Dehydrated Tuna Mornay

Including Miriam’s Vegan Tweak!


This is a long-time family favourite, a delicious camping staple using tinned skipjack tuna, tinned corn, freeze dried peas and pasta, that translates perfectly to a dehydrated version. It’s as high in protein as you want to make it with tuna, peas and milk powder – the proportions of these ingredients as well as the corn and pasta are up to you. Thanks to our reader Miriam, we now have a vegan version! And there are plenty of other hacks to cut corners!

As always, these recipes are for two.

Two campers sitting on log eating in small cleared leafy area of campground amongst mature short trees with small tent in background

Our Finnish friend loves fish, so we took lots of these on the Investigator Trail!

 

Blue plastic bowl with spiral pasta, green vegetables, corn in a creamy looking sauce

INGREDIENTS:

  • 3 onions, finely diced

  • 6 corn cobs, kernels removed

  • 6 cups frozen baby peas

  • 4-5 x 425g cans sustainable tuna in spring water, drained, with water reserved

  • Juice and zest of 4 lemons

  • 2 tbspn oil

  • 1 kg small pasta, par cooked in the drained tuna water plus water to just cover

  • 2 cups chopped parsley

  • 1 bunch spring onion finely sliced

  • 3 tspns chicken or bonito stock powder

  • Full cream milk powder

  • Mornay or cheese sauce sachets

  • Shelf stable parmesan

  • Chilli powder (optional, to taste)

  • 1 tbspn Mustard powder

    VEGAN:

  • Replace tuna with chickpeas

  • Parcook pasta in vegetable stock

  • Replace chicken stock powder with Massell stock powder

  • Replace milk powder with Bonvit Soy milk powder

  • Replace mornay sachet with commercial vegan Cheese Sauce Powder OR nutritional yeast, onion powder, garlic powder and smoked paprika


Or see the end of this post for our “CHEATS NO DEHYDRATING HACKS”


Method:

In a large, deep frying pan or wok, fry onions in oil over medium heat until beginning to soften, then add corn. Cook 5-8 minutes, then add tuna, breaking it up thoroughly [VEGAN use tinned chickpeas without breaking them up]. Add zest, juice, peas and most of the chicken stock powder, mixing well.  There may be a little moisture in the bottom of the pan – disregard this.  Cook for a few minutes more until peas are thawed and heated through. Remove from heat and mix through par-cooked pasta, mustard and chilli powders; taste and add remaining stock powder to taste. When cool, mMix through parsley and spring onion. This is your wet ingredient mix. Place a test serve in a bowl, weighing out your wet ingredient mix. This is your WET MIX WEIGHT.

Next make the test mornay sauce. These often use milk, so make up your milk or soymilk from powder, noting how much you need. Then combine the mornay powder and milk according to packet instructions and note how much you need for one serve: for our serving size we use about 1/4 cup milk powder plus half a sachet of cheese/mornay sauce per person 125-130g serve (don’t worry, a bit too much or little won’t make a huge difference). Mix everything together, then return to a small pot and cook until sauce thickens. If it’s too thick, note how much water you need to add (the pasta will absorb some, too). Add parmesan to taste and adjust seasonings, noting how much you use.

VEGAN: Do the same process without the cheese sachet and parmesan but with your soy milk plus vegan sachet OR soy milk plus nutritional yeast, onion and garlic powders until the taste and consistency is as you like it. Eat this test batch for lunch. Yum!

Place another weighed wet mix serve on a dehydrator tray and mark with a teaspoon. Fill other trays. Dehydrate at 62C (145F) until completely dry. Weigh your marked tray: this is your DRY MIX WEIGHT.

When packaging your meals for two, you will need to add to the vac bag double the amounts you’ve worked with on your test batch ie:

  • 2 x DRY MIX weight

    In a small Ziploc bag,  place

  • ½ cup milk or soy milk powder (or double whatever worked in your test serve)

  • 1 sachet mornay powder or double whatever worked in your test serve. (VEGAN: commercial vegan cheese sachet OR 2 x nutritional yeast, onion and garlic powder)

  • 2 x seasoning and parmesan (VEGAN omit parmesan)


Tuck sealed Ziploc into the vac bag, partially vac and seal.

Vacuum sealed pack of food laid on a leafy ground surface

Calculate how much water to add:

One serve WET weight - DRY weight = W

Amount needed to reconstitute one serve milk = X

Amount of additional water needed (if any) to reconstitute one serve cheese sachet = Y

Any water you added to the pot while cooking your test serve  = Z

(W + X + Y + Z) x 2 = water needed to reconstitute two meals. Write this on the outside of your bag.

In camp, open pack and remove Ziploc. Pour in measured amount of boiling water, close and place in a cosy for 20 minutes. Open bag, add powders, mix well and seal for another 10 minutes.  When done this way, rather than adding the powders at the start, we find the tuna is soft and the sauce good. Even if the sauce is a bit runny or thick, it will still taste great!


CHEAT’S HACK No 1

Green boxes and pouches of off the shelf packed food.

INGREDIENTS

  • Replace onions with onion powder

  • Replace frozen peas with freeze dried peas

  • Replace parsley with dried parsley

  • Replace tuna with fresh tuna in oil sachets

  • Omit corn or use freeze dried corn

  • Replace par cooked pasta with instant pasta

In camp: Place (corn), mustard and chilli powder, bonito , milk powder, mornay sachet and instant pasta in a bag and pour over boiling water with the peas added in. Mix well and rehydrate. Add tuna sachet, parmesan and mix well.

VEGAN:

Replace tuna with roasted dried chickpeas. Replace milk powder with Bonvit soy milk powder, replace bonito or chicken stock powder with Massell vegetarian stock powder. Use vegan cheese sauce powder. In camp, place roasted dried chickpeas in pot of cold water and bring to the boil. Continue as above but using vegan mornay sachet and omitting parmesan.

Enjoy!

 

CHEAT’S HACK No 2

Especially crafted for “no shame” cooks

Five pouches of prepacked off the shelf instant meals

INGREDIENTS

  • Instant pasta meal (VEGAN: Mac‘N’Cheese eg Woolworths Plantitude)

  • Surprise peas

  • Freeze dried corn

  • Tuna sachet (VEGAN: roasted chickpeas)

Place peas and corn into pot with water and bring to the boil. Pour into instant meal. Place in cosy to rehydrate. Stir in tuna sachet (tuna in oil works well).

Enjoy!


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