Either shop each day and consume everything fresh that you buy or get a fridge.
It is your choice whether to adopt a lower technology lifestyle while camping or to bring camping adapted domestic technology with you to fit into your tent.
A cool bag will help, a cool box is good but bulky and an electric camping fridge will fill your tiny car and make you buy roof boxes, trailers and huge estate cars.
Of course you wont have to take all your camping kit with you on every trip, so you can leave some items at home to save space.
We are camping puritans who don't do EHU, and we manage with a cool bag, as long as there is somewhere to freeze ice packs or hire them already frozen.
We "pre-chill" it with a couple of frozen bottles of water, put our food in and ice packs. We always swap them over at the end of the day, so they stay cool overnight, and late morning on the following day, if it's hot. We then cover the cool bag with a wet towel, to keep it even cooler.
If it's hot and we're going for long drive, we put it in the car and have the air con on!
We only really use it for milk and butter, because we're lazy and mostly eat out, apart from breakfast, so don't tend to have a lot of meat in it.
We've never had food poisoning yet! And we cram the empty coolbag with our dirty laundry for the trip home!
I keep meat and fish up to three days in it by freezing the meat then putting it at the base of the fridge with a frozen ice pack on top of the meat. After two days the meat/fish is still slightly frozen and needs thawing thoroughly before cooking. I wouldn't risk longer than three days. Everything else that goes in the fridge is pre-cooled to keep the temperature as low as possible - eg. no warm bottles of beer!
Quote: Originally posted by fran1000 on 11/8/2014We are camping puritans who don't do EHU, and we manage with a cool bag, as long as there is somewhere to freeze ice packs or hire them already frozen.
Same here, we don't (and never will) do EHU.
Pointless as it is to try and convert the tech-loving crowd , I could still share a few tips.
We, too, mostly eat out apart from breakfast. Now, for breakfast (usually porridge) and coffee we bring a pot of cream which takes up much less space than milk and would even do a good enough job diluted with water and poured over cereal.
Check the campsite details, if there's a shop they'd probably sell stuff like sausages, milk, butter, etc.
Before we had a coolbox, I used to just bury the cream pot in the ground (in the shade) or in damp leaves under a tree. Better still, if there's a stream running through the campsite, that could even keep raw meat fresh for 24 hours! Just stick whatever you're cooling into a plastic box/bag, submerge and make sure you tie the ends securely to something on the bank.
If you buy your milk/sausages/etc in the evening, you can safely store them like so till morning without any cool box.
Anything you cook will be safe to eat anyway - in the food industry, food is deemed free of bacteria if heated to above 65C (for longer than 5-10 min if memory serves).
If there's a supermarket within a 10-minute drive, or if you're driving through a town on your way to a local attraction (which in most places in the UK you would), buy ready meals on each trip, stick them in the coolbox with freshly frozen ice blocks, change blocks when you get back to campsite if needed. That way you won't have to lug around a massive fridge.
I guess we must be the total opposite to rebelpants, but that is the great thing about camping, you just do whatever floats your boat.
For our fortnight campings in the South East of France during July, having Electric has taken camping to another level for us, compared to how we used to camp back in the 1970's
Amongst all the kit we take, I would never be without our Mobicool C40 compressor fridge for use in the tent, and our icle Waeco CF25 compressor fridge for use along the 1000 mile journey to the campsite.
And of course there is the Freesat Satellite system c/w 1m Dish, and 15" telly.
Like they say "Different Strokes for Different Folks"
We're non-ehu too... I find that ehu pitches are often more cramped together. Although I have often been tempted if only to have hair straighteners! Lol
We also pre-cool a standard cool box. I have 4x frozen 2l bottles of water in my home freezer constantly so we're ready to up and go in short notice. If I know we're going, I put those in the coolbox a couple of days before hand and put 4 more bottles in the freezer. Swap them over as soon as they melt and as often as possible in the run up to bring the temp down and 2x freshly frozen bottles and ice packs the day we go. I buy the 1 pt cartons of milk and freeze a couple of those too and add to the cool box. That way as it all melts I have fresh drinking water and milk too. The only thing I've really struggled with in cool boxes is butter so I now take the little plastic mini portions of flora. Usually stays chilled enough for a long weekend and if we go longer we'll just use a site thatwill re-freeze for us.
Quote: Originally posted by tentadventurer on 12/8/2014
I buy the 1 pt cartons of milk and freeze a couple of those too and add to the cool box. That way as it all melts I have fresh drinking water and milk too.
Great idea!
BTW you can freeze butter, too. I often do at home, buy in bulk when it's on sale and freeze. For camping, you could maybe chop it into several pieces before you freeze.
We were half-tempted to try EHU when we started camping, but soon worked out EHU pitches are in higher demand (and we are rarely able to book at more than 2 weeks notice), cost more and you just end up bringing more and more stuff you could do without (cue overloaded car!). We're also trying to be eco-friendly when we can
IMHO, EHU is more relevant to caravanners and motorhomers. But each to their own
I have a Coleman Extreme 3 Cool box which I find works well by pre-chilling 2-3 days before departure with a couple of 2 ltr bottles of frozen water. When they have started to thaw out replace with 2 more.
Then everything that goes in it for camping is already frozen or pre-chilled. Plus ice blocks and if room 2 bottles of frozen water.
When on site cover with a wet towel and keep in the shade.
If you can't refreeze your ice blocks on site, a bag of ice cubes will do. I put my ice cubes in zipped freezer bags as it stops water leaking out.
After 5 days of hot sun in July I've still had chilled food.
------------- 2021
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Anything above 20 deg C is hot for me, and last year in July it was nearly 30 deg C when I was camping in Dorset, and it was too hot for me.
Thank goodness I was not camping on the really hot days in June and July this year.
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Went to our local Aldi today and they didn't have the coolbox in, he was very helpful and phoned every Aldi in the City but none had any left. He said they get one batch every year and thats it. Guess im out of luck :/
Our 3 way fridge is one of the best bits of camping kit we have bought. It means we can use it with gas on non electric sites or using ehu (we only started camping with ehu this year)
For us, as fridge became pretty important because we are a large family with 6 kids. A few years ago we went to a fairly remote campsite a long drive from a big supermarket. Feeding us all from an expensive Spar shop for a week cost us a fortune. So we invested in a 3 way fridge. It has also taken the stress of worrying if the milk/food will be kept cool enough in a cool box.
Why not have a look at this thread http://www.ukcampsite.co.uk/chatter/display_topic_threads.asp?ForumID=6&TopicID=296247 it links to a soft bodied electric coolbox that should allow you to squash it it the car when travelling to the campsite, then fill it on site from the local supermarket. If you do this ensure that you put in chilled and /or frozen items. Coolboxes generally work much better overall when they are just trying to maintain a temperature rather then cooling items down.
Even with my waeco tropicool, which cools to 30 degrees C below ambient i always ensure I fill it with cold or forzen foods rather than putting in ambient foods to cool.
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Topic: Should we buy a fridge?
, I could still share a few tips.
