The Hiker's Home Office doesn't actually have a "test kitchen" per se, so there are times when a meal gets put together that may have been tweaked in some way, used new or different ingredients, or was otherwise modified without actually being sampled before being included in a resupply.
Guinea pig: Pork Rind.
Normally, this is not a big deal. For one thing, hiker's tend to be very hungry at the end of the day, and hungry people tend to be less picky about things. But I want the meals I send out to be better than "okay." I want them to be "really good!" I rely on Jamie to provide feedback about the meals that includes actionable points:
"Needs more salt." - Jamie, always
"Too much volume." - Jamie, rarely
"Too much/too little spice, heat, meat, rice, pasta, etc." - Jamie, sometimes
I try not to take it personally. Since I usually use an existing recipe as the springboard for everything I put together, and I'm fairly confident in my "chefiness," it's unusual to find that something I made a conscious decision about didn't work. (Roll eyes now.) But it has happened.
When Jamie, came home for his 2-week break from the trail recently, he mentioned that the rice noodles I was using in the Thai Peanut Chicken recipe weren't hydrating well. He was even forthright enough to say they were actually CRUNCHY. I have to say... I was shocked! Shocked, I tell you! NO ONE wants a crunchy rice noodle at the end of a long hike.
I specifically chose those noodles because I expected them to hydrate well! They were super thin, and super authentic. I have made enough dishes with rice noodles to know that they can get soggy if cooked or soaked too long, so this was quite a surprise. So much so that I didn't believe it was true.
Consequently, the new and improved Hiker's Home Office Test Kitchen sprang into action and did a little comparison of rice noodles. Now, I am not going to overstate how extensive this test was. I actually only had two different brands of noodles:
the original/CRUNCHY brand
and another one I'd picked up for a Pad Thai I was planning to put together.
It is at this point where one might ask if I know that Thailand and Viet Nam are different.
I do... So why am I using "vietnamese rice noodles" for Thai dishes?
Who knows. Rice noodles are rice noodles? I mean, the ingredients are basically "rice, tapioca starch, water, salt" so it's hard to imagine vastly different characteristics. All I can say is that there really are A LOT of different rice noodles and there is only so long that I will stand in the Great Wall market looking like an idiot. (Although, it was a lot longer than I would like!)
So decisions were made to maximize utility of individual ingredients, economize on cost, packaging considerations, and the like. After all, the Hiker's Home Office is no high budget culinary outfit like Bon Appetit or Cooks Illustrated! So really, there's no need to keep you in suspense...
Jamie was right.
The first noodles did not hydrate well. But, I'm happy to say, the second ones did - perfectly. Live and learn.
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