I am researching meals cooked "ON" each of the seven summits. Would love some feedback. Here is one sample already:
http://www.summitpost.org/papas-fritas-con-rajas/678372

NO-BAKE SNO-CONE RECIPE:

Scoop up some snow. Pour Clif shot syrup over the top. Serve.

Actually, I'm trying to figure out what the OP means by "on" a mountain. Do you mean cuisine typical of the area?

Fortmental-you are a waste of time.If you have something productive to offer then do it- The potatoe recipe is a local thing on that large Argentina Mountain- I am not suggesting that anyone haul up 20lbs of taters or a 100Lb dutch oven. Your sarcasim is getting old dude.

I was working for a while near Cartenez Pyramid or Puncak Jaya. This was one of the local delicacies.


cuscus and diners by radson1, on Flickr

Good Lord.

I don't even know what that thing is.... it looks like a cross of a red panda, a sloth, and a monkey? What is it?

Penguin Omlette

2 penguin wings (hopefully minced)
3 eggs, separated
2 1/2 tablespoons milk
1 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1 large tomato, peeled and diced
1 green onion, sliced
1/4 teaspoon Bud Ice (chilled)
1/8 teaspoon, dillweed

Separate egg yolks from whites. First beat egg whites until stiff. In separate bowl, beat egg yolks until thick. Add in milk, salt and pepper into egg yolks, stirring stiffly. Fold egg yolk mix gently into egg white mix. Place skillet in oven pre-heated to 300°F. Coat bottom of skillet with butter. Pour omelet mix into skillet and bake until puffy and light brown. While baking, dice tomato, onion and penguin wings, and add with Bud Ice into sour cream. When omelet is ready, pour penguin mix into omelet. Fold omelet and remove from oven. Pour remainder of penguin mix over top of omelet.

tigerlilly wrote:Good Lord.

I don't even know what that thing is.... it looks like a cross of a red panda, a sloth, and a monkey? What is it?

A marsupial. Vegan Indonesians eat couscous instead of cuscus.

Yak steaks in Nepal.

I bet there are some totally legitimate recipes the OP could collect from people who waited in the towns before they made the treks to the last summits. Probably a lot are on the web, or can be inferred from descriptions of what people ate on the trips. A single recipe on a page is going to languish on SP.

Friends who came back from the Andes often had as many pictures of their meals as of the mountains!

MoapaPk wrote:I bet there are some totally legitimate recipes the OP could collect from people who waited in the towns before they made the treks to the last summits. Probably a lot are on the web, or can be inferred from descriptions of what people ate on the trips. A single recipe on a page is going to languish on SP.

Friends who came back from the Andes often had as many pictures of their meals as of the mountains!

I am using the information for my book

Cooked On Vinson:
- tin tuna and sliced/shredded cheese wrapped in a tortilla, heated in a pan until the cheese melts
- bread/scones for xmas lunch, just water+flour+baking soda+salt, warm with butter
- dehy mashed potatoes made up then mixed in a bowl with a sachet of sweet chilli salmon, then molded into patties and fried in a pan with butter
- make up couscous, add butter, salt, packet sundried tomatoes and tinned anchovies

Damien Gildea wrote:Cooked On Vinson:
- tin tuna and sliced/shredded cheese wrapped in a tortilla, heated in a pan until the cheese melts
- bread/scones for xmas lunch, just water+flour+baking soda+salt, warm with butter
- dehy mashed potatoes made up then mixed in a bowl with a sachet of sweet chilli salmon, then molded into patties and fried in a pan with butter
- make up couscous, add butter, salt, packet sundried tomatoes and tinned anchovies

Dude! Now I have got to use one of those recipes because there is no themed people in which to research for Vinson, not to mention those are great base camp recipes! So I will owe you money or name them after (hopefully the latter)???

Thanks Damien

No worries, though I don't think any of them are sufficiently original to have my name on them

Notes:
- with the tunacheesemelt wraps, watch the oily juice running out the bottom through your fingers on to your $800 sleeping bag
- the bread was actually made by my friend Steve Chaplin, and you had to leave the dough in a warm place for a while, not easy in Antarctica, but a warm corner of the tent heated by the sun did it
- the salmon potato cakes are great, but eaten with fingers straight out of the pan burn your f@#king tongue. These were the product of my imagination, but only because we'd run out of almost everything else, at the end, waiting to fly out. You can probably make much nicer version at home.
- the anchovies were the result of a craving I'd had the season before, but they're light and very tasty. Not for everybody, and not all the time.

I've noticed several comments "in the literature" about how appetising tinned sardines are at high altitude so the comments about tuna and anchovies don't surprise me.

DnD,

Yeh, it's something to do with craving salts and fats, but also variety, as expedition food in general can be pretty same-y. Altitude plays havoc with appetite in general, and most people don't eat much, but it's back down at base camp that the unusual tasty things get gobbled up. At BC for G1 a few years ago the sundried tomatoes, smoked mussels in bbq sauce and Vegemite did not last long.

In the case of longer expeditions, particularly polar trips, it's the things you can't have that often lure you - bananas, fresh milk, bread etc. When people get back from skiing to the Pole, one of the most popular meals requested was always bacon and eggs, regardless of time of day. On the other hand, I remember years ago being stuck at Vinson BC for several days, waiting to fly out, and in the beginning Mark Tucker of IMG had this great semi-cooked freeze-dried bacon of which the rest of us unguided peasants were jealous, but after a few days of that, as much as they could eat, they got sick of it pretty quick and Tuck couldn't give it away.

It took me a few trips to both the Karakoram/Himalaya and Antarctica to get my food right, sometimes ditching regular items and timings. For Antarctica, I factored in much more the use of soup, cheese and nuts before the main dinner course, whereas in the Karakoram I'm sick to death of bloody soup. Just remembering it makes me gag. For breakfast in Antarctica I'll usually have a packet of fruity/oaty type cookies - the Chilean version I use give around 450 Calories a packet. Great with a big mug of tea for breakfast and they can be opened and eaten while still deep in your sleeping bag, unlike cereal & milk etc. We never have 'lunch', just a constant supply of snacks. Chocolate in Antarctica is OK when you're moving all the time, but after a day or two in the tent you can't stand it - savoury snacks are better. Whereas in the Karakoram chocolate does not usually survive the heat of the approach, at least not in any recognisable form.

D