 whoa look at all this good food get in my belly I get questions all the time about what types of food do I bring on my bike packing trips well I'll keep it simple beans lots and lots of beans you know what time it is burrito time frijoles beans frijoles beanie goodness bean time I give you the sunset burrito oh John I have our beans first off I am not a nutritionist but I know what I need to fuel my body everybody's body is different and your nutritional needs are different so take what I say with a grain of salt but this definitely works for me I've been going on bike packing adventures for about 15 years now some month-long adventures where I am able to find this type of food and keep my body going and going and going I am a vegetarian I've been a vegetarian for 17 years and I've been just fine doing ultra endurance events I get plenty of protein people always asking about protein what about protein no you can only get that meat right no you can get protein and just about everything especially vegetables it is hard I will say to keep a healthy diet while you're on the road and why is that well when your bike touring a lot of times you're on roads or near highways and what's out there gas stations and you're stuck with gas station food it works it's not ideal but it certainly tastes good I love junk food after a long day of riding my bike but I do try to put some nutrition into my body that's not ice cream or Snickers nothing like ice cream on a hot day when I'm out there on a bike packing trip I'm usually on my bike for about eight hours a day pedaling pedaling pedaling and depending on the terrain and how hot it is and other factors you're burning a ton of calories I would say anywhere between three and five thousand calories a day and you need to fill yourself back up this is your gasolina if you want to wake up the next day and have energy you need to be eating lots of food and so now we're going to go through all the things that I always have on my bike at any time peanut buttery goodness if you watch my videos you know that I love frijoles beans bean burritos Mexican food I love it all so I always have a pack of tortillas on my bike and tortillas are great because you could fold them and they don't get all smushed up like a loaf of bread does and they last pretty long so I always have a bag of tortillas and of course I always have a couple cans of beans and these beans are great refried ones you can just like open up the can with a little Leatherman or a can opener spread them on your tortilla and I get this question a lot they're like how do you deal with the leftover beans in the can Ryan when you're done with a meal well I eat the whole can every time I open up a can of beans again you're hungry out there you're gonna eat everything you can if you want to jazz up your burrito of course you need a giant bottle of Valentina hot sauce right this is pretty big actually I would never bring this on a bike packing trip it's a little bit too big how about one like this a little bit smaller if you have access to diced green chilies from Hatch New Mexico these are really good sometimes you want to put cheese on your burrito this is actually vegan cheese it's pretty much not available anywhere except for hippie towns like Boulder definitely not in gas stations and you can jazz up your burritos with all that good stuff oh and sometimes an avocado but you're really only gonna have access to avocados when you go to a grocery store gas stations aren't gonna have this kind of stuff but gas stations will have bananas every now and then you know it's like the food that's always right near the cash register and they look really old there's like apples and bananas sometimes and they're very expensive but you know like I said I try to eat healthy although it's very hard sometimes when you're just starving and and tired and you just want ice cream or a candy bar and you're like um yeah I don't think I want a banana but these are really good potassium is great for helping with muscle cramps banana see I do eat healthy and yes I can eat bean burritos for lunch and dinner for day after day after day after day I don't get sick of it I lived in Honduras for two years in the Peace Corps and I love my beans so I know a lot of you think it's ridiculous to eat the same food over and over and over and over but I like it and it works it's great nutrition you get a lot of protein in the beans you got some carbohydrates in your tortillas speaking of tortillas these are also great for breakfast wraps you know I like to put in these sometimes peanut butter and jelly you can also get Nutella this is kind of the hippie version of Nutella you can also put honey in there and maybe even some raisins you know what I'm saying and you just spread it in there and make yourself a nice little breakfast wrap that is pretty healthy except for the Nutella that's not really healthy but if you're using honey and peanut butter and fruits you're pretty good oh man look at that that's the breakfast champions right there this is very important and I forgot to mention it earlier but I do not bring a stove on my trips I barely use the stove that I have in my own house and the reason is I don't drink coffee in the mornings and I just can't be bothered to heat stuff up it's just easy enough to open up a can of beans and put it on my tortillas I will say that I do eat out quite a bit when I'm on bike tours I go to restaurants for breakfast and dinner and that's where I get my hot meals how you feeling Ryan I feel great mainly because I just ate a whole plate of beans you need to be careful though it's so easy to walk in and just buy an awesome plate of food but that will skyrocket your expenses really quickly this is the happiest I've been in a long time I have been dreaming about these beans let's talk about snacks shall we I know we all love snacks that's what humans do we love to snack right and I probably get most of my calories throughout the day just eating energy bars and stuff and so I always have tons of cliff bars just hidden in all the crevices of my bag so I always have an emergency ration when I need it and I know people get sick of these and for good reason they can be hard to put down at times so it's smart sometimes to buy a variety of flavors so you don't totally just want to vomit every time you pull one of these out of your bags I think it's one of my last cliff bars filled with hazelnut butter oh f*** not filled with dirt there's about 250 calories in any given energy bar and that's a lot that's a that's a quick amount of energy to scarf it down and you're good I also love these type of things these energy blocks these taste like candy after a long day you're hot it's just nice to have some of this a lot of these have salt in them which is really really important you need to keep your salt levels up otherwise you're just going to sweat out all the hydration that you're putting into your body what else do I have for snacks sometimes I do nuts almonds lots of protein in these bad boys and I also love whenever I have the opportunity to buy fig newtons they're so good and soft they just melt in your mouth and they're somewhat healthy somewhat I would say all of this food is somewhat healthy so where does all this food fit on your bike and that's a very good question and I usually have trouble figuring out every time I get ready for a bike packing trip I've been doing this for a long time and I still have trouble fitting all this stuff because it's not just this you have all your camping gear you have your clothes you have your cameras and batteries and other random things you find along the trail so fitting all this can be an issue and if you're bike touring in an area where you know that you can resupply every 50 miles you really don't need to pack a ton of food at one time but if you're somewhere remote and you have days between resupply then you definitely need to pack a lot of food so you're not caught in the middle of nowhere with nothing but these I mean you would survive but it would be gross welcome to my living room slash bike garage I just wanted to show you where I put some of my food this is my snack bag right up here on the handlebars I'm sure all of you have something similar you want your snacks to be easy to get while you're on the bike you don't want to fish through you know a bag and it's your cliff bars are at the very bottom that's a total bummer you want to easy to access and so that's where I put all my snacks you'd be surprised you can probably fit about 15 cliff bars in one of those little bags and most of my other food goes in the frame bag I like to keep my weight centered on the bike and let's give you more control to have your weight here rather than on the handlebars or or weigh in the back so this is where all the beans and the tortillas and other things go if you have fresh fruit obviously that's harder to pack because you know it's gonna get smashed around on your bike while it jiggles around so bananas apples and stuff like that you want to pack in some sort of clothing maybe near your sleeping bag I usually keep bananas not this many at a time but just on my rear rack or when I buy those types of foods I eat them right away because I'll be honest I've definitely smashed my fair share of fruits and vegetables that avocado looks pretty gnarly still gonna eat it still good while we're near the bike the beautiful priority 600x ding let's talk about hydration this is paramount to a successful adventure I made an entire video about hydration that I will link below but in general you need to drink a lot of water again your body is working super hard and water is vital to digestion and circulation and everything so make room for lots of water bottles on your bike if you want to get jazzy you can put those little sports salt pills in there and that will help you retain more of the water that you're drinking now listen up this might be the best tip I give you in this entire video pack a butter knife yes butter knife and you might be thinking well that's kind of dumb I'll have a Leatherman or a pocket knife with me I'll just use that when I need to spread peanut butter but the problem with that is those knives are really short and by the end of the peanut butter you're digging in there and you get peanut butter all over your knuckles and you're gunking up your good Leatherman this is so much better butter knife for the win it works great for Nutella peanut butter beans whatever you got and it's metal it's not gonna like break like cheap plastic stuff don't forget this whoa what is this this here is a gourmet breakfast crepe it is Nutella and peanut butter and bananas and it is for you all right that is pretty much it remember when you're on a bike packing trip you're burning tons of calories your body's working overtime and you need to refill all those calories with some nutrients think about it this way if you're on a road trip you wouldn't fill your car full of cheap crappy gasoline right you want the best for your car well you want the best for your body as well because you want to keep going day after day after day and that junk food will definitely catch up to you I can speak from experience I think I might throw up I've eaten seven pancakes today in a Mountain Dew it is hard it's tricky gas stations don't offer a lot of great options but it can be done one way to do it is to send yourself food ahead of time I've actually never done this but I definitely know people who have and that will guarantee you a way to have the right foods that you know that your body loves it can be a little tricky because you don't know exactly when you're gonna be somewhere and maybe the package is late but through hikers do this all the time and bike pack packers can too so thank you so much for watching this video if you found it informative please click the like button and subscribe and tell all your friends and weird uncles and aunts to subscribe to my YouTube channel and stay tuned for more adventures with beans yummy gourmet burrito made by the burrito master