What do they eat in a desert?
 

Can someone recommend local dry food available in Morocco and Mauritania that can be taken on a desert trip and

- is nutritious
- can stand the heat
- is reasonably lightweight

I suspect the people with centuries of cross-desert travel tradition behind them might have something to offer as an alternative to what they sell in hiking gear stores in EU, 5 euros a pack :).

Dried camel meat, dates, dried fruit , nuts etc etc just shop in a souk - loads of choice and if you want fresh and are in a 4 wheeled vehicle (preferably!), not so easy on a moto but do-able! (see pic!)
strap a goat to your roof for a nice BBQ- (if you have the stomach to dispatch it that is!)

Dried fruit and nuts mixed up in a plastic bag is what I've used as a standby on several occasions. Last trip I bought a kilo in a shop in Laaoune and it saw me through the next 10 days or so , camping out etc, to Senegal.

Dried camel meat may be an err... acquired taste but a local technique I shared the fruits of in Mauri was to fry up strips of meat (probably goat or camel) and let them cool and set in a kind of fatty matrix - think something like lard but I'm sure it wasn't just pure fat (or maybe it was!) in a pot. That would keep for days and you could just scoop out a bit when you were hungry.

Can't say you'd win Masterchef with it and tbh it looked (and tasted!) more like what they dig out when sewers are blocked but it seemed a perfect product for desert conditions and wearing a previous life's professional hat I could see how it would work.

:offtopic:

do-able in The Netherlands too:clap:

http://www.geehurkmans.com/blogs/IMAG0001.jpg

Happy travels,

Gee