PEAK REFUEL  Beef Pasta Marinara - 2 Servings

Good taste but way too much water. I used the suggested amount and let it rest for the required time…way more like soup than a meal.

If this ended up even remotely resembling the picture on the package, it would have been worth a full 5 stars for sure. As is, I'd give it an F for effort. I followed the cooking instructions to a "t", making sure to stir thoroughly and add boiling water in the correct amount, and let it sit for the requisite time to soak in and soften everything... The results? Perfect noodles - probably the best noodles I've ever had from a freeze-dried meal - but the meat? Absolutely horrible. It was so dry and crunchy, and had a strange flavor. I even tried adding more water and giving it an extra 5 minutes- noodles were still great. Beef was still awful. From now on I'm sticking to the tried and true Mountain House I've been hauling with me for the last 25 years.

The Peak Brand definitely takes backcountry/trail food to the next level. I remember the first time I tried the Beef Pasta Marinara -- it was after a long 16 mile off-trail day and I felt like I was treated to a fine dining experience for supper. I've tried a variety of options from Mountain House, Heather's Choice, AlpineAire, etc. and I find myself always gravitating back to the Peak Brand.

Extremely delicious in trail, especially after a long hike day.

I've really liked every other meal I've tried from this brand, but this one was a miss for me. It wasn't as flavorful as I expected, had too much pasta for the amount of sauce, and it didn't rehydrate fully or evenly. I'm at low elevation and wasn't in a rush, but the beef nuggets stayed super crunchy! I'm especially disappointed because the texture of Peak's freeze dried chicken is excellent and they've set the bar so high with other meals. I'm about to stock up on chicken curry & pesto pasta, but I probably won't try another beefy meal from Peak.

First time eating one of these during our camping trip, since we wanted to cut down on the amount of perishable foods we brought and it was pretty good. I added a tad bit too much water and I would suggest you let it sit for 5 extra minutes. While the noodles were perfect the beef was a bit crunchy. I wish there was a line inside the pouch that helped indicate how much water to pour in.

I bought this packaged food thinking that it was going to taste alright based on reviews and having eaten MREs before. I thought it was going to taste ok but it was not. The marinara sauce is a hit or miss, depending on how much you're into marinara sauce...This one wasn't that great. Maybe I added too much water but it wasn't more than 2 cups for sure. Anyways, the worst part was the meat. YUCK! The texture felt like I was eating dog food. I was not into the crunchiness at all. I know some people here are into that but I'm not. The meat could be softer. If it was shredded meat with a soft texture and the sauce was a little more flavorful then I could see myself eating this again but having said that, I'm definitely not buying any more of these products.

If you're backpacking, especially if you're backpacking with a bear canister, you can't beat this meal's calories to volume ratio (it re-packed smaller than some 600 cal meals!), and it tastes great to boot. It's worth the price. Like other reviewers said, give it a few stirs prior to eating -- with only a cup of water in there you need to move all the pasta around to give it time to rehydrate. Besides that, it rehydrated/reheated well, tasted great, and was so much easier to finish than many other high-cal meal options. When repackaging this for my bear canister I added a shake of garlic powder for good measure--in hindsight the flavor was excellent so I probably didn't need extra garlic, but it didn't hurt!

Somehow, all of my family likes this one. A picky husband, a finicky daughter, and a VERY finicky son - we all like this one. I'm kind of blown away there is any hiking food we all like - we can't even get that to happen at home in our kitchen! It is not the most flavorful meal, perhaps that's why my kids like it - but it also has no offensive textures or flavors as happens with some hiking meals. I also did not feel like I was ingesting enough sodium to kill me before I got home, although, like pretty much every option on the trail, there is in fact a lot of sodium - but at least it doesn't taste like it! Will definitely buy again and it will be a meal we bring always to ensure there is something for everyone.

I gotta say, this was really good for dinner after a long hike. Expectations were low but I was wrong. So tasty! I will pick up some more of these. Highly recommend