Travelling while doing RAF

[TylerDurden]

I do a Q&A re rawpalaeo elsewhere, and someone(a musician)  asked me how to stay mostly raw(85%) while traveling on tour. I've given the best answer I could, but am curious to find out what other members' practices are when they travel abroad (ie what raw meats do they bring, how they store them(re drying etc.) what processed foods are they prepared to consume, if at all etc.

[goodsamaritan]

I would bring my own fresh meat in my bag and put it in the ref of the hotel room. 

First thing I look for is where is the public wet market.  Check out the local raw paleo offers.  Buy local, eat local.

[van]

vaccum sealed meats and fat keep really well.  I also, and not just for traveling, scoop out the marrow and put it in plastic containers with good lids.  The trick is to pack it hard to express the air. It then keeps well refrigerated.  Three or four brown bags inside each other with a frozen pint of water keeps it all cold in my suitcase when flying till I get to my room with a fridge or minibar.   But I do like eating meats from different places, like when I went to Slovenia this last summer.

[JaX]

I would say you need to do two things. Prepare and Locate.

Prepare some food to bring on the trip.. If you are going by plane then bring some leafy greens with meat mixed together (raw salad), maybe some fruits, nuts, sushi or sashimi rolls (which you can actually make with raw meat and it will look like raw fish), and, if you are really creative: make a raw sandwich (get a raw bread substitute made from raw dried fruit or something else raw, fill with what you want) and have some coconut oil ready for when you arrive to your destination. Have a big fatty meal with no carbohydrates before you travel. If you are going to a place where you know there isn't any good food source around, then you need to pack more food and prepare it by drying, like making pemmican, which I don't have experience with.

How much food you prepare before you travel to bring with you depends on how well you Locate..

This brings me to the next point: locating. Locate, before you travel, where the nearest supermarket, butcher, farm, health-food store or restaurant (like sushi place) is. If you are staying at hotel, make sure you have a fridge in your room. If you can, choose a hotel that is close to what you know you'll need..

Your best bet is to be low carb on the trip, so you are not hungry all the (eating fruits  will only cause MORE hunger and cravings imo). Staying low carb, high in fats and protein, will also make it possible for you to have only 2 meals per day so you don't have to worry about food the rest of the day.

Most big cities have health food stores though

[Raw Kyle]

I'm going to St. Kitts on the 29th and plan on bringing pemmican and jerky, possibly something for the plane ride, and then eating what they have to offer there which is probably a lot of seafood and some tropical fruits.

[JaX]

maybe this topic of traveling raw paleo deserves a sticky Tyler? Like with instructions on how to make raw pemmican, dry meat.. and other creative ideas on what to do when traveling

[TylerDurden]

Well, I know nothing about preparing/drying meats, I suppose I'll have to use Lex's instructions and wait for others to make further suggestions.


Pemmican isn't raw so it's not worth recommending.

[William]

Pemmican isn't raw so it's not worth recommending.

Pemmican as I make it is raw meat mixed with rendered fat + dried seawater. Heating the fat has no effect on health, it still qualifies as raw paleo.

[TylerDurden]

Pemmican as I make it is raw meat mixed with rendered fat + dried seawater. Heating the fat has no effect on health, it still qualifies as raw paleo.

As I pointed out on the other forum, heating fats creates toxins in large amounts(re creation of advanced glycation endproducts) so it DOES have a decidedly negative effect on health. And pemmican isn't rawpalaeo.

[William]

As Im pointed out on the other forum, heating fats creates toxins in large amounts(re creation of advanced glycation endproducts) so it DOES have a decidedly negative effect on health. And pemmican isn't rawpalaeo.

Not.
The junk scientists studied non-foods containing "lipids"; the word suet or hide fat is not found in the article you quoted elsewhere.

Pemmican is the only practical way that I can do high fat. It is not reported to have caused ill health.

The reason we do a raw paleo diet is healthy life; pemmican fits.

If you know of a practical alternative, please advise.

[TylerDurden]

They were studying fats in general. Butter was shown to be extremely harmful when heated, re its very high content of AGEs.

I find it difficult to believe that it's impossible to get hold of raw fats. I mean, even if one lives a 1000 miles away from the nearest farmers' market/grassfed -meat-butcher etc., it's still possible to order raw fats(well OK, usually prefrozen fats) via direct delivery from farms. It doesn't even have to be a farm from one's own State/region as the containers are filled with ice-packs etc.

And Pemmican was never meant as a health-food, it was just meant to be used as travel-rations to tide one by.

[Raw Kyle]

About pemmican for traveling, it's true that you can probably get raw fats anywhere, but there is a difference between being able to obtain it somewhere and being able to obtain it while traveling there. If I lived in India I might be able to track down some way of getting suet or whatever shipped in once in a while, but do you really think you could get that together while doing a train trip across the country? Maybe if you're super rich and have one of those hired people who spends all day tracking stuff down for you. Not just all day while you're there, but also does pre-planning, because I believe in some places you will not be able to find the foods you want even if you spend all day on it, it would require substantial planning and substantial expense before the trip even began.

[yon yonson]

so im thinking about planning a trip to costa rica this summer and was wondering if anyone has been there while doing RAF? i've read that they have amazing beef and pretty much all of it is grass fed. seafood should be easy to get too. i'd probably bring some pemmican though, just in case.

[Raw Kyle]

I tried a failed once. The reason I failed was that my first pemmican making attempt was unsuccessful. So I ended up going to St. Kitts for a week with only a big bag of jerky that I shared with my girlfriend. What I tried to do was not eat much during the day, some jerky until it ran out or nothing at all, and then eat a "normal" meal at night. I figure the carbs and everything will burn off better in intermittent fasting conditions, and I tried to be at least a little active there (swimming and walking mostly). I felt ok, pretty good actually, the only thing that got me was what always gets me when I eat too much spicy food and get cramps the next day. I love spicy food!

But ya, now that I know how to make pemmican better I would bring enough pemmican to last me, and supplement that with some beef and maybe even fish jerky for little snacks and variety. And if you're going some place where you can get some good fresh food for further supplementation, even better.

[lex_rooker]

If you try pemmican as your primary food source, you'll need at least one pound per day, or about 16 oz.  That would supply about 2,900 calories per day, which for a young person is about the minimum.  There is a guy on the Zero Carb forum that eats nothing but pemmican (his whole family only eats pemmican as well and has for over 4 years - small childern included), and he finds he needs about 20 oz (1 1/4 lb) per day to feel completely satisfied and he's in his late 30s or early 40s I believe.  One and one quarter pounds of pemmican made with equal weights of dehydrated meat and rendered fat is about 3,600 calories.

I'm older at 58 so can do with a bit less.  I'll be away from home at a training class starting this Friday and continuming through the following week and will be relying on pemmican as my only food for the entire trip.  I'll be taking enough pemmican for at least one pound per day and maybe a bit more as I'm sure people in the class will be curious and want samples.  It's not RAF but far more attractive than the rather hefty cost of eating out and then not knowing what you are getting.  On a previous trip I tried eating the eggs, bacon, sausage, and other cooked but paleo friendly foods in the breakfast buffet and got severe edema for my trouble. 

I would supose that Costa Rican Beef would certainly be acceptable and if I were going there I'd plan on finding a good meat market and making that my primary food source.  I guess it boils down to how much weight you wish to carry with you, a fist full of money to purchase local meat, or a backpack full of pemmican.  I might choose a combo meal plan - a bit of pemmican to tide me over during actual travel, but depend on local meat sources for the heavy lifting.  With a little research you might find that Costa Rican beef is mostly grass fed as well.....

Lex