Salt water will be better - and so are the liquid that is inside the blue packs. The only issue is perception as the salt water will thaw earlier as it warms up. That doesnt mean its warmer inside as salt water freezes at a lower temperature. Its the act of actual melting that takes most heat out of a coolbox so you actually want the blocks to melt and not stay frozen. Having small blue blocks and putting them in a freezer onsite and replacing them when they melt is the best as you are taking heat energy out.
Quote: Originally posted by DeborahTurner on 28/5/2012
Take a big stainless steel vacuum flask. Buy fresh milk cold and decant it into the flask. This can also work for white wine .
top tip - wont work with beer though
However help is on the way! self chilling beer I dont mind paying quite a bit more for a cold beer. Warm beer is
I always buy small cartons or bottles of skimmed long live milk and open 1 a day. I also use tuna for sandwich fillings also shippams salmon etc spread.
We have camped as a family with no ehu, no ice pack freezer and no shops nearby.
I find those stainless steel sigg type water bottles are good for keeping milk cool. We always take UHT milk and coffee mate as a stand by.
You can make decent meals with tinned food. OK not maybe what you would have at home but the better quality tinned curry, stewing steak and chilli all make perfectly good meals. Rice, pasta, tinned potatoes, tinned tuna, tins of rice pudding etc are all good standbys. Take some herbs and spices and salt and pepper to liven things up!
Many things you keep in the fridge at home actually keep longer than you think without being refrigerated. Butter, cheese, salad, fruit and veg all survive quite well.
Thinking about this makes me want to ditch the EHU and go back to basics!!!
Cook meals in advance like chilli/bolognese/soup and freeze them. Then take them out of the freezer just before leaving the house. The meal will be nicely defrosted for the next days dinner. We did this last week and it seemed to work and also helps keep the other things like milk etc cold in the cool box.
All you need is a soaking wet towel, wrap the stuff in the towel, leave outside, job done!
I faffed around with freezer blocks for years until I worked out that using latent heat is easier and better and I have the cool box to use as a giant Tupperware container.
We never had a fridge or coolbox in 10 years of tent camping in France. Shopped every other day for cheese, pate, salad, made them last the 2 days. Fresh meat/fish was eaten that day, then had a pasta meal or tinned the 2nd day. Didn't take spreads of any sort. Used small milk bottles, 1 per day. Whilst on site, kept the food sealed in plastic boxes under the car or behind the tent, out of the sun. Whilst travelling kept the boxes buried under bedding or towels for insulation.
Drank red wine, doesn't need cooling! OH would buy the odd beer from a fridge for immediate consumption.
Have a fridge in the 'van now, and it is better, but if space is an issue, then there are ways to cope.
You suggest it is a logisitical issue rather than a fridge vs coolbox issue.
Mostly it is as easy as not taking any foodstuffs that need refridgeration. Just cook with dryied/tinned food or buy fresh and don't let it hang around long enough to go off. Shopping the night you arrive is a good way of freeing up some packing space. Don't forget to budget shopping time into your itinery if you intend to reprovision every day (often such sorties are best done by one person with a shopping list rather than mobhanded with all the resultant faffing).
Just use UHT milk and you have bob for a relative.(you can even buy boxes of the little pots you get in restraunts, so that there isn't any hanging around unopned).
------------- My opinion is worth exactly what you paid for it.
Quote: Originally posted by suns on 05/6/2012
Reading this thread with interest.Would it be possible to freeze a hot water bottle? And use this as an ice pack.
We recently went Glamping for a friedns birthday and they provided frozen hot water bottles for the ice box. They seemed ok, but were changed daily.
Sorry folks forgot to report back on the 2l plastic bottles filled with salted water and frozen at home before my trip...
Coolbox left in the porch extension for 4 days..Butter..Bacon..eggs...Black pudding... Milk.. and 2 cans of lager kept in the box...Ice bottles slowly melted over the 4 days but even when fully melted kept everything chilled...Asked the warden if she could freeze one of the bottles on the 3rd day and replaced the one that had melted..and again kept everything chilled....Offered someone a beer on my last night and they commented on how chilled it was and asked how I had managed it...Quite happy with the results of my wee field test...Only downside was the space taken up by 2 2ltr bottles...Maybe use just one next time or two 500ml bottles...
No Idea if it was the salted water or not but water seemed to stay frozen longer...
Jelboy.
------------- Campers of the storm,Into this world are born
I have never taken a fridge camping and have never had electric hook up. Recommend a good cool box,freeze 2ltr bottles of water these will stay iced for 3days also take frozen pre cooked food as well as bacon etc. Also found that 2ltr cider containers are a different shape so are more compact.
I camped at Glastonbury with a large Igloo coolbox. It is useful to cook some food in advance. Cooked or fresh, freeze it as low a temperature as you can before packing and pack it tight. my domestic freezer reaches -30. I cooked and boned two large chickens. I also cooked a very large pot of stew. I then cooked two Kilos of sausages. I added some bottles of milk and blocks of cheese. I then froze them down and packed in the coolbox. We bought some fresh bread each day. The stew still had ice crystals in it when we reheated it after four days. My daughter also filled another coolbox with frozen filled rolls. The more tightly packed the coolbox the longer it lasts. I also cover it with the sleeping bags in the daytime to stop the heat in the tent raising the temperature.I was feeding ten but the same rule applies; freeze low, and the more packed the longer it stays frozen. Another tip is to cook new potatoes to eat cold or reheat with stews etc. So long as you do not use fat in the cooking they will keep quite well without freezing.
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Topic: camping without fridge
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