Food issue

The sniffer dog is realy good,when i arrived in ChCh in April i was waiting to get my pack from the conveyer belt and the dog sniffed my day pack and sat down next to it. I had my work lunch in it a couple days before

izogi - so what does dehydrated astronaut ice cream taste like?

It's this stuff: http://www.thinkgeek.com/caffeine/wacky-candy/9e07/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeze-dried_ice_cream , so you could probably mail-order it if you wanted to try it. It's like flavoured polystyrene, and not as nice as I remember from when I was young and a friend came back with some from the USA as a present. When I was there in February, I almost bought it from the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, but didn't because it cost about US$15 a packet. (Souvenir shops I guess!) Then I found exactly the same thing at Toys-R-Us a few days later for US$2.99, which is the same as what ThinkGeek's selling it for (linked above). I grabbed 4, and now 3 are sitting in my drawer at home because my 25 years of anticipation to try it again was ruined. Actually now I'm wondering what it might be like as a tramping snack. I'll have to take a look at the nutritional info on the packaging when I get home. What would ice-cream be like if it had all the water sucked out and didn't melt? It's basically milk powder and sugar, right?

Thanks for all of your posts. I know it is a pain - the same applies when you enter Australia. I don't want to take any chances carrying undeclared food, although I may take a bag or two of some dehyderated emergency meals and declare it, unless you can buy them in Queenstown?

Back Country Cuisine make a dehy icecream dessert. It is indeed very delicious with freeze dried strawberries etc. It is possible to order this stuff in bulk and get it a lot cheaper...

Chocolate moose (or any moose for that matter) is good to bring for a desert, its already dehydrated and can be made with cold water and milk powder. Can be a bit liquidly when its hot. Quite a cheap option.

Yes, Hansell's chocolate mousse is great and packet only weighs 70g. Really good with some mini marshmallows stirred thru. Possums like it too. Made some and put pot outside to chill a bit. When we went to get it the lid had somehow come off and some marshmallows which had been submerged were looking very clean - actually the surface had a 'licked' appearance. We gave the top layer to Mr Fruitbat and another guy in the hut and my sister and I had the underneath part. It was good.

We take chocolate mousse (think it might be Hansells, I'm not sure) and alternate it with butterscotch instant pudding. Both work great with milk powder and set really fast. Yum. In fact I make it for desserts at BBQs too - unlike some things it tastes equally good back in civilisation.

You can buy astronaut icecream from Motat in Auckland, I only saw it at the Aviation part, but may be at main shop too. It was $4.90. I was not tempted to buy any.

The Alpine supermarket at the top of Shotover St (main st)will be open till 8pm generally and is good for most things but of course Fresh Choice supermarket is bigger and perhaps better for prices. Fresh choice is about 10 - 15 mins walk from the centre of town. If you can find somewhere to store your gear for a short while take the walk. Its likely the local bus from the airport (about $8 to town) goes close. Fuel, be it a liquid fuel or gas bottle, will be available at a number of gear shops around the town centre. If you're catching a bus out the next morning there is a bakery open early across and down slightly from the Alpine supermarket in Shotover st. These days i would only bother to take into NZ those items like toothpaste, washing powder, etc to save buying quantities which will result in throwing product away. You've probably got weight restrictions with your flight anyway. Good luck