I came back home last night with a cold burrito from New York City. I calculated maybe 4-5 hours after purchase, no sour cream, I’d be safe to enjoy a rarity, on the East Coast, but definitely in Philadelphia. The perfect West Coast burrito. Chewy tortilla, steamed with cheese and simple ingredients blended, kneaded and wrapped into a tight tube, a perfect pack and go shape the size of a water bottle. Day tripping food. Cesar Chavez delivered burritos to field workers in California Valley. The perfect hand-off substantial meal, all in one neat package. This is a twist in a burrito out of the northern Sonora desert of Mexico, cattle raising territory famed for it’s dried and shredded machaca beef which can last a long time. Saute with vegetables and tomato sauce.

Roll on over to Japan, pop into a 7-11 or look into many a lunch box and you’ll find the beloved onigiri, or musubi, rice balls wrapped in dried seaweed with a flavorful and nutritious pocket inside. Various dried and prepared fish, salty sweet and crunchy pickles, each containing one flavor to meld in your mouth with rice. Seaweed, dried and otherwise are sure to be more common world-wide in the future.

I feel as with all good food to go a ways with you, there’s a sort of anaerobic state that’s created, a tight wrap around more perishable ingredients that makes it last longer. Burritos, rice balls, like empenadas are all structured this way.

Pemmikan was used by settlers, invented and traded by indigenous people. A dense mix of dried buffalo meat and fat, fancied up with the likes of blueberries, this literally fueled the expansion of settlers who found they could travel much farther on such a nutritious food. The fat increased the shelf-life as it creates that anaerobic state around the meat.

Before this poor settlers seemed to survive on the likes of ships biscuits. Hard pucks of totally dried cracker. And crack you had to. The pieces would often be added to a liquid to reconstitute. They could last years.

Never underestimate the humble PBJ as a great way to go. So many varieties of nut butter are available, great breads, jams and adding a little fresh fruit really ups the game, beyond Elvis’s honey and banana.