Worth putting the extreme option on the table honestly, because it changes the arithmetic more than any food choice: not carrying a stove.
What you drop is the stove, the pot, the fuel and the fuel's container - and fuel is the part people forget, since it is heavy and you carry the canister long after it is mostly empty. For a five-day trip that is a real amount.
What you lose is genuine and I would not undersell it:
- A hot meal at the end of a cold wet day is worth more than its weight, and on a bad trip it is worth a lot more
- Hot drinks, same
- Variety. Cold food gets monotonous faster, and monotony is why people stop eating enough on longer trips
- Rehydrated meals are efficient, so removing them can push your density down unless you plan carefully
So it is not a free saving; it is a trade that suits some trips. Short, warm, and predictable: often worth it. Long, cold, or with any chance of a miserable evening: I take the stove.
If you try it, do it on a two-nighter first rather than committing on a five-day trip. And be honest afterwards about whether you ate properly, because the failure mode is not hunger on the day, it is under-eating for three days and walking badly on the fourth.