Reading what different people are spending to cruise lead me to ask a question: What is the least amount of money that you can cruise with assuming that you keep your health and your boat in good working order? I am sure Jim B. and a few others got by for a few hundred or less a month... What is the least amount of money that is required to be a nautical gypsy?
Granted you would have to be very careful of your port of calls.
You would not go through any expensive canals.
And you would probably have to have a smaller inexpensive boat.
You would probably do all your own maintenance , trade skills with sailors for charts and other needs and live off the sea and your ingenuity.
Sounds crazy, but for those of us caught in the rat race- it would be pretty cool. :D
I wonder the same thing. When I finally get to set sail it will be on a super tight budget.
Hung out with a cool guy last night, a transient on his way back from the BVI, singlehanding his 40' Panda. His view, like many folks here have expressed/experienced, is that the cheap way to cruise, is to stay out of marinas. :)
He was telling me about a couple he met/knew who've just completed their circumnavigation. They took 6 years to make it around E to W, and stayed in marinas TWICE in the whole trip. And one of those times was because they had a job at that marina. :)
They did have some other times when they were hauled for maintenance, but by choice, and other than that, only those 2 marina stays. I bet that extended their cruising time by several months, with what they saved doing it that way...
Quote from: newt on April 25, 2008, 01:08:01 AM
What is the least amount of money that is required to be a nautical gypsy?
Short answer is that I do not know.......
Long answer? Well, my plan for 2009 is to spend 3 months on the Boat trying to live on...........a Dollar a Day :o......will I succeed?........of course not!.......but the reason for trying is to learn about me and my boat and how cheaply
I could (or would want to!) live on an extended (never ending?) voyage (and also to give me stuff to talk about on the Internet ::))........but the main reason is to give me something to work towards now.....and motivate me to give "Wayluya" Seadog the TLC I have promised........
Always easy (and a good idea) to take advice, but no substitute for doing something yerself.......and for something like this does not have to be tested for the first time on the RTW voyage.........
I am not sure how much money you spend is the important thing, but what you spend it on.
Restaurants, marinas, a car rental at EVERY stop, every wizgadget West Marine has in the catalogue, etc. probably don't enhance the "experience" of the cruise all that much, if at all.
Buying local crafts to give as gifts to people you meet along the way would, I think. So would spending whatever it takes to keep the boat in good shape (unexpected repairs do crop up) to get you where you want to go with confidence. Small boats with less 'stuff' to spend money on frees up money to go to outside-the-boat experiences.
For each $ one spends, one has to earn it. While work here in the rat-race might suck, working along the way (deliveries, boat repairs, or whatever one might do) allows one more opportunity to meet, interact and become immersed in where one is. For me, some places will open teaching opportunities. As I sit here, I can think of little else that would allow me a fuller, richer experience of the local culture than teaching high schoolers for a year (something I would be loathe to do here, btw). So...by pinching pennies TOO much, I might deny myself some of these "earning" experiences as well. (Hey, it's just a thought!)
My point is that, for me at least, focusing on the NUMBER of $$ per month is less satisfying than knowing that I could be self sufficient and that the money that IS spent is, within my own goals and values, money WELL spent.
That said, I think we are realistically looking at $1200-1500 per month as a minimum. That's for four of us. That, of course, supposes that I spend a bucket of $$ on the boat before we head off anywhere.
Good Post CapnSmollett! grog on you!
For what it's worth, during my four-month cruise in the Baltic Sea last year I spent around 2300 USD (but in SEK=swedish kronor obviously ;))
On the other hand I spent 6000 USD on the boat before departure. a new set of sails and a second-hand radar. Spread that cost over 10 years and that gives you another 600 added to the 2300 divided with four months etc..... you could bend those figures back and forth to eternity but everyone of us has different approaches to this, and different 'needs' and 'desires'...
As added info I spent about 1 night/week in a marina/guest harbour as an average. 25 bucks per night on an average. My cruising grounds are loaded with sheltered anchorages so no need to use marinas other than for shore service as laundry, provisioning etc.
Perhaps this is helpful for someone...
All depends on the sailing ground. Europe and some places in the States are a lot more expensive than less developed countries of course. After the usual expenses on the boat, food, fuel and some extras to make life more exciting (like some travel inland, some drinks at a local bar etc.. ) should be the only expenses. For 2, last year in Mexico the average was no more than $500 a month including some days at a marina (they are quite expensive in Mexico), but the rest is cheap. Food, local transportation etc... as long as you stay off the tourist traps. Long gone the days when $50 a month was enough to live in Brazil for 2 including some good times and some extras in the local restaurant... But I know there is still some places where $ 100 a month is plenty.
Capt Smollett wrote:
>allows one more opportunity to meet, interact and become immersed in where one is.<
One of the best times I ever had was working as an illegal migrant farm worker in Italy harvesting the wine grape crop, hiding from the local police when they came around checking for illegals.
Hope the statue of limitation is past ;D
Didn't the Pardeys write a book about the 'Cost Concious Cruiser'?
Oded
Wow David old Jersey...
I wonder if a dollar a day is really possible. Probably not but a nice exercise anyway. Make sure and post how your 'experiment" goes. Manannan- if you can really live off of 100 per person per month, I think that would be quite an accomplishment. Where would that be?
The other side of this equation- working as a illegal-quasi legal worker in a foreign country is intriguing. It sounds like those experiences are rewarding in different ways. As a physician, I dream of going around and giving a free clinic in the poorer islands, then setting sail and doing it again, but the logistics would probably be too great, not to mention the red tape.
For the time being, I guess I will keep my day job. ;D
Quote from: newt on April 25, 2008, 12:55:45 PM
As a physician, I dream of going around and giving a free clinic in the poorer islands, then setting sail and doing it again, but the logistics would probably be too great, not to mention the red tape.
For the time being, I guess I will keep my day job. ;D
For physicians, I don't think is it all that difficult. The issue is supply and demand. Throw away, unskilled jobs are heavily regulated in terms of getting 'permission' to work. On the other side of the coin, highly skilled jobs, like anything in medicine, are always in demand. You won't make what you are used to here, but then again, not everything of value has a $ in front of it.
I've researched this a fair bit. I've found that in Australia, for example, they are VERY strict about letting guests work - EXCEPT in medicine and teaching. :) These happen to be the fields we can work!
Honduras is another place I've been looking into. I've been in contact with a school on the coast that would hire both my wife and I right now, if we could go. They wanted us down there Fall 2007, and because they are used to dealing with Stateside and other foreign teachers, they are set up to help with the immigration issues.
Also, there's a clinic in Honduras that would take us both (her as a Physician, me doing tech support stuff for the lab gear and computers) this minute. It's a volunteer shop, though, and we have not figured out the financials on that one yet. I've toyed around with getting some kind of Stateside sponsorship to go down there for a year or so.
In other words, governments make it hard for jobs they don't really need, but easy other wise.
Someone who's really doing it-Grog to ya! Now I just have to talk my wife into living our home. Hmmm- any ideas on that? :o
Quote from: newt on April 25, 2008, 03:57:31 PM
Someone who's really doing it-Grog to ya! Now I just have to talk my wife into living our home. Hmmm- any ideas on that? :o
Have both you and she read Changine Course (http://books.google.com/books?id=UnjWaCDdcfgC&dq=amazon+changing+course+cantrell&pg=PP1&ots=35amiGYsVT&sig=R0A0fnItLLYACH8b99wfEUoO1LM&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Amazon,+Changing+Course,+Cantrell&btnG=Search&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail) by Debra Cantrell? Excellent read for both sexes.
We've read the book, but when I know the answer to the question you asked, I'll share it with ya! Right now, we are planning/researching/lining up ducks.
Our single biggest hurdle is making payments on her med school loans. If it were not for that, we could "cash out" today (not that she WOULD...but we COULD).
The 3rd world opportunities, like the teaching job I mentioned, would not cover those payments, much less leave anything left to live on. That teaching job does, however, include room and board and tuition for our children to attend school while we are there.
So, basically we have to save enough to make 1 year's worth of payments on that %^&**& loan (yes, I know, I know) to head out for a year or so. Cash from selling the house and the cars would have to be put into safekeeping to allow re-landing after said year, because right now, full-time no-end-in-sight cruising is just not in the cards for my wife.
When my wife and I lived in Italy for a year so I could study violin making there, we rented our house. Which only worked out so so. However, when my wife's boss found out we were planning to do this he voluntarily continued paying her for the year we were away. Plus he bought a cello I made.
"Do good things and good things happen"
from 'my name is Earl TV show) ;D
Oded
First I must qualify this post by saying that I'm single and I've got a small boat.
I've done three extended trips to Mexico and Central America,none less than three months.I've found that if I stay away from the tourist traps like Cabo,P.V.,and Z-town and anchor out of the smaller towns,the fishing is better and it's actually difficult to blow more than $150 a week.That includes getting a motel roomwith a real shower and a bed on Saturday night.
Speaking the language really helps with making friends.Once you've got local friends your on your way to paying local prices,which are quite different from tourist prices.
I mainly head to the Sea of Cortez anymore on my layoffs.
If your only cost is food for one person, and you are willing to live on simple foods, $1 to $2 a day in the US is possible for food. This would be for a diet made up of whole wheat bread, soups and vegetarian meals with few extra treats. The foods must be bought in bulk at food coops or other bulk supply places for the best prices. It would be best if you were smart about it and learned to fish, hunt, garden and gather wild foods to add to a diet of staples. I probably could not live on this diet for more than a few weeks but it would be healthy and I might lose some weight.
Food prices are going up so this will put a squeeze on things. The US is quite cheap compared to most places. If you want to do this as an experiment, the US may actually be the cheapest place in the world right now due to the falling value of the dollar and the highly efficient retail distribution system in the US.
If you want to keep moving, you need to be in an area where you can sail most of the time, only using the motor to get out into the open. This means big water rather than canals and rivers. There have to be plenty of anchorages within reasonable distances. Places that I know of are the Great Lakes, Chesapeake Bay, and the Southeastern coastal states, especially NC and SC. Florida might have been a boaters paradise at one time but now the stories make it out to be paradise lost. You might be able to do Western Rivers if you start up north and motor only as needed (Mississippi to the Tenn-Tom for example). Accept that moving slowly and waiting for favorable winds is the best way to travel.
You have to avoid having anything on the boat that you cannot repair yourself, or that you cannot do without if it stops working. The boat needs to be small, simple and sturdy.
I think that Paul's approach is practical. Let's say that you wanted to repeat Thoreau's experiment on Walden Pond- two years of isolation and self examination with very limited outside contact.
1. You live in isolated bays and estuaries along Maine during the summer and the everglades in the winter...venturing beyond the 3 or 10 mile state boundary for fresh fish if wanted. (so you don't have to go to town for fishing licenses) Or become a Florida resident and get your own crab pots.
2, Grow bean sprouts and simple vegetable trays at extended anchorages. Use vitamins to supplement your vegetarian or fish and grain diet.
3. A solar cell system for radio (emergency) weather fax and water maker. You may be able to live without a water maker if you anchor in freshwater and do the manual purifier thing, but I think a electric water maker would be a luxury I would pay for. After all even Thoreau had pure water. I don't know if there are yet pure freshwater springs that can be used by cruisers along the Atlantic/Gulf of Mexico seaboard.
4. A manual sewing machine and all the tools needed to fix everything on board (except perhaps a engine overhaul). Epoxy and patches, welding gear?
5. a bulletproof dingy, preferably made by you.
6. Finally, a good supply of your favorite classic books. And lots of journal material.
Could you provision for two years this way? Perhaps in a slightly bigger boat...but just think what you would learn along the way! ;D
When I was younger I use to spend a lot of time in the desert- getting my head straight and enjoying the life that was there. I think a journey like this has a lot more potential - as long as you take it slow and don't sail into any hurricanes. There has to be someone in the group who has done something like this- what do you say out there?
Quote from: newt on April 26, 2008, 12:34:55 AM
but I think a electric water maker would be a luxury I would pay for. After all even Thoreau had pure water. I don't know if there are yet pure freshwater springs that can be used by cruisers along the Atlantic/Gulf of Mexico seaboard.
There's always rainfall, too.
When Yves Gellinas started on his circumnavigation, he was counting on refilling his tanks with rain. The first 70 days or so, from the English Channel to Cape of Good Hope, he had surprisingly little rain (far less than he had planned to get). He was down to a few liters when he resupplied at the Cape.
Quote from: sharkbait on April 25, 2008, 06:48:54 PM
.
Speaking the language really helps with making friends.Once you've got local friends your on your way to paying local prices,which are quite different from tourist prices.
do not forget some item to trade for fish or lobsters.. or fruit and veggie, and think about some occasional and... innocent 8) smuggling items to sell or trade, that can extend your cruising for quite a bit. I had some experience on living and travelling with less than a dollar a day, but that was riding a horse in the heart of Brazil for 3 months. Also, because of some downluck, had to live on rice and beans for sometimes while cruising until we reached a place we could find work (always illegally, but without any problems..).
Quote from: newt on April 25, 2008, 12:55:45 PM
Wow David old Jersey...
I wonder if a dollar a day is really possible. Probably not but a nice exercise anyway.
My thinking is also not, but apart from the catchy title "sailing away for a dollar a day" 8) I figure be of interest to me (and maybe others? - depending how I get on) for my later use.......however I should mention that I will be "cheating" to some degree, mainly that between now and then the boat will have $$$$ spent on her to make my life easier / cheaper later on......and I can afford more than $1 a day (which is both a plus and a minus for this project - as IME neccesity is the mother of invention or at least motivation!).
Below is part of a post I did elsewhere, with a few more details of my thinking (hopes? / delusions?!):-
OK, their are a couple of compromises (cheats?!) involved....
1) Only going for 3 months - I am not completely mad! I reckon long enuf to learn what is working and what is not. (boat and budget wise). Plus it is a weather thing.
2) D-Day (Dollar Day?) is 17 May 2009 (see comments about boat needing some TLC )
3) My Kitty will more than allow for emergencies (or cheating!) or changing the trip into a more normal one if things get too much on a dollar a day.
4) A fair wad of cash will be spent on the boat beforehand that could otherwise be spent during the 3 months to up the budget comfortably above a Dollar a Day, including to make my life easier during this (and future?) trips.
5) I will not be voyaging far (relatively) - Throughout the Channel Islands and to the adjacent coast of France (I know the areas - and most importantly know free berthing / places to Anchor - plus easy to abort the trip from).
(http://www.ired.com/pix/news/mkt/channel.gif)
6) I have a good idea that I will be able to get free WIFI access at least now and again - but I may well include access to the Internet outside the dollar a day expenses in order that I can update a Blog.
7) I am thinking that I will spend a lot of time fishing - and I hope this is my main source of Bartering (and Protein?!) - Before I depart will line up some Barter freindly folk. who like fish .
8') I do have certain shoreside expenses / commitments (not a great deal - but some) that I will still need to meet during the 3 month trip which will be outside my Dollar a day budget - but I will not be allowed to use my shoreside facilities (Home / Cars / Motorbikes / Workshop / Washing Machine) etc etc.
9) The Boat will (hopefully) be well sorted at the outset - so likely that no major boat expenses will be incurred. Famous last words!
10) I will start off with a full tank of diesel (not in the Budget) but I will add the top up on my return to the budget.
A few "rules" (which I may or may not break).....
1) No "begging" or depending on the kindness of others (aka scrounging) - and no working - however, bartering will be allowed. If someone is willing to swap a couple of cans of baked beans for some fresh fish or for a meal cooked onboard then all well and good. Not too sure about bartering my manual labour for food......sounds too much like work .
2) Not sure about guests aboard who exchange food for free accomadation - or getting invited ashore for nosh - sounds a bit too cheating, but I will think about this a bit more.
3) Not allowed to return home to do my laundery / watch TV etc
4) No criminal activity But morally dubious is OK
5) Not sure about adding a "Begging Button" to my Website.......I was thinking about giving folk the option to contribute a dollar towards the following expenses of their choice:-
a) Cold Beer
b) Hot Women
c) Boring Boat Bits
So the big question is........what do I spend USD92 on??? I am thinking bags of Rice.......and maybe Multivitamins
BTW I am quite happy to fail to meet the USD1 target, (and expect to) but am interested in how close I can get / what the expenses and difficulties prove to be.
I reserve the right to instead go to Vegas ;D
Your Dollar a Day challenge is interesting not only from a perspective of "how do I budget" but also how does not having money affect your way of thinking. Is it a purifying process? a struggle? do you walk away from the experiment with a feeling of freedom and independence? do you come back to civilization seeing things that you once thought were necessary as luxuries and conveniences that only lead to wage slavery, or does the constant gnawing hunger turn you into a stark raving madman? :) oh the drama!
From another perspective, I like to spend time in the wilderness, and would like to spend a summer exploring places like
http://tinyurl.com/6s2wcx (http://tinyurl.com/6s2wcx)
http://tinyurl.com/6re36o (http://tinyurl.com/6re36o)
Its not really so much to escape from people as much as getting away from the hustle and bustle and to enjoy natural beauty, being surrounded by nature rather than driving in and standing at the brink of wilderness in a park. Thats what you can get with a boat, being part of natural environment rather than an alien transported in from the human sector of the planet. Or you could think of the boat as your own personal space ship and pretend you are exploring other planets, your choice of fantasies.
A side effect of wilderness anchoring is that when provisioning for long periods of time without a refrigerator, you tend to eat less expensive foods. While there are towns that you could visit to buy things and services, for the most part there is no one to take your money in the wilderness. So it is possible to follow a different quest and still end up at the dollar a day experiment. I think it would be more difficult anchored near towns, the temptation would be much greater. mmm pizza! irresistable!
As a minimum, to survive comfortably, each day I would need:
a handfull of legumes (beans, peas, lentils)
a couple of teaspoons of dried vegetables
a handfull of rice
a few pinches of spices
an onion and a few potatoes
a dollop or two of oil
a cup or two of flour
a handfull or two of mixed nuts, seeds, grains and dried fruits
a pinch of yeast
a few quarts of water
fuel to prepare the food,
a pinch or two of baking soda to brush my teeth,
and a swipe of soap to wash and shave.
beyond that all is luxury.
However I do enjoy luxuries!
Some serious cruising waters there.
One of my very favorite books is Hiscocks "Wandering Under Sail" in which he wrote about his early vogages all over that area, in an engineless gaff cutter, Wanderer and later Wanderer II.
Also that area is the same place where most of the tales come from in Heavy Weather Sailing, by Alard Coles
Definitely NOT the Florida Keys or the Bahamas. ;D
I'd say that accepting good will gifts, say of seafood or such would be perfectly acceptable. Even if you were cruising on much more, you wouldn't turn down a good will gift like that, from a friendly person.
One other thing-fuel for cooking...
What if you modified a smaller wood stove to fit in your boat. I think even a large can which you could mount on the rear pulpit and cook over a grill. You would use Propane or other while underway, and gather driftwood when at anchor. Refrigeration- I don't know. It sure would be nice for storing a larger fish- but I guess you could dry the meat. I guess my meat drying racks could double as my clothes line which would also work as my boom.
It sounds like we are not designing the most stylish of homes, but one that could really work. ;)
Really good post there, Skylark. I splashed some grog on you. Interesting for me to see those 'close-ups' from the Great Lakes. Had no idea there are some nice islands there... this whole planet is probably just filled with sweet spots...
let's go explore them! ;D
Quote from: skylark on April 26, 2008, 08:33:14 AM
However I do enjoy luxuries!
Me too ;D - but I am someone who is happy with a straightforward life, even if it does involve more than a hairshirt.
Also am mentally self sufficient, and I am not going to be spending my time totally alone - so (hopefully!) madness should not overcome me!........have also been both temporarily and completely broke when far abroad and it does not fundamently phase me - and in this case I will be cheating about being broke (although next trip - the "big one" - I may not be cheating!).
Not sure about Garden Island - nearby Beaver Island sound like it would be worth investigating.......at least for a bloke stuck on a boat for 3 months ;D
Interesting list on the food, one of the things that I am going to have to figure out is a menu that is a) affordable b) healthy / balanced and C) I can cook!!.......fortunately I am not greatly fussy on what I eat / what it looks like! - although ironically not usually overkeen on fish!
Which kinda leads on to:-
Quote from: newt on April 26, 2008, 09:45:30 AM
One other thing-fuel for cooking...
What if you modified a smaller wood stove to fit in your boat. I think even a large can which you could mount on the rear pulpit and cook over a grill. You would use Propane or other while underway, and gather driftwood when at anchor.
At the moment I have a two burner Origo Spirit hob - but boat was designed for a full Oven / Cooker. Although the Origo is perfectly ok, it would soon enuf blow my budget on fuel consumption. I have no concerns on Gas and will probably go that route - albeit part of me does fancy either a Diesal Oven or one of Taylors Parafin efforts, the downside to both is the $$$$. Gotta learn how to use a Pressure Cooker as well.
I was also thinking driftwood, but for heating - and then I discounted the idea as the weather would not warrant the expense of a wood burning heater (an extra blanket is cheaper and easier!). I did not think of using driftwood for cooking. Will definately now think this one through, albeit as a secondary means of cooking - either in the cockpit or on the beach - weather and available fuel permitting!
Quote
Refrigeration- I don't know. It sure would be nice for storing a larger fish- but I guess you could dry the meat. I guess my meat drying racks could double as my clothes line which would also work as my boom.
At the moment no Fridge. It is my intention to have one. I have lived without a fridge and it is too restrictive on diet for me and IME expensive in wasted food. The question is how big / energy expensive.........which I am sure will develop into a topic of it's own once I have reached that stage and done a lot of reading up. But also drying / pickling / canning is something I want to look into, especially given that I expect on the fishing front their will be good days and bad days (and way more of the former!).
Quote from: CharlieJ on April 26, 2008, 08:50:21 AM
I'd say that accepting good will gifts, say of seafood or such would be perfectly acceptable. Even if you were cruising on much more, you wouldn't turn down a good will gift like that, from a friendly person.
This kinda relates to one of my "Cheats" - not being far from home, I am likely to still be in contact with "freindly natives" :)
Quote from: maxiSwede on April 26, 2008, 01:33:29 PM
Had no idea there are some nice islands there... this whole planet is probably just filled with sweet spots...
let's go explore them! ;D
Great Lakes - I am sure they were Named "Great" for a reason 8) - One of the things I have realised over the years (having travelled a fair bit, albeit mainly sans Boat) is that plenty of people will travel half way around the world to
your backyard and regard it as the trip of a lifetime..........whilst you do the same to theirs!!
Quote from: David_Old_Jersey on April 26, 2008, 02:04:49 PM
At the moment no Fridge. It is my intention to have one. I have lived without a fridge and it is too restrictive on diet for me and IME expensive in wasted food. The question is how big / energy expensive.........which I am sure will develop into a topic of it's own once I have reached that stage and done a lot of reading up. But also drying / pickling / canning is something I want to look into, especially given that I expect on the fishing front their will be good days and bad days (and way more of the former!).
I lived aboard for several years some while ago and for the last year, we used zero refrigeration- this in Florida. We seldom missed it. I learned to drink cool beer, rather than cold, and found that German and Mexican beers were far better- stuff like Bud doesn't even particularly taste good cold. REAL beer however isn't bad.
On Tehani we almost never use the ice box for food. We DO use it for cold drinks and maybe tossing in a candy bar or two once in a while. We can hold a 16 pound block of ice for 10 days with no difficulties. Forget crushed- it won't last 2 days usually.
I grabbed this write up on living with no refrigeration some time ago, can't find it online, so here's a LONG inclusion- I think you'll find it quite interesting. I'm having to post it in segments because it's too long all in one.
Honey, I tossed out the cooler
By Karen Larson
Illustrated by Dave Chase
Sailor and writer Webb Chiles is credited with saying something to the effect that when the engine in his boat died he was set free - no maintenance chores, no need to get fuel, no more worries associated with whether it would run or not.
I am married to a refrigeration engineer who was prepared to design the onboard refrigerator to beat all refrigerators, but the choice to live without an icebox during a recent vacation set us free in ways we hadn't expected. There was no need to run to civilization in a quest for ice. We had no worries about the quality of the food left on little ice or concerns about what must be eaten soon because it surely must have been thawed too long. And we didn't have to run the engine to keep a refrigerator alive.
Above all, our icebox was no longer a bottomless cubicle, the purpose of which seemed to be storing ice and little else. It became, instead, a marvelous vast storehouse for flour, spices, and canned goods. It offered stowage space the likes of which I'd never had on our bilgeless racer/cruiser.
The biggest freedom was in the escape from civilization. We generally take our vacation cruises to the north shore of Lake Superior and Isle Royale National Park. In that part of the world, marinas and facilities are not handy. Civilization is usually at least a day's sail away. With ice melting in about six days, our stays in the wilderness were limited to about four days at a time or longer if we went without once the ice was gone, but planning for the transition is a bit challenging.
To avoid the awkward stage, we had proposed two possibilities: build a refrigerator or learn to live without ice. We chose to try the sans ice approach first. We may never again consider the alternative. Our diesel engine thanks us for making this choice, since it won't have the wear and tear associated with running a couple of hours a day for the sake of cold food. And we'll avoid the need to return to civilization in search of fuel to power the engine that keeps things cold so we don't need to return to civilization to buy ice. (If that isn't a Catch-22, what is?)
My first major adjustment, as provisioning officer onboard Mystic, was in cooking to avoid leftovers. At home I thrive on making large batches - pots of spaghetti for example - so I can freeze the excess for later use. Frozen blocks of spaghetti sauce and other mass-produced meals also helped when we were living with a cooler. They served as "ice units" until thawed. Then we ate them. On board, with an ice chest for food storage, I couldn't cook by the potful, but saving leftovers to eat another day was not much of a problem.
With our changed lifestyle, however, I began buying the smallest cans and jars and thinking critically about how much rice or pasta to cook. It's a science. You don't want to go hungry, but on the flip side, you don't want to encourage overeating. And you certainly don't want to throw food away. We found, fortunately, that leftovers easily last one day, so when I miscalculated, we polished off the rest the following lunch or dinner. Some leftovers worked out nicely as omelet filling for the next day's breakfast.
Eggs don't need ice
Omelets require eggs, of course, and we typically think of eggs as something requiring refrigeration. In her book, Cooking on the Go, (from 1971 and unfortunately out of print) Janet Groene argues that many foods do not need refrigeration:
"Because we have roomy refrigerators at home, we get in the habit of chilling many items that can be kept safely without refrigeration. Cheeses and sausages traveled the world long before the days of refrigerators or ice lockers.
"Of course you keep fresh meats chilled for safety, but we have kept cooked meats for second and even third appearances on our table. Packaged bacon doesn't last more than three days in warm temperatures, but well-salted pork and slab bacon, as well as cured hams, date back hundreds of years before the discovery of electricity Š it really isn't necessary to go without many of the items you keep refrigerated at home."
Groene notes that not too long ago people packed fresh farm eggs in salt, where they kept for a year. In three and a half weeks, we never had an egg go bad onboard Mystic, although I was skeptical at first. There are a number of actions you can take to help eggs last. One set of routines deals with sealing the shells. These involve smearing them with shortening, Vaseline, or salad oil. Other people swear by dipping them exactly two seconds in boiling water. Another set of routines involves keeping the inner membrane moist by turning the eggs regularly. Mother hens do this on the nest. Just to be safe, I decided to grease the shells with Vaseline AND turn them every day. It's possible that either method would have been enough.
We are not big egg eaters at home, typically, but we left for vacation with nearly four dozen eggs, since I planned to use them in baking, hard boiled in salads, and in omelet making.
In the beginning I was cautious and tested each egg before using it. People who have lived without refrigerators suggest that you crack each egg into a separate container and not directly into your frying pan or bowl full of ingredients, so if it is bad, you can toss just the egg and not the rest of your meal. Even before breaking an egg, you can test it in a glass of water. If the egg has developed gas and floats, it's bad. If it sinks to the bottom of the glass, it's good. It's a bit like testing for witches in Salem. If she floats, she's a witch and has to be burned at the stake. If she sinks, what a pity. We'll let the record show that she wasn't a witch. This time-honored test works better for eggs than people.
Cheese tricks
Refrigerators and coolers are also nice for keeping cheese. How do you go three weeks without cheese, we wondered. As it turns out, grated parmesan can last, as can cheese that comes in wax. In her book, The Care and Feeding of Sailing Crew, Lin Pardey talks of long-life processed cheese that can last up to two years without refrigeration in sealed containers, and of other wonders, such as canned cheese.
Lin probably led the way for all of us who have tried the non-refrigerated lifestyle. Not that she did so on purpose. She appears to enjoy cooking, and she and Larry both prefer fresh foods. So Lin prizes her well-insulated cooler on Talesin. Unfortunately the Pardeys' icebox runs out of ice on long passages and at anchor, just as ours does. As a result, Lin wrote The Care and Feeding in 1980 and republished it with new information in 1995. It's a terrific reference for anyone provisioning for a long trip or planning to do without ice.
Lin reports that waxed cheeses keep perfectly for up to two months at temperatures below 55 degrees F. Unwaxed cheese, she says, "should be wiped lightly with vinegar and then wrapped in plastic wrap and stored where it will not be bumped around too much." She also discusses storage of feta and hard cheeses in oil.
I read Lin's book after we returned from our trip, however I had heard that cheese stored in olive oil will keep, so I tried that. I kept chunks of cheddar and havarti for three weeks in containers full of oil. The Tupperware container leaked and was a mess to store, but a jar with a tight lid worked very well. This process offers a nice way to store oil for cooking, too. The cheddar lasted well, while the softer havarti turned very mushy before we returned to civilization. Hard cheese is the key for this storage technique. Lin mentions in her book that cheese becomes "creamier" as it ages with this technique. I'd second that opinion. Lin's directions for storing cheese are more elaborate than mine and sound like a process worth trying. She also mentions the concept of waxing your own cheeses and of the "drunken Stilton." All of this is in the chapter she titles "Day 37" and should be in either version of her book. The Pardeys' books are available from the Good Old Boat Bookshelf (www.goodoldboat.com/bookshelf.html).
Baking aboard
The next obvious problem with life without an icebox is what to do when the bread turns blue. Over the past year or two we'd experimented with onboard bread baking. We'd cooked bread in our pressure cooker, pan-fried Indian fry bread, and baked a couple of yeast loaves. We make muffins regularly, but creating good bread was a bigger challenge. I wasn't crazy about the taste of the pressure-cooked bread, and baking yeast loaves seemed messy and time-consuming. This year, however, I came armed with 40 pounds of white and wheat flour (twice as much as we needed, it turns out) and a number of new yeast recipes. The second recipe we tried turned out to be such a winner that we never tried another one. It simplified the risings and didn't seem so messy somehow. It was a mock French bread from the James Beard Cookbook, and we liked it so much we'll be cooking our own bread with all that extra flour this winter even though Minneapolis abounds with wonderful bread shops. (Recipe is below.)
With each baking I made two small loaves. The first we consumed almost in its entirety straight from the oven. There may not be anything better than warm bread, and we reveled in the luxury of having it. The other loaf lasted a couple of days. Now that we've discovered this easy bread, we may leave the dock with fewer loaves of the store variety. We prefer those we can cook ourselves, and the vacation lifestyle seems to encourage the breadbaking routine. Marilyn Palley (wife of Reese Palley) recommends a book called, Fast Breads! by Howard Early and Glenda Morris.
Bread recipe
(from The James Beard Cookbook, 1959*)
1 package yeast 2 cups lukewarm water
2 Tbs. sugar 1 Tbs. salt
5-7 cups flour (one egg white, if desired)
* Dissolve the yeast in the lukewarm water in a large bowl. Add sugar and salt and dissolve them. Gradually add flour.
* Turn out on a table and knead. Cover with the bowl and let it rest for 10 minutes. Knead.
* Let it rise in the bowl for another 1-2 hours until it's double in bulk. Knead.
* Form into two loaves (French-style long ones, round ones in an oven-proof bowl, regular pan loaves, etc.). Sprinkle the bottom of each container with cornmeal and place the bread on it. You don't need to grease these pans. Slash the tops of the bread and spread with an egg white, if desired. Let the bread rise another five minutes.
* Place in a cold oven and turn it on to 400. It should cook in 35 minutes. (In reality, with our boat oven, we turn the temperature on about halfway, whatever that setting might be. Then when we think about it, we turn the temperature up all the way. We remove the bread when it looks done, but it probably takes longer than 35 minutes.)
*My copy was purchased in the 1970s, but I guess it is a bit of a relic.
Meat or meatless meals
Meat is another issue for the sans-cooler cook. While we don't eat as much meat as we used to, we weren't ready to go without. Canned chicken and ham are available on the grocery store shelves in small tuna-sized containers. I also found small containers of corned beef and tiny little hams, canned shrimp and crab meat, salmon, and fish balls.
There are a number of spreads along the lines of deviled ham and chicken. And of course there are small canned hot dogs (masquerading as sausages), Spam and other "delicacies." I also planned to supplement our supplies of meat with completely acceptable no-meat pasta meals. Jerry wasn't so sure he'd find even the occasional vegetarian meal to be all that acceptable. There's nothing quite like being held captive a day or two from a grocery store and learning there's nothing on board you like to eat. He may have feared this new "adventure" to be a ruse of mine to take a few pounds off him when he would be unable to defend himself. (See article below for his thoughts.)
I had just finished reading Don Casey's book, Dragged Aboard, in which he makes it seem like anyone is capable of canning meat. I was inspired by this and shared the book with Jerry, who went on a dedicated hunt for a larger pressure cooker - one capable of doing canning. The small one on our boat was not up to the task. In the days of microwaves, instant meals, and grazing, pressure cookers are becoming a thing of the past. Small ones, such as our boat pressure cooker, were available, but large ones may be disappearing from the North American scene along with buggy whips.
Jerry's search began with Target and K-Mart, where the small ones can be found, and moved to an upscale home cooking specialty store, where a sweet young clerk asked in all innocence, "Pressure cooker? Is it an electric appliance?" and led him to the toasters and coffee makers. Once he found the pressure cooker section, there were only small ones and another clerk who asked, "What do you do with one of these anyway?"
The obvious answer, for anyone who grew up with a mother who used one frequently, is you blow up your kitchen with these devices. It seems we all have fear-of-pressure-cookers tales to tell. Perhaps that's why they're falling from favor these days. Jerry finally landed a full-sized canning pressure cooker at the Fleet Farm store, a chain in our part of the country that caters to farmers, truckers, and other independent types.
By now, however, we were only a couple of weeks away from the start of our vacation, and wewere in the usual pre-trip blitzkrieg of vacation preparations and work project wrap-ups. I was no longer interested in canning additional meat for our trip. One evening we invited Jerry's younger daughter over for dinner, and I prepared a pork roast and simultaneously baked a couple of turkey thighs for use in the next night's meal. Jessie is a marvelous pitch-in gung-ho daughter, and before the evening was over, the three of us had canned the remaining pork roast and turkey as a great group activity. We left for the trip with 11 half-pint jars of the best canned meat we'd ever tasted. Next year we'll do more of this and include cubed beef and hamburger.
Mayo's not untouchable
We hear so many stories about mayonnaise and are likely to be confused by them. I'm no expert on the subject, but my current level of understanding is that if the stuff is kept pure, it can last. Mayonnaise mixed with other foods must be kept cool, it would seem. And you shouldn't "contaminate" a jar of mayonnaise by sticking a utensil back in there after it has been in contact with other food.
We have heard of some people getting small packages of mayonnaise from fast food places for their boats. That works, too. We bought small squeeze bottles of mayo, and one lasted two weeks. It was emptied before it began to smell or cause any concerns. Unopened jars of mayonnaise sit on grocery store shelves for months. As it turns out, they can do the same once they're opened, as long as other food doesn't come into contact with the mayonnaise. I'd love to understand why this is so and will welcome further dialogue on this subject for our Mail Buoy column.
Milk is a problem
Cold milk only lasts a week or so. If it isn't kept cold, the number of days diminish dramatically, of course. I like milk. As an aging woman, I need to drink it or get my calcium in some other form. So I missed this on our vacation. I bought powdered milk, which we used in cooking, but I used it on cereal twice and never again. I never drank it straight. Jerry can happily drink that stuff, and I really wanted to be able to do so also. But life's too short. I ate cheese and took my vitamins. I'm told that UHT (ultra heat-treated) milk is a passable substitute, but I don't have any experience with it (and it doesn't appear to be available in the U.S.).
The following information is from Michael Greenwald's The Cruising Chef Cookbook, an excellent cooking resource I've just discovered (Paradise Cay Publications, 1996.):
"Pasteurized milk takes up precious space in the refrigerator and spoils within a few weeks. Long life, ultra heat-treated milk is an unrefrigerated product which comes in a paper box. It tastes as fresh as pasteurized milk, contains more vitamins, and lasts six months without refrigeration. It comes in half-quart and quart (liter) boxes which are slightly more expensive than refrigerated milk. This product is hard to find in the USA but is the most common way of buying milk in many parts of the world."
Margarine lasts well
Butter and margarine are also part of the non-cooler cooking equation. I had read somewhere that stick margarine, softened and repackaged in plastic tub containers, keeps well without cooling. This is true. I had feared that it would turn into liquid gold without the help of an icebox, but it did not melt. Toward the end of our vacation, when we did a touch-and-go in civilization for diesel fuel and a pumpout, I was able to buy a few groceries at a camping store. We were running short on margarine, so I bought a couple of sticks of butter. I repackaged these sticks in the margarine tubs, and the butter lasted as well as the margarine did.
F
Fruits, vegetables suffer
By the end of three weeks, we were left with apples, oranges, grapefruit, potatoes, onions, garlic, and cabbage. We also had a large assortment of canned fruits and vegetables. The other fresh fruits and vegetables had long since vanished, and even the apples and oranges had seen better days. I had read about a West Marine product called Evert-Fresh bags, which keep certain fruits and vegetables fresh longer. These bags were particularly recommended for lettuce. The lettuce must be absolutely dry when placed in the bag, however. Unfortunately I shop at one of those stores which tries to impress shoppers with a fine-mist spray on the leaf lettuce and spinach. Even when I'm not provisioning for a trip, I hate that "blamed" mist.
I waited until the last day possible to purchase the fresh foods for our trip and wound up at home trying to dry out the leaf lettuce and fresh spinach. Something halfway, but not completely, dry went into the Evert-Fresh bags. The result was that these foods didn't last as long as they might have in a fresh-air environment. Wiser now, I will try this again with improved drying on our next vacation.
Ice for drinks? Come on!
Cold drinks aren't terribly important to us. We didn't miss ice for our drinks, since we don't tend to put ice in them anyway. However, Lake Superior stays cold all summer long. The 50-degree water is an excellent cooler for cans and bottles, if we choose to use it that way. We found that storing cans next to the hull below the waterline was enough for us.
We did meet one cruising couple traveling with a freezer, who offered to give us some ice, since they felt so sorry for us. But I had to turn down the offer. What could we do with a small supply of ice, when our cooler was already filled with bags of flour? Another pair of friends who anticipated seeing us on that vacation had just gotten their cantankerous refrigerator to work after several years of frustration. They were so self-assured now with their working freezer that they threatened to sail by pummeling us with frozen Brussels sprouts. This wasn't pity. This was revenge Š perhaps because we had chosen the easy way out.
No big deal, really
Living without the cooler was not the challenge I had thought it would be, but I wasn't alone in believing that we were facing a tremendous lifestyle change and challenge. When buying supplies at the grocery store one day, my collection of purchases looked a bit unusual, so I mentioned to the clerk there that my husband and I were going off into the wilderness for three and a half weeks without refrigeration or a cooler. The clerk was so impressed you'd have thought we were heading off to scale Mt. Everest without gear.
But in fact Jerry and I were just going back in time to great-grandmother's day Š to a time even before the ice man came around from door to door Š back to a time when people canned and prepared food for the seasons when they wouldn't have any. Most of these people never had the luxury of sailing off to remote places in sailing yachts and living from the stores they had aboard. (Even the menus of the sailors of the same time period were far from grand.) Their lives seemed hard and uncompromising, while we experienced the best vacation we have ever had. There were no hardships. We were better off without the trappings of civilization because we didn't experience the tyranny of ice or endure the rattlings of the engine in order to keep a refrigerator going. Great-grandmother never had it so good.
No cooler? What did you EAT?
by Karen Larson
Perhaps I can share a few menus - not recipes - I'm all for simple, uncomplicated onboard meals. I don't go along on sailing trips as the galley slave. I want to be on deck sailing and sightseeing, not below creating gourmet delights. My ideas were culled from those who've been there and done that: sailors Cathy and Dan Haupert, sailors Ken and Pat O'Driscoll (who introduced us to cold pasta salad even though they were using a refrigerator), sailing writers Reese and Marilyn Palley, author Janet Groene, and world cruising women who communicate on a listserver I subscribed to. Next year I'll incorporate meal ideas from Lin Pardey also.
Typical breakfasts included omelets, cereal with blueberries or bananas (early in the trip while we still had the fruit and before I decided that powdered milk is not a beverage fit to ruin good cereal and fruit), pancakes, eggs, French toast, oatmeal, and coffee cake.
Typical lunches included ham, tuna, or chicken salad sandwiches; pasta salad; grilled cheese sandwiches and soup; peanut buttersandwiches; and leftovers. Canned spreads worked as picnic food when we wanted to leave the boat and spend the day exploring. Wary of taking a pre-made chicken salad or similar mayonnaise-based lunch along for a day in the sun, we ate strange spreads from small cans. These are adequate, but not exciting. The best is the deviled spread, but variety in all things mundane is best. They all got dull and downright boring after several similar lunches. But they fueled our bodies, and the sights we were able to take in while unattached to the mother ship fueled our souls. It's a tradeoff.
Dinner presented more variety. We had salad in the beginning, fresh broccoli for a while, and an endless variety of ways to cook potatoes. Canned vegetables picked up where the fresh food left off. Dinners included mashed potatoes with the meat we canned; pasta with beef and broccoli; chicken with rice and spinach; stuffed cabbage using canned corned beef; pasta with sauce (small jars of marinara, alfredo, clam and other sauces are available in the stores); and corned beef and cabbage.
I got creative with cold pasta dinners. Some of our favorites included pennette rigate pasta with canned corn, olives, canned shrimp, chicken, or no meat at all. After one such meal, Jerry vetoed the use of canned crab for this, but others might like it. I did. All this went well with whatever else I had to throw in. Carrot slices, hard-boiled egg slices, and artichoke hearts work, too. We mixed these ingredients with oil and vinegar dressing. I bought several small jars of prepared salad dressings for variety, but preferred the oil and vinegar styles best. Mayonnaise would work, too.
We made a scalloped potatoes and ham recipe in the pressure cooker that has been a real winner for two years now. We tried some prepared rice packages: curry, saffron, stir fry rice, lentils and rice, black beans and rice, red beans and rice, and so on with our canned meat or with canned sausages (a.k.a. hot dogs). Salmon fish cakes mixed from canned salmon and mashed potatoes were a big winner. The possibilities were endless.
Jerry (ever the engineer) suggested several years ago for our standard two-week vacations that I create full menus on a spreadsheet and then sort this by item to determine how much of each item to buy. It's far more organized than I would have been, but it worked very well. However, when asked to share our provisioning lists with fellow sailors, I realized how hyperdetailed our food preparations appeared to be.
This year's longer trip helped me understand for the first time what planning must be like for a much longer voyage without reprovisioning stops. Although I did create daily menus, I didn't live by them. I had so much variety aboard in our food lockers that I cooked serendipitously Š more like I do at home. It starts with, "Let's see, it's somehow gotten to be dinnertime. What needs to be eaten? What is fast to prepare?" And finally, "What would we like to have tonight?" I often referred to my onboard menu lists for inspiration, but I was able to manage the use of fruits and vegetables, eggs and potatoes, leftovers and partially used cans of things more effectively without the constraint of a previously prepared menu.
This is how we'll go in the future. Menus will guide my shopping and help inspire my cooking, but daily meals will be planned at the time of the meal. That might be called "just-in-time menus." I'll keep the food lockers supplied as I would at home, and meals will happen when they happen. From now on, we will not bother with the hassle of ice for our weekend trips. We won't take a cooler full of ice and a few perishables back and forth to the boat. Even for weekend trips, we have been set free.
You what? Tossed out the cooler?
by Jerry Powlas
The first time Karen suggested that we spend a whole vacation without ice, I talked her out of it. I had visions of a very unpleasant couple of weeks eating some of my least favorite foods Š all from cans.
I'd been a refrigeration engineer for about 29 years, and I had some strong ideas about what kind of refrigeration system should be installed in our C&C 30. I'd been designing the system in my head and on paper for about five years. I wanted something with less than half the run time of currently available systems, because I knew that once there was a refrigeration system on board, it would dramatically increase the energy budget. I'd heard horror stories of boats that have to run their engines one, and in some cases, two hours a day to keep that little tiny box cold. I didn't want the noise, wear, and fuel consumption. The design that I came up with was complicated and unproven, and it would add 70 to 100 pounds to the weight of the boat. Even doing all the work myself, the parts would not be cheap. Although I targeted much higher efficiency, the boat's upgraded electrical system would be taxed to about the reasonable limits of its capacity. I had put off building this monster for five years. Ice is really simple, and 70 pounds of it holds our icebox for six to seven days. We'd have to live on the boat forever to pay off the refrigeration system with the savings in ice.
The problem was that we really wanted more range on our vacations. We wanted to go out and stay out for more like a month without having to resupply anything. We'd solved most of the problems in doing that by the time Karen suggested going iceless the second time. She was more insistent this time. She wanted to do the research for an article, she said. That did it; I caved in. Well, almost caved in. I rushed out and bought a pressure canner and quickly canned some pork and turkey before we left. These meats proved tasty, and I will can more for next season, but frankly we didn't need them.
We ate very well for more than three weeks without any ice or refrigeration. The food was good. I enjoyed all the meals except one, which is probably better on average than I do ashore. From a systems standpoint, Karen solved the problem with the lowest-cost, lightest-weight option. The design five years abrewing in my head didn't compare with zero weight, zero cost, and good meals anyway. Karen truly had set us free.
I was so impressed with what she had accomplished that I suggested that we get rid of the refrigerator at home. It is a noisy, poorly designed thing that just might last forever out of sheer nastiness. She thought that might be going too far.
Moderation in all things, I guess.
There are a couple if unique and possibly useful cooking utensils at this site
http://www.garrettwade.com/jump.jsp?lGen=category&itemID=12381&itemType=CATEGORY&iMainCat=12375&iSubCat=12381
Oded
Zero Refridgeration? Wow, a lot to digest :)......some interesting stuff for me to mull over and also ideas that even with a Fridge I would like to try out........and cheers for posting that somewhere I can find it again easily!
Although I am not thinking Freezer, I would be very very surprised if I do not go for a Fridge......but we will see.
QuoteThere are a couple if unique and possibly useful cooking utensils at this site
Their is quite a nice looking vice on their............
Prompted me to do some Googles and came up with a "Thermette":-
http://www.thermette.com/thermette_whycopper.htm (http://www.thermette.com/thermette_whycopper.htm)
(http://www.thermette.com/thermette-snow-cooking-large.jpg)
" It boils water very efficiently with just pine-cones, twigs and scrap paper"
Invented by a KIWI and used in WWII :) - never heard of it, but sure looks useful......
Cool site... neat tools... darn...asked them for a catalog... :)
Grog for ya. :)
Quote from: oded kishony on April 26, 2008, 05:34:08 PM
There are a couple if unique and possibly useful cooking utensils at this site
http://www.garrettwade.com/jump.jsp?lGen=category&itemID=12381&itemType=CATEGORY&iMainCat=12375&iSubCat=12381
Oded
@ Charlie J
Thanks for the posting! :D Good and very helpful for everyone that has forgotten all of Grandma's cooking and related procedures. - And these days, it seems like most people have..... forgotten i e. ;)
As a side note on Mayo - yes, the 'of the shelf' jarred stuff (filled with a lengthy list of additives and preservatives) keep well for months w/o refridgeration. That's how they store them in the grocery shops, right?
Or, one could choose the gourmet way of doing it. Preparing your own mayo is super simple. One egg (just the yellow half though) and oil (olive is my choice) drip the oil into the egg while whipping it. Keep doing so until the viscosity and taste suits you and Voilá! ;) the most wonderful mayo you've had probably. Add a pinch of salt and thats it, or add garlic and you've created a wonderful aioli, mmmmm, thats tasty :P
BTW, please don't ask how long this stuff stores w/o fridge....'cause I still have to find out... ;) 8)
Thanks MaxiSwede, that brings ''l'eau à la bouche'' and I can taste this mayo.
But since the Mayonnaise is a national treasure since 1589 in France, I would add a little something.
Once you have your yolk in the bowl, put the salt, and pepper mix then add a tea spoon (we say coffee spoon, it is bigger) of mustard (dijon), mix again then add slowly the oil, while whipping. At the end, add a coffee spoon of wine vinegar, and mix slowly then enjoy. (put salt at the beginning, to assure a good result). Make only what you need, because that does not keep well without refrigeration unless the area you are cruising is a big refrigerator in itself.... ;)
The real trick to keeping mayo from spoiling without refrigeration is to not contaminate it with anything else. Always use a clean spoon or knife to get the mayo out of the jar, or better yet, use a squeeze bottle for it.
Wow-After that I really want to :
Add the Mayo, add the lettuce (sing along to the Burger King anthem)
special orders won't upset us
All I ask is if you'll let us
Have it our way... ;D
My special order (question) today is : How are you preserving the fish that you catch while out there? A 3 foot tuna can last me a week if the meat doesn't spoil.
1. Canning on the boat -too big of a bother?
2. Salting it down-is anyone doing this and how is this done?
3. I thought drying it might work- it is what is used in desert survival, May be cooking tins could be used to heat it up fast if positioned into the sun.
Any other ideas?
What about slicing/cutting it, and then keep it soaked in oil... or salt - I mean REALLY salt - water. (sorry, I don't remember the word for this in English. Just another of Granma's food preservation methods.
BTW- the word is brine. ;)
After I posted about fish I looked up what Lin and Larry Pardey had to say on the subject. In "The Care and Feeding of the Sailing Crew" they give an interesting recipe for marinading the fish down in the bilge with sealed jars. They use garlic carrots and peppercorns in equal parts salad oil and vinegar. They fill the jars with fish, can them and then stow them in the bilge. Good for 10 days.
A simpler method they also talk about is rubbing in sea salt, drying for three days on sheets of newspaper, then storing the fish. The stiff as a bone fish is then soaking in fresh water for at least 3 hours, changing the water at least once. Then you fry them up or do what you want with em. This method I am going to have to try. I wonder if you could collect enough clean sea salt from the deck after some rough sailing and drying conditions afterwards.
I haven't yet found the brine water preservation of fish posted by maxiSwede. I have heard of it in the history of sailing. Didn't fishermen keep all thier fish in brine for an extented period of time? How long will fish keep in Brine?
Quote from: newt on April 28, 2008, 10:46:37 PM
How long will fish keep in Brine?
Their whole lives? :P
(Sorry, couldn't resist...)
Smart A$$- :D :D :D
Since brine is water saturated with salt (about 25%) I guess their lives will be short. :D
Quote from: newt on April 28, 2008, 11:35:50 PM
Since brine is water saturated with salt (about 25%) I guess their lives will be short. :D
I certainly hope yours will last a lot longer... ;D
BTW preserving fish in brine on fishing vessels is said to be good for 7 weeks.
One more thing on this fishy discussion...
Before talking about canning, brine, and keep this 3 foot tuna for weeks, remember, sushis are good, then also raw tuna marinated in soy sauce and teriyaki sauce, or marinated in lime or lemon tahitian style etc.. etc..Then grilled, (seared) fried, cold with MaxiSwede's homemade mayo, or in salad. In stew, wonderful !! and leftovers from all that are even good for breakfast... But before everything..., catch the fish, and that for me is the main problem !! ;D
Quote from: oded kishony on April 25, 2008, 12:24:04 PM
Capt Smollett wrote:
>allows one more opportunity to meet, interact and become immersed in where one is.<
One of the best times I ever had was working as an illegal migrant farm worker in Italy harvesting the wine grape crop, hiding from the local police when they came around checking for illegals.
Hope the statue of limitation is past ;D
Didn't the Pardeys write a book about the 'Cost Concious Cruiser'?
Oded
$1 a day. Wow! Sounds like a great project. I couldn't provision for that, and I'm a veg.
However, most folks believe that there's nothing like an "old yoke" at dawn. :)
When I was a kid, and Mama kept the cave clean for us, we did our "emergency" eggs with paraffin. And, more often varnish (it may have been shellac I can't remember for sure) and then coated them with beaten egg white before putting them down in a bed of either sawdust or grain. I do remember, for sure: 1: the eggs had to be fresh from the hen (not a store because they refrigerated them, a big NO - NO); 2. The wet eggs had to be dried sitting on an ink blotter, and a touch up done after they dried (you could break the shell picking it up if left on the bare table); 3. They had to be stored big end up. I hope someone else remembers if it was varnish as I remember, or shellac which seems more logical.
We also used to can eggs, by blanching them in boiling water and putting them down in quart ball jars, and sealing with care.
I was dragged, kicking and screaming, to help put up at least 200 quarts each of tomatoes, potatoes, corn, and peaches every year, in addition to eggs, and popcorn (the easy one). And, then there was the cucumber pickling in 15 gallon crocks, and the sweet bread and butter pickles in ball jars. Of course the fun started when my Uncle and Dad supervised the 100 gallons of red wine and 50 gallons of blackberry wine produced every year, a smell not easily forgotten. Wahooooo! But, the floating powers that be might frown on a bubbling barrel of red.
Wow! Lots of good information floating in the bilges around here. :)
Shipscarver, I am just dying to know how long those paraffin coated eggs lasted- a week, a month, a year? And when did they start tasting funny, or smelling funny when you broke them open.(They may not have been bad, but my wife would not have eaten them) I had heard my mom doing something like this too during the depression.
Manannan- if we run into each other in port, you can just have fish from my locker. I have a kid that lives for trolling off the sailboat. Every time we see a flock of gulls diving he puts in his concoction of lures in and comes up with one or two tuna. Getting blood out of the cockpit is my major problem. I think he is going to start cleaning all fish in the dingy.
One last question MaxiSwede- do you just throw the fish in the brine (past cleaning) or do you anything special to prepare them for their final swim?
Hey Newt -
I don't remember how long eggs lasted at max for shelf life. But, I do remember doing them at Thanksgiving eve, and having them New Years morning. Tastes like eggs. :) Of course, Mama always said to break each egg into a cup before adding it to the pan so you wouldn't waste a batch with a spoiled egg. I wouldn't say it is the reason, but we also cooked eggs with onion, pepper, tomatoes, and cheese when we had it.
BTW - I grew up on powdered milk, the canned condensed was too expensive to waste for anything except baking. I think when folks don't like PM, the reason is, no fat. Their response is just the other side of the coin from mine. I think cold skim milk is kinda heavy, but a treat. However, I REALLY can't handle regular milk.
Gee, it is hard to believe that there so many Doubting Thomas sailors when it comes to canning fish. Doesn't anybody speak Norwegian anymore?
::)
I'm a little late to the party on this thread, so please forgive me for bouncing around.
Disclaimer: I have a fridge and a freezer. For longer trips there is only so much space and I have been trying out ways to both reduce the stuff that has to be chilled and to minimize the number of items I "stock."
Eggs can keep a long time. The issue as I understand it is that when the internal membrane dries air gets in through the porous shell and the egg will spoil. I bought refrigerated eggs from Tesco in England and finished the last of them off about two months later in Annapolis. All I did was flip the whole Styrofoam package over a couple of times a week.
The components of bread (flour, yeast, water, etc) keep a very long time. I do miss my old stand mixer, but it doesn't take much longer to do everything by hand. I have an oven but no thermostat so I have to keep an eye on it.
maxiSwede is right on about making your own mayo. Again, the components last indefinitely. I use a KitchenAid immersion blender (you need at least a small inverter) to make mayo. It takes less then a minute. I haven't done it with a whisk (yet) but mayo predates electricity so it must be do-able.
I've had great luck with UHT milk. In my grocery it is in the aisle with international and organic foods. It is available in six-packs of half-pint drink boxes which works wonderfully for me. Once opened it should be used or chilled.
I keep a couple of boxes of blueberry muffin mix (includes little cans of blueberries). Makes for nice breakfasts and late-night snacks.
Lock & Lock containers are much better IMHO than Rubbermaid or Tupperware. I have yet to experience a spill.
One piece of conventional wisdom that doesn't work for me at all is to use hanging nets. I understand the ventilation issue, but the movement while sailing seems to quickly bruise and wear through the skins of whatever is in the net. It isn't worth the mess below to me.
sail fast, dave
Newt -
I cannot brag of actually having any personal experience with this , yet.
I would do it like this though. Firstly, do what you usually do before cooking fish. Like gutting, cutting the head and tail off etcetera. Then either scrub(right word) the scales off or skin the fish.
Then either cut fillets or just pieces from the fish. Put in a tight container and fill it up with brine... I guess. erh, good luck buy the way ::)
BTW, I could do with a lesson or two from your son in fishing from the sailing boat too.
I used to fish a lot when I grew up, but that was in lakes and rivers. Feel slightly lost when I try it at sea.. . there's a lot of water around ;D ;)
Actually my son is one of the laziest fishers around, maybe that is why he is so good. He just doesn't stress too much about it, yet he always manages to bring in mackerel, tuna etc...
Have you seen these lines that just come off a spool? I will try and get a picture of it. Heavy line (30 kg test) with a steel leader and then a blue spoon or wooden lure of some type, He just throws it in when we are about 10 meters deep and lets it troll behind the boat. Best speed seems to be between 3-5kts. He ties the line to a cleat, and sometimes puts a bunge cord in to relieve the strike stress.
Thanks for the tip, Newt.
I for one, like that 'Lazy Fishing' approach. And everything else that can be done without much effort
;D