I’m going to be camping for 4 days at a location without easy access to fire (hence no boiled water). As such, I’m going to be packing a bunch of canned stuff for my daily meals. The place is in England, where we’re expecting a few hot days this week and maybe some rain over the weekend.
However, I have some free time before the trip to cook food. But I’m not sure if there’s any good foods I could bring along that could keep for 3-4 days without a fridge. I guess that crosses out most meat dishes.
Some ideas I had were: falafel, fritters, bread, calzones, pasties. Have you tried taking such foods camping and if so, did they last a few days without spoiling? Are there any other foods you’d recommend? Thank you so much!
It really depends on whether or not you plan to be pooping during those few days.
Pfft, eat a few MRE’s a day and you won’t poop for two solid weeks. Emphasis on solid because when that shit comes out it will be a brick the size of a baby.
I can’t remember what it’s called, but mixing the brownie with the coffee was the best thing I’ve ever had from an MRE.
It’s called ranger pudding and the recipe is 2 packets coffee, 1 packet creamer, 1 packet chocolate beverage powder, 1 packet sugar. Add a bit of water, stir and enjoy. You can also add peanut butter if you’re feeling frisky.
Edit: I forgot the 1 packet of crackers. Gotta add those bad boys in for substance.
Thank you! I’m a civi (civilian) and only had it when my older sister came back from basic training.
Ok, I’m googling that shit (no pun intended), didn’t know about it.
I wouldn’t have noticed at all if you hadn’t said it
Goes in as an MRE, comes out as an MRE. Efficiency.
Because of a certain YouTuber now every time i see MRE i hear the sound “let’s get this out onto a tray… nice”
Wow I wasn’t expecting to get some much info today!
👀
A true sign of a Lemmy old timer. That was what, a month ago now?
At least.
Cup noodles can be made with cold water too. But they will take about 30 mins instead of 2-3 minutes. Tried and tested. They still taste good. They are not very nutritious, though.
I would recommended making Energy Bars/Balls. You can find a lot of recipes online but here’s mine:
- Roasted almonds
- Roasted cashews
- Roasted pistachios
- Roasted hazelnuts
- Roasted walnuts
- Raisins
- Dates
- Dried Cranberries
- Peanut Butter (unsweetened) (mine contains coconut oil)
- Sesame seeds
- Muskmelon seeds
- Flax seeds
- Pumpkin seeds
- Dark Chocolate
- Roast the nuts and grind almonds and walnuts to almost flour consistency, and grind the others coarsly.
- Just put everything in a food processor and let it mix everything. You can also mix it with hand or spoon.
- To make bars, just put the mixture in a baking dish or a tray and put as much pressure as you can on top of it with your hands or spoon to remove all the air pockets. Refrigerate it for 4 hours. Then cut it into bars.
- To make balls, just lightly oil your hands and form a ball shape. Again, press them hard to remove the air pockets.
These can last over a week outside the refrigerator (considering the ambient temperature in your area does not rise above 30° C). And inside the refrigerator they can last for over a month.
You can add different types of seeds, nuts, sweeteners etc, depending on what you like, what your body needs and what’s available.
Hope this helps.
Activating your almonds, I see
There’s a similar Indian recipe
Yes. They can last for months. But they are relatively hard to make at home. I usually buy them.
I’m over here getting nostalgic for BEANS.
New York City???
Look into backpacking meals. They keep forever practically and simply require heat and water most times to prepare.
Came here to suggest this as well. You said no easy access to fire. I don’t know if that means you can’t have a firepit or any kind of fire period. If it’s the former, you could look at backpacking stoves. They’re small and compact. Good way to boil some water.
a jar of peanut butter with granola and dried fruit and candy mixed in is a solid go to.
granola bars in general are solid, even the ones you make yourself.
fresh fruit like apples and bananas are good.
canned condensed soups are surprisingly good cold if you have access to fresh water to reconstitute them and you aren’t worried about dehydration. that brings me to my next and much, much more important question:
do you have water figured out?
you can easily survive for four days without food, but you can’t make it that long without water. you can’t expect to rely on springs/streams/wells especially if you haven’t been drinking from them for a while already.
you need about a gallon of water a day, more if youre exerting yourself, sick or eating very dry foods (like camping foods). so if you don’t have a supply already figured out, focus on water. If you do have a supply already figured out, pack a gallon or so and some iodine anyway. you literally can’t survive if for whatever reason the supply that was fine last time isn’t running or is spoiled.
if you do end up having access to water, you can use flameless ration heaters to boil it quickly and use that to heat up any sealed foods you have. frhs’ are powdered metals and salt that make a real hot reaction when you pour water on em. so if you had a bag with a frh in it, you had say some food that would taste good hot in another sealed bag, you could put your food bag in the frh bag and pour some water in, fold it closed, prop it up on a rock or something and wait for your food to get hot.
You can always go with a historic solution to packing long term food: Pemmican.
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Good bot!
Don’t know how feasible this is to cook, but jerky will last more than 4 days. One of my favorite snacks, but it is very expensive.
Funny this comes up, I just made jerky at home for the first time a couple days ago. Much cheaper and very tasty. Easier than I was expecting too.
Did you just use a cut of meat from the store?
Yup, top round.
Would you mind sharing the recipe you used? I may have to try this!
The recipe I used ended up being terrible haha, so I kinda started winging it halfway through. The later batches turned out better after some adjustments but I’d still like a better starting recipe, so if you find a good one please let me know!
Yeah, beef jerky, even when making it yourself like @CloverSi@lemmy.comfysnug.space does, can be quite expensive depending on where you live. Thankfully beef jerky doesn’t require high-end cuts of beef. Round Eye is one of the preferred cuts and even in regions with relatively high prices for beef (e.g. Germany) it’s still quite economical compared to store-bought Jack Link’s.
I have a friend that makes his own before trips. He has it down to x pounds of fresh meat per person per day. He just buys meat, adds seasoning, and dries/cooks it in his oven. There is surely a youtube on how to do it.
I dig what you’re getting at here man, however my advice is just get a little propane camp stove. Mine has improved my camping life so greatly I’m kicking myself for not buying one before. It’s not even expensive one and you can cook in no time flat anywhere. That being said Tuna and crackers is a classic, there is a lot more canned meat than tuna and you can get a lot of variety out of crackers.
Yeah, small propane burner and heating pot instantly makes camping a more enjoyable experience, because you have a wider variety of foods and drinks to choose from.
Heck Bobby, propane is the future!
Beef jerky and salted/tinned fish.
Butter.
Eggs (unopened; only if not pasteurized/cleaned which you will not find in a typical US grocer for anyone other than OP).
Pretty much any baked goods.
Pasta (uncooked obviously).
Avocado, onion, tomato… Pretty much any fruit or veggie that isn’t kept refrigerated at the store really.
Nuts.
Chocolate
Marshmallows
Graham crackers
Edit: NO FIRE?! The hell you camping?! Could you at least get some sterno or an electric camping stove? How you gonna have a camping trip without s’mores? 😩
Although I also would suggest a basic ass ice chest. My family went camping all the time for that length of time when I was growing up and we would bring regular food to cook over a portable electric stove and keep it in an ice chest. It would keep for at least 5 days.
Eggs (unopened; only if not pasteurized/cleaned which you will not find in a typical US grocer for anyone other than OP).
You can usually tell by where the eggs are located in the grocery store. US eggs are ‘cleaned’ and kept in the fridge at the store (and at home), whereas a lot of other countries don’t clean them and you just find them on a regular shelf instead of in the fridge.
It’s interesting… It’s mandated to wash eggs in the USA, whereas it’s mandated to not wash eggs in Europe. Different standards.
Y’all have some big ol balls going backpacking with eggs.
Pickled or boiled eggs. I buy the 2 packs of already boiled eggs so there is never a partially opened container in my cooler.
Also carry quarts of eggs in cooler and cook all at once. Good with a bag of frozen hash browns. But this takes a way to cook (we carry Coleman style stove).
Some places have fire bans due to dry conditions and high likelihood of forest fires. Those don’t include little stoves, though…
Another thing I don’t see people talking about much is canned food. Almost all canned food is precooked or otherwise sterilized, and it takes years to expire when the can is left sealed. While cold ravioli isn’t the most satisfying meal, it will fill your stomach without making you sick.
Exactly this. I have eaten cold ravioli in Yellowstone when we drove to the opposite end of the park.
We also have the tubes that keep a loaf of bread from getting crushed. Add a can of chicken and mayo packets for a rough but edible chicken salad sandwich.
Also sometimes carry the peanut butter and honey as both are shelf stable. Can even buy premixed.
First of all, depending on the area you’re going to be camping in, is a camp stove out of the question? I don’t know what’s readily available to you in England, but there’s quite a range of different options out there from little folding metal things that fit in your pocket that use solid fuel tablets up to briefcase sized ones that are basically like a regular kitchen stove that use 1lb propane tanks (or larger tanks with an adapter) and basically every form factor in between using just about any kind of fuel imaginable. You can even make a small stove out of some soda cans that burns denatured alcohol. You can probably have most of them delivered to you from Amazon before you leave for your trip, and assuming prices are similar in the UK to the US, there’s options out there that will only cost you about £10-£20 plus a couple more bucks for fuel
Some of them are practically like cooking on a blowtorch so the flame is too concentrated and intense to do much besides boiling water, but even that opens up your cooking options a lot. Being able to heat up your food or make some coffee/tea/hot cocoa can be a huge quality of life improvement. And having a method to boil water to sterilize it in an emergency is always a good idea.
Usually, at least in the US, camp stoves are exempted from fire bans if that’s what you’re up against, look into your local laws about that.
Beyond that, your options depend a bit on how comfortable you are ignoring “refrigerate after opening” warnings on labels. A lot of things will say they should be refrigerated but would probably be fine for a few days as long as they’re stored with a little care (container with a tight lid, wrapped up careful in some plastic wrap, foil, wax paper, etc. kept clean, dry, kept in a shady place out of the heat of the sun, etc) and depending on the type of camping you’re doing, if you can bring a cooler full of ice you can bring just about anything you would normally keep in a fridge, some things can be kept cool by submersing them in a cool stream. Anything that’s very sugary, salty, packed in brine or oil will probably last at least a day or two after opening. Many of those types of foods originated as ways to preserve stuff anyway.
But assuming you for whatever reason absolutely cannot have any type of cooking appliance and no access to any way to keep your food cool- Most fruits and veggies will last fine for a couple days unrefrigerated. Breads should be fine. Jams, and jellies, pickles, and other types of preserves are probably fine. A lot of smoked/dried/cured meats should be fine (jerky is a classic choice, salamis, summer sausage, etc. should also work but try to get a whole one, not pre-sliced, country ham if that’s available across the pond would probably do the trick, maybe prosciutto) Dried fruits, nuts, harder cheeses. In general you can take a lot of inspiration from a charcuterie board. A lot of “just boil water” kinds of foods don’t necessarilyneed the water to be boiled, it just makes it go a lot faster, you could do some overnight oats, instant noodles, etc.
As for your ideas, falafel and fritters are probably fine, but will depend on the exact ingredients and recipe you use. Calzones are probably fine, but I’d keep away from using too many wet ingredients in them, keep a separate jar/can of sauce to serve them with, don’t load them up with too many veggies and such, stick to cheese and maybe cured meats like pepperoni for the filling. I had to look up pasties because we don’t really have them in the US, but I’d say largely the same as the calzones, probably fine but be smart about what you put in them. At any rate, if you don’t have a plan to keep them cool, I’d say you probably want to plan on eating them the first or second day, they might start getting a bit questionable after a couple days.
There’s loads of hiking/camping shops here. Mountain Warehouse, Go Outdoors, Black’s… OP has plenty of options if they want to pick up a stove.
Yeah, I figured they have options, I’m just not sure exactly what they are with different countries having different regulations and standards, like I kind of suspect that 1lb propane tanks may not be as common in areas that use the metric system, and I don’t know what the closest equivalent would be if there is one, though I suppose if anywhere is going to measure propane in pounds outside of North America it would probably be the UK. I could also see some places banning or restricting things like white gas or esbit tablets for one reason or another, and of course different countries having different terms for things.
You’ve gotten tons of good suggestions, but also like just bring a camp stove? Even if an actual camp stove isn’t allowed, you could easily use a tea candle. It takes a bit longer but it will boil water.
There are some amazingly small and light stoves out there. There’s the Esbit stove (size of a deck of cards, including fuel) and the PocketRocket (fits in a mug but needs bulky fuel). Then if you’re willing to deal with collecting firewood, there is a whole family of wood burning stoves that can produce a surprisingly strong fire as long as there is firewood in the area. They then pack down completely flat.
Is there a reason you can’t use a Coleman style camp stove or single burner backpacking stove? Those are standard fair for campgrounds and backcountry.
Fare*
Although, certain fairs have also been known to be near-standard fare at campgrounds, here and there.
Jet Boil’s are compact and awesome.
Jet boils are not compact. They are awesome, just not great if you are a gram counter. Probably exactly what this guy would want though as it sounds like he is car camping.
24 packs of Scampi Fries and a dozen Mars Bars.
You can have meat, but something cured and in a pack like biltong.
And every hiker’s favourite, Kendal mint cake, which is as close to Terry Pratchett’s dwarf bread as any substance I know.
And this is England. Chances are you’ll be like two miles from the nearest shop at a push.
I tried to look for a super-remote forest location last year; my intention was to take a tent, get dropped off on the edge, go deep into a forest with laptop & keyboard, to write some forest-inspired music. I was pretty shocked to find out that all our once-deep forests are criss crossed with roads. You were kinda joking, but you’re literally right, there’s nowhere far from a road in any of our forests.
biltong
Found the South African!
No but I’m a fan of the accent. Or at least Joss Ackland’s in Lethal Weapon 2. Diplomatic immunity!
They started selling it in the UK a few years back. It’s quite expensive though.
I’m going to guess Lake District or Scotland. You can easily be several hours walk from shops.
Well, Scotland isn’t part of England. But sure, you can get far from civilisation, by UK standards. Dartmoor and Yorkshire Moors are others. It’s only a few miles as the crow flies, but it’ll feel a lot more than that when carrying a load of camping stuff and having to go around a river.
I’ll add cured sausages such as chorizo and dried tomatoes. Both keep well unrefrigerated and add a lot of flavor to any dish.