BEST Backpacking Meals?: Green Belly Review

I’m always on the lookout for the best backpacking meals I can find. Generally, I want something healthy, as I try to eat healthy at home (low carb, quality “real” food). However, I’m also realistic. I’m only on-trail for a few days and more than anything, I just want enough calories to keep me going. I also want to reduce the weight of my food as much as possible.

Last year for my AT section hike, I decided to try Green Belly Ready To Eat meals.

Green Belly uses whole foods to create convenient, high calorie, nutritional, ready-to-eat stoveless meals for backpacking. Basically, it’s two bars of nuts, chocolate, and fruit in a single 400-600 calorie meal (not a snack).

Why Green Belly Meals?

I almost always pack way too much food. I’m just afraid I won’t have enough to eat. Green Belly makes that process very easy. I know exactly how many calories are in each meal. Theoretically, you have 3 Green Belly meals per day. With a minimum of 400 calories each and mine were more like 650 calories, I was close to 1,900 calories, just from Green Belly. I also packed Carnation instant breakfast to flavor my morning cold coffee (I went stoveless) and I was over 2,000 calories per day. I bought Green Belly’s 15 meal variety pack for a 5 day trip. 3 backpacking meals per day for 5 days. Perfect!

Second, I didn’t have to pack a stove. The meals are ready-to-eat right out of the package. No cooking necessary. The stove brings a lot of complication to a backpacking trip. Do I have enough fuel? Did I pack the stove, a lighter, my pot, or the spork? You don’t need to remember or carry any of these things with Green Belly.

Green Belly Concerns

Before leaving for the trip, I was a little nervous about a couple things.

1. I was a little nervous that this wouldn’t fill me up. I know I could see the calories, but these are just bars. It’s a snack, right? Surely, these won’t fill me up for all 5 days.
2. Am I going to like the flavors? They come in 5 flavors: Spiced Caramel Apple, Mango Cashew Coconut, Dark Chocolate Banana, Cranberry Almond, and Peanut Apricot. Will I get tired of eating these 5 flavors and just bars?
3. I was going stoveless with these backpacking meals. This meant no hot coffee in the morning. Was that going to be an issue?

Ultimately, I decided that it’s only a 5 day backpacking trip. I can survive anything for 5 days. 1,900 calories is more than enough to sustain me. I wasn’t going to starve. I may be a little uncomfortable, but I wouldn’t die.

Addressing My Concerns

So, what did I do to address my concerns?

1. I added a few single serve Spam packets to my food. These are very lightweight and quite a few calories. This is one of my favorite backcountry meals/snacks, so I knew I’d like them and they’d provide some extra calories without a bunch of extra weight.
2. I usually drink my coffee black….when it’s hot. Knowing I wouldn’t bring my stove on the trip, I had to find a way to get my cold, instant coffee down in the morning. I didn’t want to go through caffeine withdrawals on the trail, so I had to have coffee. To satisfy this need, I added Carnation Breakfast Essentials (Instant Breakfast) to my pack. Not only did this make the cold, instant coffee bearable (barely), it gave me a few extra calories in the morning.
3. Flavors? Well, I figured I was just going to have to suck it up and be bored with the flavors, if I didn’t like them or got tired of them.

Green Belly Backpacking Meals Review

So, how did it work out?

Well, on the first night of the hike, I ate all my extra Spam singles.

“WOW! You must have been super hungry!”

Nope. It was the opposite. After eating only the Green Belly meals all day, I wasn’t hungry. I didn’t want to carry the extra food for the next few days, so I just ate my Spam to get it out of the pack. My primary concern was addressed in the first day.

The Carnation Breakfast Essentials did help the cold, instant coffee, but not much. It got me my caffeine for the day, but that’s about it. I didn’t even use the whole packet, each day. So, I didn’t need the extra calories, but it did make the caffeine delivery system bearable.

As for getting tired of the flavors, it was never an issue. I loved them all. I didn’t even have to “pick” a favorite for each meal, instead I just reached into my food bag and whatever came out was breakfast, lunch, or dinner. They were all GREAT! In fact, I could have kept eating them for many more days, if I was on a longer backpacking trip.

By the end of the trip, I was looking forward to a hot meal. This was far from necessary, though. It was a nice reward for completing the trail, but I could have gone much longer without a hot meal.

Green Belly Conclusions

I loved this option for backpacking meals. I will probably also use these for my hunting trips, especially for those all day sits in the blind. They’re quiet, filling, and flavorful.

They’re also very cost effective. The 15 day pack costs a little over $100 and average $7.67 per meal. This is less than I spend on Mountain House and because I’m not over-packing my food, they cost less than when I just try to create my own menu for a trip.

Pretty sure these will become my regular backpacking meal option going forward.