I know I could just try this but I'd be an expensive experiment if it didn't work.

I've been using Expedition foods dehydrated meals and really like them. They say on the pack that you can use cold water but it takes longer. Any experience of this and any recommendations for brands/meals that work well like this?

I'm trying to practice becoming an ultralight, hardcore endurance racer. It's not going well

IME anything will rehydrate if you leave it long enough but
1) certain parts will rehydrate quickly and certain parts will take time[ due to different sizes]- so some bits may be "crunchy and some may be mushy so you are playing these two off against each other
2) Think deeply about what instant meal you really want to eat cold and a mixture of mush and crunchy


I will do [flavoured] cous cous this way but that is it for me personally

I'm trying to practice becoming an ultralight, hardcore endurance racer.

In practice, most will eat real food and lots of it. One of the skills of being a hardcore endurance racer is knowing where to buy it

I really am with norm on this one - One night to save a few hunderd grams of stove etc may be worth it but three days of cold mushy/crunchy food is not that high up my wish list - and you could just stop and but stuff,
Miminlaism is great but IMHO you still need enough to make it nearer to comfortable rather than nearer to just able to avoid death/pure survivalism. then again i may just be being soft

YMMV

There was a lengthy thread on this a few years ago. I think the recommended way was to shove the packet down your top so it warms up to body temperature, this being marginally more palatable than at burn water temperature.....

I must say that for me its one step of TLS too far and the benefit of a stove (200g's for full set up mind) is you can also make a brew.

The advantage of dehydrated food is it's lighter as the water's taken out. If you have to carry it with the water added back in for hours whist it rehydrates then that sort of defeats the point.

I'd prefer to eat pork pies than cold rehydrated curry.

When racing I don't take a stove. I'm happy to eat cold food for up to 36 hrs. On a longer event I'll try to get hot food, even if that's just a ginsters heated in the microwave at a petrol station. It's just calories so doesn't make much difference what it is but when soaked to the skin and shivering something hot does help lift the spirits.

I landed in Spain late on the last day of April not realising May Day, even if not a Monday, was a national holiday. So I set off around the Bosques del Sud with no cylinder for my stove. After 3 days of crunchy expedition meals I headed to a town and bought a stove. Yes I kept moving, yes I got calories but no it wasn't fun.

New stove blocked immediately to make things worse but then I discovered a tooth brush bristle is a fine tool to clear a jet.


Dave

I make my own "overnight oats" for breakfast. I use oats with powdered milk and some dried fruit, add water and leave for 2-3 hours or overnight to absorb the water then eat it cold. If when you come to eat it you find it's a bit stodgy then just add a bit more water. Much nicer than porridge in my opinion and no cooking. Just make sure the slugs can't get at it.

that is called Bircher Muesli and I do the same - but a cold breakfast is hardly uncommon

If you have to carry it with the water added back in for hours whist it rehydrates then that sort of defeats the point.

Fairly confident there is no weight saving between carrying it in your belly instead of on it