Long-Shelf-Life Foods

[juneau]

Hi folks, I would like to ask what is the concensus regarding canned goods. Is the weight an issue? It seems to me that The canned hamburger, beef pork or chicken chunks, butter and cheese etc. would make a good addition and well worth the weight.
thanks for your input!

[dixonwj]

We have used canned meat from Brinkman's farm in Ohio for years. Have a pantry full now waiting on weather to break.

[GordMay]

Greetings and welcome aboard the CF, juneau.

[swagman]

Welcome also Juneau.

Just use as many cans as you would ashore. As dixons infers, overstock on a boat, and you'll be still carrying them years later.

JOHN

[Zephyr's Aura]

I use canned food all the time. Usually take the labels off and mark what's inside with a permanent marker. The labels seem to fall off after a few weeks if you don't remove them. I take a little cooking oil and wipe the cans down to hell keep them from rusting.

Tim

[dpex]

Originally Posted by juneau

Hi folks, I would like to ask what is the concensus regarding canned goods. Is the weight an issue? It seems to me that The canned hamburger, beef pork or chicken chunks, butter and cheese etc. would make a good addition and well worth the weight.
thanks for your input!

I've been through this. Rather than buy canned foods I started bottling my own, but decided the bottles were a) very fragile, and b) heavy.


You may have heard the expression that: 'There are two types of eaters. Those who eat to live and those who live to eat.' Ergo, the former eats for fuel, the latter eats for taste and texture.

Until about two years ago I was the latter and could spend two/three hours in the kitchen, creating awesome food. Now? I can't be bothered. I just eat for fuel.

Sure, there are exceptions, in as much as I love making my own pressure-cooker breads for breakfast and lunch. But the evening meal is pretty predictable. Rice, heated stew (available in an amazing variety in cans) Moong bean sprouts, (to which I am utterly addicted) followed by a coffee and 'one' chocolate biscuit.

Just two years ago such gastronomic sacrilege would have been cause for a riot. Now? I just eat to live. I'm sure the moong beans provide most of what I need.....haven't got scurvy yet:--))

The bread thing is really there to fill in an empty moment.

I've been experimenting, mixing all manner of thing with the dough. Like handful of ....yeah, you guessed it...Moong beans. I've used a tin of Salmon/tuna. I've added a few teaspoons of soy, sushi vinegar, cheese, you name it.

Speaking of cheese.

I've been running another experiment on this issue. I bought four small (250G) blocks of Tasty cheese, packaged in sealed packets, about four months ago and simply slung them in my pantry.

After a week I observed the oil leeched from the blocks, but the blocks didn't lose strength...still nice and solid. After the first month I opened the first block and poured off the leeched oil. Result? Couldn't taste the diff between this cheese and stuff kept in the fridge. Next month, same result.

And so month four is coming up whereupon I will open the last pack. Judging by what I can see through the clear plastic, the fourth month's version will be as good as the first.

One of my big issues being, I love a cheesy 'thing' at least once a week. And the issue of preserving cheese, without a fridge, had baffled me. No any more. :--))

[Roaring Girl]

Cans work fine, including for veg. Last year we were in southern France and Italy - very expensive places with little easy shopping from the waterfront. We loaded up from a cheap supermarket on lots of canned food and at well throughout the summer cruising (short last year but still a couple of months) without spending as much.

Normally we hugely prefer fresh but still always have some tinned meat and fish as back-ups. Even if coastal cruising you can get stuck - we had six days in a Spanish anchorage with too much wind to get ashore in 2006! Dried stuff can be a useful back up too.

We put our tins into plastic crates that fit under the main saloon bunk, on the wooden 'sole' that sits on the stringer and provides a flat floor to the bilge. (Stuff for near future use goes into the galley.) This has worked well in terms of both dampness and chafe over the last seven years, whereas tins right in the bilge (eg under the locker sole) has quickly lost its name and sometimes got rusty.

[AquatiCat]

If you don't want to spare the weight for canned goods, try the kind that come in pouches, they are also decent, and in some ways "fresher" than canned - for chicken chunks and tuna, at least.

[forsailbyowner]

We can our own stuff. After finding my borderline high blood pressure was caused by excess sodium in diet, I started reading labels. Many canned goods have 1000mgs in a single serving. We store the mason jars in dedicated cabinets built for this purpose. They get wrapped in dacron furniture wrap. Haven't once broken a jar in transit. When we run into a deal, or catch a lot of fish we can stock up. The lids get reused over and over so after the initial purchase its way cheap. Also, no trash empty jar gets rinsed and put back in empty spot.

[barnakiel]

Cans are fine - but keep yours in a dry place - the welds tends to corrode. Also, if you lose the paper labes, you might be hard pressed to guess what you have there. This is why we buy painted tins rather than paper-sleeved ones. (Yes - you can color-code the tins, just why?)

Quality of can food varies - in EU some stuff is excellent quality (e.g. Italian tomatoes, French veggies, Dutch butter, etc.) - no preservatives, no colorants, etc., but elsewhere we had some very nasty surprises, e.g. in Brazil the content of any taken can was at least 30% salty water. This made our 'cheap' provisioning suddenly not all that inexpensive.

b.

[OliveOyl]

Here's a site you might want to check out - Packit Gourmet

They stock a lot of freeze-dried and dehydrated food that we really like to use. It keeps forever without refrigeration and it weighs a lot less than canned. I love having a big container of dehydrated bell peppers around - you can throw a bit into whatever your cooking for a really nice flavor. Just a few scoops, then reseal so you're not stuck with a whole can if you don't need it. Everything also cooks really fast which is nice for the fuel issue. I wasn't really familiar with freeze-dried and dehydrated food before, but they have this chart that helped to understand how much you're getting and how much to use.

They also have a bunch of interesting powders (soy sauce, honey, maple syrup, etc.) and some meals that are for hikers. I've tried a couple of meals and they're good and easy.