Is there any such thing as a...

[Fredflinstoneswife1]

Picnic style freezer bag which would keep icecream frozen for say 12hrs?

I usually do picnics to keep the cost down for our family days out, but one thing that is very costly now is icecream in a cone, around £12 for four cones where I am. I'd love to know if such a thing exists as a cool bag that actually keeps things frozen which I could throw a tub of icecream in and not face a mess at the end of the day!!

You need the catering style ice blocks. They stay frozen for absolutely ages.

We put ice lollies in a thermos flask. You could put ice cream in scoops in one of those designed for soup maybe

You can get big blocks for freezer . Put in cool bag with a box of ice cream cones .

The easiest thing is just to promise them an ice cream when you get home. Take cake instead.

Find a tesco express, co op, iceland etc and dont look in the individual ice cream freezer, look in the big freezers... box of 4 for a few pounds

A small cool box with decent blocks BUT you must pre-cool it first so fill it with bags of frozen peas or something overnight. Then swap new ice blocks in the morning, remove peas then IMMEDIATELY put ice cream in and zip. Fill any empty space with clean cloths or scrumpled up newspaper

Have you got any takeaway containers? The plastic ones that you get from Chinese/Indian restaurants? Fill those with water and freeze them. They will stay frozen for absolutely ages.

Fill 2litre milk bottles of water and freeze & /or drinking water for the day .. the larger blocks of lice will keep ice cream cold - wrap in newspapers or esky to trap cold.

We used to have a plug in cool box would go in the car boot. It could do frozen or fridged and we used it for camping.

I would just be careful of high tech solutions because they might not actually save you money.

A multi pack of magnums or cornettos is what, £5. As you say, buying ice cream cones for the family is £12 so you're only saving £7 per picnic.

An electric cooler box is anywhere from £50-120 according to a quick search. My goodness, it'll take you more than 10 picnics before you've saved any money.

It's not worth it. Save it for when you get home

Will you be travelling in a car? You can get ones that plug into the car to keep cool I think. Like a mini fridge as such

Besides, your kids will see other children walking around with their Hackney Gelatos and then being presented with a soggy half-thawed cornetto, they won't even appreciate it. I've found it's easier just to say no sometimes.

Then when they get home and the only option is a cornetto from the freezer, it feels more like a treat then

Yeah sure, these, and lots like it.

www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B0DVCHK73Z/?encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_plhdr=t&aaxitk=e0ff31ede016d79c73049e2c9179c448&hsa_cr_id=0&qid=1776167803&sr=1-2-1ee1b2e4-01d1-4cd0-b737-4c27ebfc8105&aref=4Wd3NFgx7y&ref=sbx__sbtcd2_asin_1_title&pd_rd_w=4cNkn&content-id=amzn1.sym.ea5688b2-3646-4432-bc05-fbb4b7714d51%3Aamzn1.sym.ea5688b2-3646-4432-bc05-fbb4b7714d51&pf_rd_p=ea5688b2-3646-4432-bc05-fbb4b7714d51&pf_rd_r=Q22GN5MBAHJAXJV7TWFZ&pd_rd_wg=cDi2S&pd_rd_r=d871aaca-bf94-4dc3-a938-a2ea84a082b6&th=1

Yeah this, I did this recently, and everyone else was queuing up for the van! Literally spent the same on a box of 4 as they were spending on 1. May even have been less for some types!

If you are thinking about going the electric cool box route, the best time to buy new (or ideally secondhand) is autumn. We got ours on a local selling group for about £5 and it ran for about 10 years before finally conking out. We get all our camping equipment like that and it’s often barely used.