Meal Pattern Repetition: Part 2

21 April 2018

This is Part 2 of Meal Pattern Repetition. See Part 1 for the beginning.

This is a two part process as I am working with 2 vendors. We’ll first go through how I added in variety within the first vendor (5 options) then how I layered the second vendor’s options on top of the initial strategy.

FYI, An alphabetical letter has been designated to each meal type. Similar to the examples in Part 1 but in grid format.

In Image 1, notice only 4 meals are entered for each day. I decided to include one meal from the second vendor each day. This was done because with 5 options as shown in Part 1, Example 1, meal variety over days didn’t exist. This is also true over weeks with adding in only 1 meal from the second vendor.

However, moving to 4 meal from vendor 1, gives me more variety within the day and week. Adding in the second vendor gives variety over weeks.

Next, seeing the patterns, represented by the blue and red brackets, shows that similar meal patterns exist every 6 days. Knowing that we’ll be out there for weeks, I wanted to improve upon this.

In the Image, day 4, 8, 12, 16, N+4 will be populated by the second vendor’s food entirely. This will give a break to the red/blue cycle and allow me to use even more variety.

This next image is what I call, the Nested Diagram, it shows the meals provided by both vendors. As this was a template for my own planning, I switched to using ‘1’s to note a meal without regard to vendor. As a side note the 45th day’s second to last meal breaks the pattern. This was a product of ordering a even number from the second vendor.

For meal planning patterns this is where i’m at currently. Look for a future post on further food selection including snacks. I’ll also post up on how we’re going to bag each day’s rations once the food arrives. Image: Nested Diagram Image:

In the end i believe the meal plan as shown above provides:

a simple meal plan each day (grab a meal and eat from the daily bag) a simple plan over the course of weeks (build it while you’re well rested and on land) a hedge against one vendor having a spoiled meal (packaging issue, placement in boat, etc.) variety of meals for nutrition and flavor Not a requirement but there’s a modicum of cost optimization by using meals of different prices Food Time Comment

tags: food