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30/5/2024 at 2:08pm
Location: London
Outfit: Lunar Cosmos 524
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I usually take EVERYTHING I need for the duration of my caravan stays.
I've a 12v/240v camping freezer, so I stock that with 'dinners' (usually home made stuff) at home, run it on 12v in the car on the journey, then transfer it to caravan on arrival and run on 240v EHU. Fresh perishables go in a cooler bag, and then the caravan fridge on arrival, as it's nicely cooled down during the journey (caravan is in storage, so can't pre-chill/stock the fridge until I hook up at start of journey)
Bread will last a couple of weeks in the fridge, plus I take part baked Baguettes to supplement 'on demand' if I need extra.
Tinned and dried stuff makes up the rest. My favourite beer, wine and soft drinks also get taken. And of course dog food and treats!
I hate shopping, so the last thing I want to do when I'm away is waste time trundling around strange shops hunting for things I cant find and taking far too long about it! I've also got the dog in tow, so shopping run would mean leaving her alone in caravan, depending on how close suitable shops are, for maybe a couple of hours! I refuse to leave her in the car whilst I shop, and obviously you cant take her in the shops!
If a site shop, or somewhere convenient on my travels I can pop into, then I may 'top up' on a few items, but generally 'shopping' is NOT part of my holiday!
I might venture off to a nice dog friendly pub for a meal if it appeals, and one on my favourite sites has a permanent 'takeaway' van that does Fish and Chips, or home made pies, or Pizza on different nights that it's open.
Pre-Brexit and no food movement restrictions, when we did our lads trips to Le Mans motor race in France, we'd take a small domestic chest freezer packed with PROPER bacon and sausages (none of that French rubbish for our Full ENGLISH breakfasts!), ready roasted meat joints, vac-packed marinaded meats, and steaks etc. for the BBQ, all of the best quality from local butchers who knew the animals they came from! We'd take kegs of English real ale too, so no need to suffer the nasty 'fizzy' Europ**s lager. We'd only shop locally for perishables, wines, cheese, veg etc. Usually plan it in such a way that just one shop on way to camp site would see us through a week. We got to be exceptionally good at it and lived like kings for quite a few years, whilst all around 'got by' on dodgy hot dogs and burgers from a dubious selection of mobile vans!
Brexit has sort of put pay to such extravagant 'export' of fine British produce, but then the need has diminished too as age and illness has whittled away our numbers somewhat, and change of vehicles has limited our load lugging capacity rather severely too, so will have to live with fond memories, and locally sourced food on any future trips.
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31/5/2024 at 8:50am
Location: Devizes Wiltshire
Outfit: MWB VW Crafter PVC
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Once I am on site and have set up, I don't particularly want to go out again to buy food and drink.
Therefore, I usually take food with me. The first night if it is cold, I would take something I have previously cooked and frozen in the freezer, like a mash pie of some sort so that it can be finished off in the oven. I carry an instant noodle and a tin of soup plus other provisions in the van, plus snacks too.
I have a meal plan and shopping list for grocery when I go camping in UK.
Being on my own, I buy make or buy meats in bulk such as burgers, chicken thighs, pork slices and lamb ribs etc., marinade them if required, and pack them down into single serving portions, vacuum pack then freeze.
I do the same for breakfast packs - 3 rashers or bacon, a couple of slices of black pudding and a sausage in a pack.
Also bacon in packs of 6s - I usually buy about 2kg of smoked streaky bacon from a local farm shop and pack the rashers down into packs.
Sometimes I would buy a big piece of rump steak and slice into thin strips, marinade in different flavours, pack into vacuum packs then freeze. This way, I have beef for stir-fry, served with rice or in a noodle soup with some stir-fried vegetables.
I also get rib-eye steaks from them too in vacuum packs for the freezer.
For a BBQ, I would take at least 2 pieces of meat per meal. Usually a steak dinner per trip too.
The list of grocery items dairy items such as milk, double cream and butter, eggs, plus seasonal vegetables. I would check the fridge first before I go and buy anything, and take what I can from the fridge with me.
For going to mainland Europe, I tend not to have a meal plan as I don't know what I would find in the supermarket where I would do my first shop.
I usually eat while I am on the road when travelling in Europe, so no meal for the first night. There is always snacks in the van if I am peckish!
My van has a 84L fridge with a freezer compartment, and I take a 28L thermoelectric coolbox in the warmer months and longer trips, to keep the drinks cold and the salad leaves from being frozen in the fridge!
DK 
Post last edited on 31/05/2024 08:55:11
Post last edited on 31/05/2024 08:56:30
Post last edited on 31/05/2024 08:57:08
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* Apple The Campervan - A Van For Work, Rest And Play! *
- 2025 - inc. FR & DE
- 2024 - 10/56 inc. FR & NL
- 2023 - 48 inc. FR
- 2022 - 49
- 2021 - 34
* Ex-tenter & solo female camper *
* Treat life events like a dog: If you can't eat it, play with it, or hump it, p1$$ on it and walk away! *
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31/5/2024 at 1:09pm
Location: London
Outfit: Lunar Cosmos 524
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DK, hairs on the back of my neck prickling as I read your post, we either live in parallel universes or we're clones!!!!!! Weird!    
My shopping and food prep/storage practically mirrors yours! … right down to vac-packing/freezing single portions for a Full English Breakfast 'kit'!
Maybe it comes from a logical mind and a organisational work background which we also seem to share!
Only other person I know who's that organised and practices similar 'techniques' is my mate who's a pub owner/chef, he did it for commercial reasons when running his restaurant, to get fast turnaround on meal prep and minimise wastage. We both did it before we met many years ago, so haven't picked it up from each other! He's the mate who mostly organises our food for the 'lads trips to Le Mans motor race in France' - it's that degree of planning and organisation that lets us eat like Kings, all for minimal effort and cooked/heated on rudimentary camping stoves, and at ridiculously low cost! - we'll eat for £5-£6/head, whilst a visit to a restaurant to match the quality of food would set us back probably £30 plus, and we eat like that EVERY day of our trip. 
Like my solo trips, we're busy doing stuff most of the day, so wasting much time cooking is not for us, it's all about eating well in the minimum time spent achieving it. That comes from planning and pre-prep.
I find that the pre-prep and portioning of food gives me great flexibility, no 'I'll have to have the same tomorrow, 'cos the (bulk) pack is open, and it'll spoil if I don't use up'. Very much the convenience of commercial 'ready meals', but good better quality, and precisely to my taste, home cooking.
…. as to breakfast kits, I've taken to pre-cooking at home the sausages, bacon, black pudding, hash browns, before vac-packing/freezing, then in the van thawing/heating in microwave, with a 'finish' in oven to crisp, whilst I do scrambled eggs in the microwave. F.E.B. in minutes without all the mess and clearing up to do! Maybe not quite as nice as freshly done, but nice enough to enjoy and relish the LACK of the big clean up! - reckon doing from fresh, eating AND cleaning up after, lost well over an hour and a half of my morning, probably all done, eaten, and on way out door now in around 30-40 mins!
I suppose for me, it's only really a variation of my home cooking routine, I batch cook stuff, then freeze down individual portions. Despite only mostly catering me, I'll roast a Turkey/Chicken/Beef joint, etc. then portion it up for future meals, and rapidly prepared meals at that.
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31/5/2024 at 2:03pm
Location: Devizes Wiltshire
Outfit: MWB VW Crafter PVC
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Quote: Originally posted by Monty15 on 31/5/2024
DK, hairs on the back of my neck prickling as I read your post, we either live in parallel universes or we're clones!!!!!! Weird!
No hash brown for me, as I have fried bread instead - fried after cooking the sausage, black pudding and bacon, yum!
I make breakfast packs before freezing as I don't want to cook and eat a fry up every day when I go camping in order to use up a pack of bacon, sausages and black pudding.
I make packs of 5-6 rashers of bacon separately so that I could have a bacon sandwich or French toasts with bacon as part of my breakfast lined up. Lighter breakfast so that I can eat a bigger meal later in the day as I normally have snacky dinner after a big fry up for brunch!
I like having a variety of food and not the same thing every day.
Buying in bulk to cook and freeze makes sense as I am on my own and really CBA to cook every day. Ping dinner or in the airfryer is fine when I am at home.
I seldom cook a joint with just me at home. I stopped doing a duck on Christmas Day and another joint, usually belly pork or beef on Boxing Day. However, that's way too much for just one person.
So nowadays, just one joint of meat on Christmas Day.
Last year was belly pork, prepped and cooked the oriental way, and I had it fresh with crispy crackling with rice and vegetables with a dipping sauce made out of garlic and oyster sauce (traditional for me); plus a couple of pigs in blankets.
I made crispy belly pork bites on Boxing Day to have with bao buns which did not work too well as I found the buns rather doughy (frozen from Waitrose). The following day I had crispy belly bites in duck pancake instead and it was very nice. The last of the roast pork was turned into more crispy belly bites to served with rice and vegetables.
This year will be a duck. Roast duck with all the trimmings on Christmas Day. Crispy duck pancake on Boxing Day, then duck noodle soup the next day, and fried rice afterwards (usually enough for 2 meals).
I love to cook and to eat, hence I spent a lot of time and effort designing and kitting out the kitchen in my van.
Just bought a Cobb Frying Dish so that I could cook wet food using the Cobb. This way, I could go off grid without electricity for a day or two using the Cobb with charcoal.
DK
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* Apple The Campervan - A Van For Work, Rest And Play! *
- 2025 - inc. FR & DE
- 2024 - 10/56 inc. FR & NL
- 2023 - 48 inc. FR
- 2022 - 49
- 2021 - 34
* Ex-tenter & solo female camper *
* Treat life events like a dog: If you can't eat it, play with it, or hump it, p1$$ on it and walk away! *
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