Provisioning with no refrigeration?

[Dr. D]

Can this work for a two week trip? If so, how?

[Chotu]

Originally Posted by Dr. D

Can this work for a two week trip? If so, how?

Sooooo easily

Just get more canned things (vegetables, meats, watch the sodium if needed)

Get dried things like pastas, beans, etc

Get some random quick meals in a can. Chef Boyardee ravioli sucks but it will get you by for a snack.

For the pasta, just get premade sauce in small jars.

They sell rice in pouches. They sell tuna in pouches. They sell a lot of stuff in pouches. Just look at that area of the grocery store.

Not sure what food you are trying to eat either. Name some dishes that you really enjoy. And there will be equivalents that you don’t need to refrigerate.

Get nuts. You can get a cabbage and not refrigerate it for quite a while.

You can get eggs. Bread. Butter. Mayonnaise. Ketchup. Mustard.

If you feel a little sketched out about the room temperature mayonnaise, get some packets. They sell them on Amazon. In fact they sell all condiments in packets on Amazon for a single use. Just like you would find at a restaurant.

You can get fruits and some vegetables will last a few days at least in the beginning of the trip.

You could also go grocery shopping halfway through and not have to worry about much regarding refrigeration.

[Grith]

Whilst on the topic any suggestions for very extended cruising without reprovisioning availability and also with limited fresh water and serious weight constraints?
Planning a three month cruise/adventure on a 28 foot trailer sailer with these issues.
Whilst having small refrigeration for the odd cold drink it’s only 40 litres.

[JPA Cate]

G'day, Dr. D.,

It's going to depend on what you like to eat, of course. And to me, what that meant when relying on food that wouldn't spoil, meant planning on an onion per day per two people. It is amazing, with canned foods, what benefit you gain from adding some fresh minced onion, and it is a vit. C. source. The other thing, is bring along some of the herbs you like, buy fresh dried herbs, and use as much as you need.

The fresh vegs that keep best without refrigeration are onions, potatoes, carrots, and cabbages and chokos. The fruits are generally ones with thick skins, like grapefruits, naval oranges, and we found honey-dew melons to keep well, too. The cabbages should be wrapped in newspaper and kept stem up, using the whole leaf from outside to in. Carrots will get limp, but still taste carroty in cooking, lightly.

We have found freeze-dried foods to be tastier than canned. You buy them from places that service backpackers, REI used to carry them. They also respond well to tweaking with herbs, fresh onions, and wine.

We found that buying tins of meat (we're not vegetarian) was better than buying tins of meat products. So, you buy tinned beef (the best quality available), and then turn it into something, boeuf bourguignon, for instance, or stew. Among freeze dried meals, chili beans were okay, and dried green beans and or peas, as well. So then your on board carrots, cooked lightly go well with them. Have used instant mashed potatoes, and they are tolerable, with butter, minced onion and powdered milk.

Eggs from the chicken ranch (fresh, not washed, never refrigerated) will stay usable for almost 3 months, but to me, only usable for baking, by then, and should be opened into a glass, in case they've gone off, by the end of the 2nd month. (You want them easy to dispose of.)

Another thing we used a lot is the Parmesan cheese that comes in a plastic jar. A couple of tins of diced tomatoes, lots of oregano, a dash of wine, and served over pasta, both canned beef and chicken make nice meals. Dried mushrooms or tinned, add to it.

Mike OReilly is a member here, who dries a lot of fruit & veg, and he might share some of his concoctions; and I'm here to say that after 3 or 4 weeks of no fresh veg being left, an herbed salad of dried green beans with a vinaigrette dressing is WONderful!

Incidentally, you can do your daily bread in a covered thick bottomed skillet on the stove top. It will rise slowly overnight, and you knock it down when you get up, and place it somewhere warm, let rise till double in bulk, and cook it on low. A 7 cup of flour recipe will last two people 3 days, if you use bread at all meals. You'll also want a really good bread knife. We mostly cooked ours in a pressure cooker without the gasket, then turned the loaf to brown the top. Bread with lots of preservatives will last a long time, I've never timed it because after it was gone, we shifted to cabin biscuits in a tin, and used them in place of bread... or I made pancakes, plain, or cornmeal.

Finally, a lot of foods work okay cooked in the p.c., then re-heated to a boil, put the weight on, and leave till the next evening, re-heat before eating and then re-heat afterwards for the sterilization, till it's gone. You have to be willing to eat leftovers, of course, but things like corned beef and cabbage, stew, or pea soup and of course, curries, seem to do well treated this way, although it is totally contrary to today's ways of doing things....it is a step back to before refrigeration. Pease porridge in the pot, 9 days old, spent a lot of time in the kettle being reheated and losing flavor, and keeping people alive! and probably having the odd turnip or swede added from time to time, too.

Chotu mentioned mayo in packets. Fwiw, we have been using unrefrigerated mayo since about 1986, being careful to always use a clean knife in it, with no ill effects. I wouldn't expect a doctor to be willing to try it, but the practice has been consistent with us living into our 80's.

How much thought you need to give to this really depends on whether or not there will be reprovisioning spots along your way, for fresh things you like. Today, you can do a lot better than salt meat and weevily biscuits.

Ann

[Chotu]

Yes, exactly Ann.

Mayo is just fine to leave out. It’s fairly acidic.

The way that mayo goes bad is people put that knife in after it touches some meat or something. They contaminate the mayonnaise.

So if you follow Ann’s instructions and always use a clean utensil to scoop out, you can leave mayonnaise out forever.

If you notice in the store, it’s not refrigerated when you buy it.

[MicHughV]

My first boat did not have refrigeration. I had an icebox....plain and simple. It was reasonably well insulated and top loading.
Prior to leaving, I'd really fill it up with ice all the way to the brim to get it chilled down. A few days before leaving, I'd put in a variety of food stuff that needed to be chilled. and re-pack it to the brim. I'd use block ice, and break it into smaller pieces, but bagged ice is also good.
In the cockpit I had another smaller cooler. It likewise was chilled down for a few days prior to leaving.
For the first few days, I didn't open the icebox at all, and used the smaller cooler for food and drinks. After about 3 days, that cooler would be mostly empty and whatever ice was left went into the icebox.
My icebox would be good for 7-10 days after that. By the 10th day, I'd need to replenish the ice, but by this time, I was usually at some place where ice was available.
About two 10 lb bags per week was my ice consumption. For the most part I never had any issues. Stealing ice for the evening rum drink was limited to one cube.
I did this for months at a time. Every once in a while, I was someplace where I could not replenish the ice and had to have my rum drink without ice, but I got used to it.
Can't say I remember ever having any food spoilage issues. The box was not always at 32 f.....but there would be nothing in there requiring to be frozen...

[Mike OReilly]

Lots of great suggestions and ideas already. I would say two weeks is easy. We usually stock the boat for three month periods. Two weeks is our window for eating mostly fresh foods, although to be fair, we do have a modest fridge on board now.

As others have already said, there are many fresh foods that will easily last two weeks. Generally, all manner of root-type vegies will be fine if stored in airy, cool places. Potatoes, onions, garlic, parsnips, carrots, cabbage, etc.

Fruits like grapefruit and oranges seem to last a long time. Hard apples like granny smiths, or some of the hard reds, are great. Avoid the softer, sweeter versions like macintosh.

Hard cheeses can also last a long time if kept sealed and cool. Generally, the harder the better at long life. Even old chedder will be good for weeks. We tend to buy in bulk, then cut it up and seal it in smaller packages. That way you only expose the chunk you're working on.

As Ann mentions, we also carry a lot of dried food. I'm not a fan of commercial stuff, although some of it can be good too. I prefer to dry (dehydrate, not freeze dry) our own meats, veggies and fruit. We usually stock the boat with a month's worth of dried food at the start of each season. Basically, we dry what we like to cook with, so lots of zucchini, mushrooms, peppers, tomatoes... that sort of thing. We also carry dried beef, chicken, and usually bring along a few dried/cured hard sausage sticks.

Of course, all of this is easily supplemented with dried beans, rice, couscous, barley, along with nuts, raisins, etc. We bake our own bread, and grow herbs and sprouts along the way.

Bottom line is, two weeks is absolutely no problem.

[John_Trusty]

Two weeks is easy without fridge. Most foods in your fridge are there for texture, not safety - example cheese, yogurt, and jelly were literally invented to preserve milk and fruits , and we fridge them. Don’t be afraid to cut off surface mold of a cheese or yogurt and eat the rest. No one mentioned ultra purified box milk (parmalat makes some) that stays safe at room temperature for months.

[Adelie]

The book “Voyaging on a Small Income” by Annie Hill had a very good section on provisioning without refrigeration.

[Pete7]

Originally Posted by Grith

Whilst on the topic any suggestions for very extended cruising without reprovisioning availability and also with limited fresh water and serious weight constraints?
Planning a three month cruise/adventure on a 28 foot trailer sailer with these issues.
Whilst having small refrigeration for the odd cold drink it’s only 40 litres.

For a 28ft trailer sailor, water is probably going to be your problem because its heavy and bulky. Will you be able to top up every 3 days easily or is this going to be a problem? If so, how about a water maker? A small one that is.

The Katadyn 40e isn't the most efficient in terms of watts per litre, but at 11.3kgs and just 17 inches in length might solve the other problem on a 28ft yacht of were to put it. 11.3Kgs is about half a jerry can, but could make 13x its own weight in water each day in clean seas.

Originally Posted by Dr. D

Can this work for a two week trip? If so, how?

Yes, but I question why? Your Beneteau surely has a fridge, why not use it for milk, butter and cheese plus salad and stuff?

We are setting off tonight for a fortnights holiday. Weather looking good and since the prices of marinas has shot up over the last couple of years, now £45 a night, they are to be avoided.

We will stop a couple of times to top up supplies and because we want to, but we have a weeks worth of fresh and tinned food on board.

You can't buy tinned butter in England, clotted Devon cream in a tin yes but no butter. Long life milk in tea also isn't great. I think water might also be a problem for you, if you can't top up a couple of times in the two weeks.

Pete

[El Pinguino]

Not mentioned in either case is exactly where the planned cruise will take place. A cool climate is far simpler than hot.
Simple to do a 'dry run' at home.
Water? With 3 people I can go 44 days on 200 litres a bit over a litre per head per day in a cool climate. If hot it is much more.
Milk? UHT.
Butter? Tinned Red Feather and Golden Churn are available in the US from what I can see, probably also in the UK if you look hard enough.
Cheese? Stick with hard cheeses.
Eggs? as stated above unwashed unrefrigerated last long enough.
Fruit? Oranges and apples keep well enough, bananas and the like--- will see you out the first week or more.
Veges? Unwashed spuds keep well , carrots not so much. Brown onions keep well. Had a bad run with 'white' onions from Ecuador - lasted little more than a fortnight.
Cabbage - lasts long time unrefrigerated - peel don't chop. Also had a bad experience with cabbage from Ecuador recently - had been refrigerated - went rotten from the inside out in short order. Prior to that had 2 months out of cabbages more than once in a cool climate. Avoid anything that has been refrigerated.

Dry stores.
Tinned veges are good these days, Hunts(?) from the US - peas, beans, carrots and peas, peas and carrots - a staple on my boat. Tinned tomatoes - whole and diced. Corn - sweet and not. Mushrooms.
Packet soup - often used for lunch and boosted with the appropriate tinned vege - normally either corn or mushrooms.
Best avoid tinned asparagus.
'Packet potato' - better than it used to be - good for fish pie using tinned fish.
Bread? I think I have previously posted a recipe on here for shetland bannocks - do a search.
Tinned meat? Generally quite disgusting - if you think Hormel's SPAM is bad try their 'picnic ham'(?) made from 'mechanically separated chicken'. Corned beef? Last I bought was in Uruguay - home of corned beef - only way to get rid of it was to process it through assorted stray dogs - even then they had to be really down on their luck.
Better to buy an Esky/Chillybin and fill it 50/50 with salt water ice and vacuum packed meat including bacon.
Salami in the stick.

[Tupaia]

Do not buy chilled fruit and veg if you can help it.

Supermarkets typically chill for transportation. Once chilled, perishables will need to remain chilled otherwise they will deteriorate very rapidly.

Whenever possible buy fresh fruit and veg from open markets. Buy small quantities of the same item from multiple vendors as it is likely they will be from different sources and have varying stages of ripeness.

Keep stored items separate, most fruit and some vegetables, bananas in particular give off ethylene gas as part of the ripening process and this will cause other fruit to rot. Check daily and discard any individual fruits that show signs of rot. Cruciferous vegetables are very sensitive to ethylene gas so should be kept well away from fruit. Keep things like apples and potatoes in the dark.

Vegetables such as squashes and gourds last for months if they are not cut so make for good reserve stores.

Fresh eggs will keep for long periods and are easily tested before cooking.

Buy more than you need and expect a percentage to be wasted. Use the good stuff first.

During Antarctic expeditions Amundsen chose to eat the freshest food that provided his team with good nutrition and a healthy diet never needing to eat the stuff that was going off. Scott on the other hand chose to eat stuff that was on the point of perishing so never got to eat any of the freshest food and as a result his team had a poorer less healthy diet. And they had the worlds biggest fridge.

[Chotu]

Eggs: I wouldn’t even worry about making sure you have farm fresh eggs that are unwashed. It’s only two weeks. Any eggs will last two weeks.

[Tupaia]

Originally Posted by Chotu

Eggs: I wouldn’t even worry about making sure you have farm fresh eggs that are unwashed. It’s only two weeks. Any eggs will last two weeks.

Beware eggs is cardboard cartons. We do not allow any cardboard on board. Cardboard, especially food cartons, are cockroach heaven.

[Grith]

Water is one of our biggest potential issues. Yes I have been reviewing buying a RO Watermaker but they are both outrageously expensive and our need for one is uncertain as The Kimberley’s does have some waterfall and stream water in most dry seasons.
One of the issues with RO Watermakers is they actually don’t like sitting unused and our need is potentially very intermittent and restricted to this one trip as with both a pressure seawater extra tap in the sink and 220 Litres in tankage and portable containers we are generally fine for drinking water.
Heading up there for about a 3 month very remote cruise without resupply next year is the challenge for food, water and fuel.