...must be SOMETHING we can eat..?

[Baddox]

When we carry the tent off into the hills for a few days we take tortilla wraps with us instead of bread. They are bought pre-sealed in bags and stay fresh for months. Another advantage is they’re already flat so take up little room and don’t mind being squashed in the bottom of a bag.

 

[dancrane]

...plus, there's no beating Mexican entres!

Hmm, you have me wondering, just what non-refrigerated Caracas folk take for their weekend breaks.

It must be perfectly possible, or the world wouldn't have been populated where it's always hot...and the opposite seems to be true!

 

[nimbusgb]

I wouldn't bother with biltong - very expensive and pretty unappetising.

I can tell you have never had decent biltong!

 

[dancrane]

I expect there's already been a thread on this theme, but I haven't yet worked out how to search through our 'archives'. So...

...can one successfully grow any vegetables on a yacht? They'd need to survive being sealed up in a bright cabin, sometimes.

I don't want the interior to resemble Montague Withnail's house, but some really fresh stuff, and fresh-caught mackerel, would liven-up any long trip's meal-times.

 

[guernseyman]

Is there any solution to bread, or rolls, that doesn't require their being chilled?

Chapattis, made with just wholemeal flour, salt, and water. Use a wine bottle as rolling pin. Cook in dry frying pan, or grill them.

 

[prv]

...can one successfully grow any vegetables on a yacht?

People seem to grow cress and beansprouts on long voyages.

I guess nobody tries much with more substantial veg, because 1) it takes up space, 2) on a long voyage you don't have the water to spare 3) on a short voyage you don't have the time to spare and can just pop to the shops anyway.

Someone told me that Dutch barges often grow tomatoes on deck. Not been there myself.

Pete

 

[dancrane]

Green instincts...

I found a forgotten onion in a rarely-opened cupboard in the kitchen at home. It had pale green shoots, eight inches long, coming out of it. Admiring its instinct for survival, I planted it in a pot and watered it. Three weeks on, it's two foot high and has learned how to use the TV remote.

So, I expect they're rugged enough for shipboard life; I'm just wondering how I'll know when to harvest?

On reflection, it'll have to be a pretty long voyage if onions which are fresh at the start, are inedible before landfall. Are there any other vegetables that repay a little compost and hospitality, and serve themselves up for yacht crews who are tired of salt-beef and weevilly biscuits?

 

[rob2]

I remember someone writing in PBO about keeping meat on board. He advocated frying the meat in olive oil and then putting into a kilner jar, or similar, pouring over the cooking oil and filling up with fresh. Apparently his trials so far showed it worked for a matter of months, simply reheating before eating.

Rob.

 

[Grumpybear]

I believe Miles and Beryl Smeeton used this method on their travels in Tzu Hang in the 1950s. Some of her other culinary methods were less palatable, to judge from Miles Clark's superb biography High Endeavours.

 

[dancrane]

Grumpybear, please don't stop there!

Let me guess what the 'less palatable' aspects of the menu included...

Membri virilis of komodo dragon? Or, squid-ink cocktails?

Amazing, how pampered we are today. I almost never feel hungry. Then again, I am getting worryingly fat. Hard to imagine our forebears' almost intolerable hardships on long treks/voyages, the highpoints of which we now look back at as utterly, enjoyably glorious.

I quite like the 1984 film The Bounty, with Anthony Hopkins as Bligh, keeping the lifeboat full of men more-or-less alive by occasional molecules of nourishment, and sheer discipline.

 

[jwilson]

Apologies in advance, if this subject has been covered many times and your eyes are closing at the revival...

Leaving aside refrigerated and deep-frozen products, does anyone have some really reliable recipes for hearty dinners that can be made only from things left in tins and packets, at cabin-temperature, for months on galley shelves?

After time away, often arriving aboard too late to have shopped for fresh ingredients, I've wondered what I should keep in stock, which might have made something really good.

I'm thinking here of something more substantial and, frankly, more impressive, than a pie in a tin. (Though, those are great, too. When there's really nothing else.)

Any favourite solutions?

No, but the worst dinner I ever had on board was in Barry Old Docks, Sunday night at the end of November, raining hard, and all that was left on board was a tin of broad beans and some brown rice. I'd expected to be back at Uphill, and home for dinner, but ran out of wind and tide coming up from Ilfracombe.

 

[Grumpybear]

dan crane

Read the book! She did make curry for guests using cat food on one occasion. she was also prone to mixing up (before setting off) roadkill for their animals with proper meat for the family......

 

[dancrane]

Thank you Grumpybear. I'll find time to read the book. Sounds very...practical.

 

[dancrane]

J Wilson, that was interesting reading, thanks. But a question arises therefrom:

(Your quote...) all that was left on board was a tin of broad beans and some brown rice. I'd expected to be back at Uphill, and home for dinner, but ran out of wind.

...broad beans and brown rice?? How could you run out of wind??



I'll be absent for a fortnight, now. Enjoy the peace...