Food Reviews, Desolation Wilderness trip: Organic Spuds w/Spinach & Cheese from MaryJane's Farm, Southwest Black Bean and Corn Salad from Packit Gourmet

A vivid blue gradient and a paintbrush-swipe of clouds just before the top of the Crystal Range. At this point, the terrain on the other side is a mystery. Just like the mystery that is dinner.

I was raised on mashed potato flakes. In fact, I think I preferred them to real mashed potatoes for a while. I'd have mashed potatoes with ketchup and fantasize about the french fries I was almost never allowed to have. I remember my grandfather, a self-proclaimed "gourmand" bitching to my parents at the Thanksgiving dinner table about me putting ketchup on his homemade mashed potatoes, shaking his head. I also remember buying the cup-o-mashed potato cups all throughout middle school. I'd rehydrate them with less water than recommended and somehow I really enjoyed the kinda crusty, kinda dense, concentrated flavor, not fully rehydrated quality of the whole thing. Anyway...given all this backstory, it's no surprise I really liked the MJF potatoes. And Dennis, who I didn't expect to like them, was enthusiastic too. "Getting back to my Scottish roots," he said.


The salad kind of freaked us both out. Black beans, corn, peppers and tomato: okay, typical. But asparagus and sliced black olives were a wild card. The freeze dried ingredients came with a packet of red pepper dressing, malt vinegar and olive oil. Options were provided for cold and hot prep. I opted for hot prep because I didn't have an hour and a half to spare. It was....surprisingly good! I didn't taste the asparagus at all, it tasted like corn, black beans, olives, and red pepper, deliciously tangy and vinegary. All in all, a very enjoyable salad.

Together, these dishes stuffed two adults who had samosas 4 hours previously for lunch.

Cut off the top to eat more easily. Crunch crunch!

Organic Spuds with Spinach and Cheese from MaryJane's Farm

Flavor, Nina: 9/10

Flavor, Dennis: 9.5/10

Ease at camp: 10/10

Price: $6.50 for Farmhouse (double) serving
Would buy again: Yes

Best for: a side dish

Praise: no specific praise- just very delicious. Would go very well with a nice beefy-style veggie stew.

Criticism: the same criticisms that accompany flaked potatoes. Tastes like mashed potato flakes which is good or bad, depending on your preferences.

Southwest Black Bean and Corn Salad

Flavor, Nina: 8/10

Flavor, Dennis: 8/10

Ease at camp: 10/10

Price: $6.99
Would buy again: Yes

Best for: a generous side dish

Praise: a tangy and refreshing salad, well seasoned (maybe too salty for some)

Criticism: takes a while to rehydrate, pretty one dimensional flavor, chips for topping are unsalted/bland/slightly stale, so we used leftover chip crumbs from our happy hour meal.

Notes:
None really! I'd eat both of these again and not really change anything. I don't feel like I could replicate the black bean and corn salad or improve it without a freeze dryer of my own. The salad was also comprised primarily of organic ingredients which is a nice bonus. The spuds didn't taste too much of cheese or spinach, but they were rich and delicious, if a little bit pasty.

Rehydrating slowly, the beans take a while.

Kinda mooshy, but a good, varied texture and lots of flavor. Generously seasoned.

Sorry! Didn't get a good picture of the mashed potatoes. But really, potato flake mashed potatoes all look the same. It's basically a spoon full of pale yellow globs. Yum!