Stinger Organic Chews
1 Hummus package	I didn’t eat it
1 package Rice Crackers
1 pudding package (eliminated)
3 homemade meals
1 pre-packaged meal
1 bag jerky
4 small bags of nut mixes
4 small bags nut mixes	I should only have brought half (2 bags)
1 small bag of almonds	Not necessary, I didn’t eat many
1 bag of Babybel cheese 1 small bag of fresh peas	I should have brought half of them (6 only). Kris only ate one.

Items Kris Brought

Items Kris Brought	Reason Why He Should Not Have Brought It
muffins
2 hot chocolate packages	He never drank them
5 chocolate covered granola bars	He didn’t eat it until he had finished the trail
2 chocolate chip CLIF bars	He ran out (he took some extra from my parents)
7 Honey Stinger organic chews
1 Aero chocolate bar	He didn’t eat it until he had finished the trail
1 big package of beef jerky	The jerky started to go bad before he could eat it all. It’s only supposed to be open to the air for three days.
1 small package of beef jerky	He suggested two of these instead. The jerky will last longer unopened.
1 bag of Crispers
3 pre-packaged meals for supper

West Coast Trail Food That Was Fantastic to Bring

• Clif bars: These made for a quick breakfast when we had an early 7 a.m. start and didn’t want to cook.
• Fresh peas: Juicy and nice to have fresh veggies on the trail

Final Thoughts

This West Coast Trail Exciting Food guide gives you an overview of what we thought we’d bring. We changed our minds and revised the food. We updated it again once we had completed the trail to know for next time. It’s acceptable to constantly amend your food plan. We learn by trying over and over again. I find it’s easier to revise your food menu after you’re done with the trip than try to remember before you’re next trip what you didn’t need.

The home-prepared meals we brought were fantastic. I would have preferred more home-cooked meals but it made Kris happy so we compromised to both be content. It also takes time to make home-cooked meals, Kris didn’t have the time to prep them. Sometimes you need to do what works for you. I would suggest being careful not to bring too many snacks. Often you won’t be as hungry as you think. Fewer nuts and more bars. Bring the essentials and have fun!

Additional Links

• Ultimate WCT Packing List
• 2023 West Coast Trail Tips
• Stay Positive Backpacking in the Rain
• Backpacking Poboktan Trail Successfully
• Guide to Winter Backpacking Into Jacques Lake Hut