What food do you take and cook on a long trip?

[FoodieLoobie]

We will soon be setting off on our longest trip yet. We are heading up to Scotland to do the North Coast 500. We plan on doing the trip quite slowly to give us plenty of time to admire and enjoy the scenery.

We will set off with a fridge full of fresh food and take some dried pasta, a few jars of pasta sauce, pesto, olives, capers etc so that we can knock up quick meals from store cupboard staples. We expect to be able to visit a few restaurants and pubs along the way for meals too.

I am sure we will be able to stock up with some new fresh supplies here and there.

What do others take and cook when on a long trip?

 

[Max-Felix]

We always get a head start - so cook at least three meals in advance (casserole, curry, coq au vin, Ratatouille etc) - stuff that you can easily reheat in one pot and combine with pasta, rice or a favourite - those little Pomme Rissoles they sell frozen in the French French supermarkets.

Freeze these meals at home and pop in the Cali fridge the morning you go - they will still be partly frozen a couple of days later and it gets the fridge nice and cold!

Then on travels just whatever you fancy or see in the markets - BBQ's, Cassoulet, Nicoise Salads, stir frys, Risotto, Salmon fillets, Paprika chicken, that lovely French bacon with local eggs and green beans - the list is endless!

 

[Niborn]

Last trip we took rice and pasta and bread , lots of cheeses , fruits , yougut , tomatoes , lettuce , baked beans , jams , condiments, ham, eggs , sausages ... we bought on route , sometimes we bought a cooked chicken and added the rice and salad . Potatoes warmed up from a tin . We thought we ate rather well on the whole . Wine only in the evening as we were driving !

 

[Borris]

We buy local produce as we go, in order to help support the local economy otherwise all that us campervan types do is drive through.

You might be lucky and be able to bag a wild haggis at this time of year. These small shy native creatures only have three legs and one of them is shorter than the other two. Therefore they can only run round the Scottish mountains one way. All you have to do is to find their run and lie in wait with a sack.

 

[Loz]

We like a collection of wayfarer's and for longer trips like Morocco we take a freezer with frozen portions of Mary Berry meals

 

[GrannyJen]

Whether to pre-prepare or not for me depends on hook-up or no hook-up.

If no hook-up, using Aires, then very basic frozen curry that can be warmed on the hob, or find a local restaurant. From then on it is buy for the day locally. My last long trip I packed the fridge with three frozen meals as it was just a blast to provence, only stopping to buy wine

 

[Meoncoast]

We buy local produce as we go, in order to help support the local economy

Ditto for us as well We also carry a few tins for days we do not find a supplier.

 

[T6 CFO]

In addition to the suggestions above someone on here suggested the M&S tinned curry. I was sceptical, they were nice. Three different ones last time I looked, warmed up with a spot of rice and a bottle of red is very easy and a good standby.


Mike

 

[MattBW]

We always like to cook a couple of meals properly from fresh but we do of course go for convenience sometimes too. Our general goal though is fresh is best.

Anything that doesn't need chilling goes in the slidepod, which gives us a lot of storage in the beach. The rest in our 40l fridge. I could talk for quite some time about what we take and cook, maybe Ill do another video on campervan cook out about that.

 

[Velma's Dad]

We buy local produce as we go, in order to help support the local economy otherwise all that us campervan types do is drive through.

+1 for that.

Also, as the OP acknowledges, there are a lot of very nice restaurants around the NC500 route if you don't want to cook every evening, or for lunches en route. Here's just a small selection, that we've tried and can recommend:
- Dornoch Castle Hotel. But better to avoid their 'home made' gin!
- The Old School restaurant, near Kinlochbervie. Simple but well cooked pub-style food.
- Drumbeg Stores. Not a restaurant, but a superbly stocked village shop.
- Peet's, Lochinver. Lovely relaxed modern-style brasserie by the harbour, excellent seafood.
- Am Fuaran bar/restaurant. Directly opposite the lovely Port a Bhaigh campsite at Altandhu. Dark and atmospheric inside, so maybe more of a winter-time stop, but good food anyway.
- Shieldaig Bar and Coastal Kitchen restaurant. On the lochside in the very pretty village of Shieldaig. And pick up some salmon from the smokery just up the street to take away.
- The Applecross Inn. An institution, not to be missed IMO.

 

[Loz]

As much as we would like to buy local as we do on occasion, we are on holiday and a couple of years ago went with a few vehicles and found ourselves in a supermarket every day with someone needing something.
With either frozen or some of the really good readymade stuff onboard and eating out a bit we can enjoy our holiday without the shopping we are trying to get away from.

 

[GrannyJen]

+1 for that.

Also, as the OP acknowledges, there are a lot of very nice restaurants around the NC500 route if you don't want to cook every evening, or for lunches en route. Here's just a small selection, that we've tried and can recommend:
- Dornoch Castle Hotel. But better to avoid their 'home made' gin!
- The Old School restaurant, near Kinlochbervie. Simple but well cooked pub-style food.
- Drumbeg Stores. Not a restaurant, but a superbly stocked village shop.
- Peet's, Lochinver. Lovely relaxed modern-style brasserie by the harbour, excellent seafood.
- Am Fuaran bar/restaurant. Directly opposite the lovely Port a Bhaigh campsite at Altandhu. Dark and atmospheric inside, so maybe more of a winter-time stop, but good food anyway.
- Shieldaig Bar and Coastal Kitchen restaurant. On the lochside in the very pretty village of Shieldaig. And pick up some salmon from the smokery just up the street to take away.
- The Applecross Inn. An institution, not to be missed IMO.

+1 for Am Fuaran, and the lovely hostess Catriona. I was in there when the wild storms of the winter of 2015 were reaching their wildest. I had parked in the most sheltered part I could on the campsite and went for dinner. Catriona apologised, due to the bad weather normal deliveries had been suspended but she had managed to get some fresh haddock off one of the trawlers that had managed to get out of Port. It was the best fish and chips ever!

Later that evening she came and said the weather predictions had changed, a red warning for wind had been posted, she had cleared some space outside the rear of the pub where I would be more sheltered and protected. Superb hospitality, a place that I have a very soft spot for and a lovely lady.

 

[RoB5urf]

We don't have a fridge so its mostly tins and veg. We're fans of one-pot veg meals like chilli, curry etc so we always take tins of kidney beans, chickpeas, lentils; jars of curry sauce, sweet potatoes, peppers etc. Then we might shop locally for BBQ stuff like tuna steaks, sausages for use on the same day.

 

[Loz]

We have a large saucepan and what we do quite often for a quick no hassle meal is put two boil in the bag Uncle Ben's rice portions in the water and two wayfarer meals that heat in the bag on top and heat the whole lot up in one go.
1 pan to swill out and 2 plates/bowls to wash, simples...

 

[Erbster]

We love our thermal cooker. Prep in morning or at lunchtime, hot meal ready when you're tired at the end of the day. Easy to cook meals from fresh. http://mrdscookware.co.uk


Charles

 

[FoodieLoobie]

+1 for that.

Also, as the OP acknowledges, there are a lot of very nice restaurants around the NC500 route if you don't want to cook every evening, or for lunches en route. Here's just a small selection, that we've tried and can recommend:
- Dornoch Castle Hotel. But better to avoid their 'home made' gin!
- The Old School restaurant, near Kinlochbervie. Simple but well cooked pub-style food.
- Drumbeg Stores. Not a restaurant, but a superbly stocked village shop.
- Peet's, Lochinver. Lovely relaxed modern-style brasserie by the harbour, excellent seafood.
- Am Fuaran bar/restaurant. Directly opposite the lovely Port a Bhaigh campsite at Altandhu. Dark and atmospheric inside, so maybe more of a winter-time stop, but good food anyway.
- Shieldaig Bar and Coastal Kitchen restaurant. On the lochside in the very pretty village of Shieldaig. And pick up some salmon from the smokery just up the street to take away.
- The Applecross Inn. An institution, not to be missed IMO.

All this information is brilliant. I will print your reply and take the list with me so we can try a few out as we pass on our travels. Thank you.

 

[FoodieLoobie]

Thank to everyone for all your suggestions. I will definitely take some frozen meals as well as fresh food when we set off. We will be buying local produce during the trip and trying out a few restaurants too.

I know the fridge will keep the frozen things frozen for a while - last time we had a couple of nights away I put the fridge an maximum to get it cold, then thought I had turned it down, but turns out I hadn't. Hubby said iced beer was an odd experience! I know this was operator error but I will learn from it and double check the setting next time. The white wine was very nicely chilled though!

 

[vmaxkiddy]

I keep some of these (http://www.lookwhatwefound.co.uk) in the van. Can be boiled in bag, nuked, or empty in to a pan and heated with pre cooked rice.

 

[bvddobb]

We have a small stash of some tinned food, rice, pasta etc always on board for the odd (emergency) occasion we have not been able to buy fresh on the way. And when we leave, we take some of the leftovers we might have in the freezer at home to finish the first one or two days. But from then on it's always local and fresh.

 

[GillianC]

We love our thermal cooker. Prep in morning or at lunchtime, hot meal ready when you're tired at the end of the day. Easy to cook meals from fresh. http://mrdscookware.co.uk


Charles

Wow this looks interesting! Never heard of it before.

 

[jmw]

We take the usual stuff - fresh pasta and a sauce of some kind, M&S tinned curry and I can recommend the Jamie Oliver vacuum packed beany casserole thingy too. In addition we take rice, couscous and some homemade frozen flatbreads which are heated up in a frying pan. We can add fresh stuff to these basics and usually carry some fresh herbs, curry powder and a jar of hot mango pickle to give the tinned curry a bit more flavour. Also tinned rice pud is a great 'after a chilly walk' treat.

 

[Digger]

Bought a vacuum seal machine to take home made chilli plus rib eye steaks and eggs (ridge monkey does nice steaks) Plus on GJ's posting - tinned curries.

 

[Erbster]

Wow this looks interesting! Never heard of it before.

We bought it pretty much on a whim a few years back. We can make a two pot meal for four. Useful size saucepan for us (2adults+2kids)


Charles

 

[peregrinus]

We usually cook a pan of something and keep it in a thermal bag so its still warm when we arrive at our stopover. For short hops, I also take Kohinoor curry in a bag from Lidl for £1 a helping and boil them in the bag with Uncle bens BIB rice. They all cook in one pan of water. I ate them everyday at Latitude.
We then eat whatever we find locally.

I'm interested in the people who take a freezer. Does it work off 12v or just on hook up?

 

[Esandar#1]

We usually cook a pan of something and keep it in a thermal bag so its still warm when we arrive at our stopover. For short hops, I also take Kohinoor curry in a bag from Lidl for £1 a helping and boil them in the bag with Uncle bens BIB rice. They all cook in one pan of water. I ate them everyday at Latitude.
We then eat whatever we find locally.

I'm interested in the people who take a freezer. Does it work off 12v or just on hook up?

Hi peregrinus,
I think people are taking a fridge (set on very coldest setting) rather than a freezer. If you pack your fridge with pre-frozen items, and have it on it's coldest setting, it will all stay very cold for several days. We have a Beach and have bought a Dometic Fridge for extended trips. This works off the 12v when driving (though we have learned to plug it into the 12v socket in front dash as that is battery engined powered - thus saving leisure battery). It works off the three pin mains when on EHU or it will work of the 12v leisure battery sockets for maybe 1-2 days if turned down to a lower setting, or it can run off gas (but only outside the van I would suggest!) We find this is better and bigger than a 12v powered cool box but it is a more expensive and bulkier solution. Will let you know in September how this solution worked for us on our planned August trip. Taking it does go slightly against the grain of keeping things simple, but having a supply of food staples that need to be kept cool is an important part of good sustainence (or so the wife reminds me!). You can add your freezer cool blocks as you go (if needed to help the fridge).

If you want to go the whole hog, there are lots of threads about how you can hard wire in a temporary fridge and improve your lesiure battery endurance qualities using a clever bit of kit called a Ctek. For now we just put our fridge in the Beach when needed and sometimes use it as a beer / wine fridge at home in the interim!

https://vwcaliforniaclub.com/thread...e-to-leisure-battery.17642/page-4#post-220381