Another camping food one; eating a balanced diet (e.g.vegetables)

[NannyR]

I've just come back from my first camping trip. I had 5 days chilling out in the Lakes and enjoyed most of it, apart from 24 hours of torrential rain!

However I would love some ideas for eating better when camping. I had a trangia stove (the really small one person size) and I took a couple of portions of frozen chilli and some pouches of curry and meatballs, all served with pre cooked rice warmed up. I just felt that it got a bit boring and samey, and I couldn't wait for some fresh veg when I got home.

Also, can anyone recommend a really good, but small cool box? I took a cheapy 24 litre box but it wasnt that effective and it was only half full - milk, bacon, wine. I think I could probably get away with one half the size.

Thanks

Could you take some frozen mixed veg? Then you just need to reheat - if you took a steamer you could do this over a pan containing another element of your meal. Also thin about quick cook veg: spinach, peas etc

Tinned veg??

I take stewed steak /casserole frozen or buy tinned tewing steak then add tinned veg and potatoes and cook in the one pan.

I have a dbl burner and take a frying pan and do stir fries - using the supermarket pre pack stir fry veg.

I have also bought the cooked chickens in the supermarket - served with boiled veg and gravy made from granules.

I do use alot of tins when camping. I buy fresh meat but pad it out with jars and tinned sauces and veg.

I have a big cool box and i freeze a couple of 2litre bottles of water + some small individual ones to use as ice packs, then as they defrost and you've used up the meat etc from the box you can drink them. If we're away for a few days I take some frozen sausages and bacon helping them stay cool for longer.

I have a smaller cool box for things we use often, like milk, drinks and butter, then you don't have to open the big one so often, keeping the cold in.

I tend to take salad and fruit more than veg tbh as it goes with anything and doesn't take up room on the stove like veg. Exception being corn cobs.

Also, your box may have been less effective because it was half empty. Try filling the space, even if only with frozen water and other drinks to keep it colder.

Salad!

We eat a lot of salad when we camp. Not much in the way of other (cooked) veggies. So salad with every packed lunch (big tupperware of tomatoes, cucumber, pepper, radishes, carrot sticks, etc. to share between us), and quite often something with salad in the evening.

Yy to filling the coolbox. Pack it with newspaper if nothing else.

We generally take veg we eat raw - carrots, sugar snaps, peppers. Plus plenty of fruit.

Corn on the cob is beautiful cooked on the embers of a campfire in its husk.

A Dutch oven and tripod, big veggie stews that cook well and are yummy

Nanny - we cook risotto on our trangia - I agree that that does sound samey!

Things like carrots, baby cauliflower, green beans, new potatoes, tomatoes, broccoli, squash, onions, leeks, apples and oranges would all last for five days without a fridge.

We eat tons of fruit and veg, at home and when camping. I put fruit and veg in a cool bag, no ice packs, and leave it in the shade. We eat things like salad leaves and strawberries on the day we buy them but find that everything else is fine in good old Blighty without refrigeration generally.

Stir fry type things are possible in the trangia too.

If you want a better box have a look at an icey-tel I love mine, ££££ though, but well worth it imo :)

I would probably try filling your existing cool box with fruit and veg first to see how it fares if you are missing fresh food.

I have a Dometic Waeco Cool Ice - lasts five days easily - review here:

www.blokespost.com/camping/gear/techni-ice-vs-waeco-cool-ice-review/2807

Small size here:

marinestore.co.uk/Dometic_Waeco_13Ltr_Cool_Ice_Passive_Box.html

A white cabbage and some carrots would keep fresh unrefrigerated, and with some sachets of mayo available at Burger King etc you could make coleslaw to avoid using another ring. Do you have a fire as well as your trangia? Or BBQ? We have done corn on the cob (buy one in it's leaves to keep a couple of days) , or Mediterranean type veg cut up and roasted in foil parcels in the embers.

To improve the efficacy of any cool box/bag keep it covered in a wet cloth. The heat will evaporate the water from the cloth rather than heat up the contents. It really works! You have to keep wetting the cloth and it has to be big enough to completely cover it.

Before coolboxes existed, my Dad would use a large terracotta plant pot upended on a tea tray covered with the wet cloth arrangement, surprisingly effective!

As pp have suggested, use a receptacle just big enough for your needs, so investigate the many different sized coolbags out there. Consider shoving the whole thing in the freezer before you go and have 2 sets of freezer packs so you can have one in the bag/box and one in the campsite freezer.

And salad bags are your friend!

Nanny, must add that last week I cooked risotto in the big pan and then covered it/put the pan on the grass while I cooked asparagus in the frying pan and wiped it out and warmed bread in the frying pan - you can do a lot with a trangia.

Thanks for all the suggestions. It seems that salads might be the way to go!

I need to get more used to cooking with such a small pan and just one burner - I wasn't actually doing any cooking last week, just warming things up.
For example, at home last night I had marinaded chicken, asparagus and broccoli and there is no reason why I couldn't have cooked that on the trangia, provided I could keep the chicken cool and fresh (along that line of thought, I could marinate the chicken at home and freeze it in a food bag then pop it in the cool box before I go, it would be still fresh and defrosted enough to eat in a day or two, wouldn't it?

Can second the waeco boxes- we have one and it's really good (and much cheaper than icey-tec),
Another tip is to make one pots at home (stews, tangine, curries etc) with plenty of veg in them, freeze them and then they will defrost slowly in ice box. We take one ready to go for first night and then two other frozen options. Also, salmon or chicken marinaded and griddled/BBQ'd with one or two veg... (disposable BBQ)