Road Trips: Snacks, Stops & Hunger
When the weather gets nicer… we start leaving the house! And when we do, the car becomes transportation, sleeping habitat, the playroom, and our dining room… Sometimes all at the same time.
Depending on the length of time that you are going to be in the car, your strategy may differ by a large amount! And that is how I thought this might be best broken down. It is not the end to be all but these are the things that have worked best for me and my family of six while staying conscious of my own wants & needs.
Road Trip Strategy by Time
1-2 hours in the car
I’m gonna say it… there’s no need for snacks. None. There’s no need for stops. You can bring your own drink. Preferably your water to make sure you’re staying hydrated. You can enjoy something else when you get to your destination.
Ideally, you have had a meal prior to the snack or you will have a meal when you arrive. Maybe you’ll even have both. But there’s no need to bring something with you in the short amount of time. That will leave you in a situation where you have things with you for when you get bored and there’s nothing else to do except eat the snacks that you brought.
And if you’re really that desperate for something along this short amount of time, bring some clementines. Grab a pint of blackberries or raspberries. Get a bag snap peas. Use it as a time that you can mindlessly snack and also get in some fruits and veggies that’ll give you some extra volume & fiber.
3-6 hours in the car
I don’t know about you, but this teeters on the edge of what my children and myself are willing to stay in the car for in one stretch. This has hit that point of requiring a snack or a stop. If you think about the length of time and your normal eating times, this would definitely be in the zone of maybe one to two of your meals. If you normally eat your breakfast around 9 AM and then you normally eat your lunch at 1 PM… that’s a four hour window would be in the car for four hours or more.
This is where you come up with a game plan… what do you want to do?
- Do you wanna have enough snacks that it would cover the amount of one to two meals?
- Do you want to pack some meals like sandwiches or something in a cooler?
- Do you want to have enough snacks that it would cover one meal and stop somewhere else for another?
There are so many choices here but having a game plan ahead of time is how you make it through a road trip. When you are 4 to 5 hours in, you’re bored, you don’t wanna be in the car (so dissatisfied) AND there are options around you that are very indulgent and being displayed on billboards… There is a high chance that you are not going to choose some thing that you would have in the best scenario. What changes things when you plan ahead… it’s easier. It’s right there. There’s a plan. You don’t have to think about this. You have already worked through it and that is what you decided to do.
7-12 hours in the car
This one is hard. Depending on how you are and the plans that you make, this might be the length of a car ride that you choose to break up with a hotel stay. For others, they may choose to push through and make this one day trip still.
These two things bring about two different game plans.
Hotel stay
If you break up this ride, you might be able to prolong some of the eating that you will do along the way. You can essentially create a break for dinner in your normal timeframe of eating dinner and be able to get a good nights rest. In many of these situations, you can wake up and have breakfast along a normal time schedule as well. This minimizes the need for snacks.
Driving Through
There’s a good likelihood that you will be stopping at a handful of different gas stations along the way and it might just be a personal preference on whether you end up snacking the whole way through because of the things that you’re able to pick up at those places and the amount of time that you’re willing to spend them. Some do have availability to sit down and eat something but minimizing the amount of snacks purchased at each stop is one of the best ways to mitigate the overall consumption.
13+ Hours
Truthfully, the plus matters more here. This becomes more about your route and the strategy that you have for your timing then it does about the food. That must take priority and then you figure out where you’re driving through and what you’ll have available to you. The beauty of this is… you can always find grocery stores and gas stations. Gas stations may not have the best of options depending on where you are, but you can always find something that can hold you over long enough until you can find something better.
During many of our longer trips, we did a combination of fresh fruits and veggies. protein bars and shelf stable protein shakes and premade items in a small cooler. We each had our own items that would essentially cover our portion for that ride. There was never extra on purpose.
General Thoughts for a Road Trip
- Plan your route: You can take time to not only plan your driving route, but plan for rest stops, places of interest and find food options that can easily work.
- Stay Hydrated: this is one of the things that people generally try to avoid so that they don’t have to make extra rest stops, but we are 60% water. Water helps regulate hunger cues and keeps your energy levels up. If you end up dehydrated, you’ll look at a lower amount of alertness and fatigue. It pays to hydrate.
- Limit Snacks: I do encourage that these are limited because what is in the car with you can easily be consumed by you. However, some great options that are shelf stable are sleeves of rice cakes, individual single-serving bags of popcorn, protein bars, whole fruits like clementines, apples or bananas, jerky or meat sticks, dried unsweetened fruit, and pretzels in individual portion bags. These are all things that can help with the need to chew and minimize the calories/macros.
- Stay Active: Incorporate physical activity into your travel itinerary. Take a walk to explore an area. You could also stop at mall where you have a lot of indoor walking space to be able to stretch your legs and have a break from driving.
- Restaurant Choices: it can be very tempting to choose something indulgent or out of the norm while you are traveling. But during a road trip, this could be some thing that lowers your energy levels, throws off your digestion and possibly doesn’t satiate your hunger in the same way. You could try to navigate these things by taking a look at these; Navigating Restaurant Nutrition: Tips, Tricks, and Realities of Calorie and Macro Tracking, Mindful Eating Strategies for Dining Out & Weight Loss, and Making it work: Cuisine, Fast Food & Restaurants.
Road Trip Foods
Recommend packaged singles or pre-portioned amounts to help with overall calorie consumption.
Shelf Stable Foods
- Mixed Nuts: Almonds, walnuts, cashews, etc.
- Beef Jerky
- Edamame
- Whole Grain Crackers
- Tuna or Salmon Pouches or mini packs with crackers
- Nut Butter Packets
- Roasted Chickpeas
- Pumpkin Seeds
- Dried Fruit (unsweetened)
- Seaweed Snacks
- Rice Cakes
- Veggie Chips
- Protein-Packed Trail Mix
- Fresh Fruits: Apples, bananas, oranges, grapes, berries, pears, mandarins, peaches, plums, kiwi, pineapple, watermelon, melon slices, cherries.
- Fresh Veggies: Snap peas, cauliflower, carrots, broccoli
Cooler Foods
- Hard-Boiled Eggs
- Greek Yogurt Cups
- Hummus Cups with Veggie Sticks
- String Cheese
- Cottage Cheese Cups
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