PRODUCE LOVE ON & OFF ROAD
Being self confessed foodies, you can imagine how important our produce is to us. Eating a plant based diet while on the road definitely makes the case of refrigeration allot easier. Of course, we still must be careful with our goods which are chilled. But never having to worry about meat or dairy not being cool enough and spreading germs is one less thing to focus on when it comes to produce. Because sometimes refrigeration does not always go to plan, as you can imagine, being a home on wheels.
In our coaster home, we have designed our couch to be able to flip up, to access our fridge/freezer. The fridge/freezer which we use in this vehicle is the 70 litre Engel Fridge. About 90% of the time this is powered by our solar. Any other power for our fridge will generate from a powered site that we book into. All in all, this particular fridge has worked a treat for us and not let us down.
On a plant based diet, as you can image a high volume of your food consumption is usually fresh. That is, if you choose to only consume a small amount of processed plant based foods. A large majority of our fresh produce is fruit and greens. Fruit has not been a hard produce to store. If travelling consistently, without stopping for days in between, we simply pack our fruit bowl away in a sealed container which has air flow. Always checking frequently on the condition of the produce, especially softer fruits or vegetables. Try and pay attention to where it is coolest in your van. Like underneath beds. Dark places are always an easy place for food to create mold. So this is really important when storing produce. Hanging a large tote bag is a great alternative to fruit bowls or storing produce on small kitchen spaces. One important tip to remember whether travelling or not is some fruits and veggies produce a lot of a gas called ethylene as they ripen. Others are particularly sensitive to ethylene. So try hard to keep these away from each other. Or, conversely, put closer to another if you’re attempting to fasten the ripening process. Below are a handful of popular fruit and vegetables in each category, to help you with your fresh produce storage.
Ethylene - producing
- Apples
- Apricots
- Avocados
- Ripened bananas
- Figs
- Kiwi
- Mangoes
- Nectarines
- Papayas
- Peaches
- Plums
- Tomato
Ethylene Sensitive
- Unripe bananas
- Green beans
- Broccoli
- Carrot
- Cauliflower
- Cucumber
- Eggplant
- Spinach
- Sweet Potatoes
Now we all know that organic is best. Sourcing produce from local shops and fresh food market is such a great way to shop. Knowing where your goods come from and often allot of the time buying pesticide-free. When travelling you can come across allot more opportunities to visit a large amount of markets and stalls, which is fantastic. However, allot of the time fresh produce will not last long, depending on how fast you eat what you have purchased. So, shopping can be frequent, especially if you have extremely small storage. So here are two handy tips to keep in mind if you can not quite make the next market day or fresh stalls are few and far between on your travels. One of these tips provide you with 12 fruit and vegetables to try and avoid if shopping at your large supermarket, due to their high pesticide levels. With the second list providing 15 of the cleanest fruit and vegetables in terms of pesticides. Lastly, a simple natural produce wash to add to both organic or supermarket produce. These three sources may help you decide which fresh produce you will want to choose next time you are ready to stock up
EWG (Environmental Working Groups) 2019 Dirty Dozen - A list of fruits and vegetables with the highest level of pesticide residues.
- Strawberries
- Spinach
- Kale
- Nectarines
- Apples
- Grapes
- Peaches
- Cherries
- Pears
- Tomatoes
- Celery
- Potatoes
EWG (Environmental Working Group) 2019 Clean 15 List - A list of the fruit and vegetables that contain the least pesticide residue
- Avocado
- Sweet Corn
- Pineapples
- Frozen Sweet Peas
- Onions
- Papayas
- Eggplant
- Asparagus
- Kiwi
- Cabbage
- Cauliflower
- Rock Melons
- Broccoli
- Mushroom
- Honeydew Melons
NATURAL FRUIT & VEGETABLE RINSE
Studies have shown that washing your produce can reduce the pesticide residue, but won't eliminate all pesticides. Adding natural vinegar to your wash is a great solution, especially when buying organic produce is not possible. By far the best brand is Bragg Organic Raw Apple Cider Vinegar. I will be touching base more throughout the website in regards to the versatility of this great product as well.
Fill a large bowl with about 8 cups of water. Add in 2 Tablespoons of apple cider vinegar and your fruits and vegetables. Let them sit for about 15 minutes. After 15 minutes, gently scrub, rinse, dry and enjoy.
PACK CAREFULLY
Now back to storage. One big tip, really with whatever cooling system that is used, is to learn how to pack your produce correctly. You will soon learn that things are a little different from your stand up fridge at home. Unless you have enough room for one of these models in your space. It may sounds obvious, but packing appropriately is crucial. Using sealed wraps or eco wraps as we like to use. Tightly sealed containers. Metal containers are a great options when travelling. If you want to minimize your plastic use and plus you will not have the headache of worrying about any smashed glass when the road gets bumpy. I have even found that sourcing vintage affordable tins to be a great way to store some dry goods. Simply giving them a good scrub and be sure to check that the seal will be tight enough. Then you are good to go.
PLANNED MEALS
I personally love intuitively eating. I love to consistently experiment and mix up my options when cooking. But it truly does take out allot of hassle when you plan a large amount of your meals. Most of the time there will not be appropriate room to have ready to go meals prepped in your cooling system. So purchasing a majority of your produce with your week in mind, is a clever way to shop. You will not have the luxury of stacking cupboards full of endless options. So thinking ahead really will help.
STAPLES
Following on from meal planning advice, another key to the way we store or food is sourcing a good variety of great dry-food staples which can be stored outside of the cooling system. Below are plant - based dry staples that we love to have stored for regular use. We try hard to use BPA free cans, when purchasing processed foods also, as much as possible. BPA is an industrial chemical that has been used to make certain plastics and resins since the 1960s. The toxic chemical can leach into foods from the lacquer lining of cans, food containers and bottles made from certain plastics. So keep an eye out for the BPA free labels next time you head out to collect your items.
DRY FOOD STAPLES
- Canned Chick peas
- Canned Kidney beans
- Lentils
- Brown rice
- Quinoa
- Coconut cream
- Plant milk
- Spices (Favourites, Turmeric, Paprika, herbs, Cumin )
- Vegetable soups
- Quinoa pasta/gluten free pasta
- Gluten free wraps
- Oats
- Flaxseed
- Chia seeds
- Apple Cider Vinegar ( Bragg is a great brand )
- Nutritional Yeast
- Tamari
- Curry Pastes
- Canned Tomatoes
One other simple but crucial tip to remember is cupboard lock security. By this I mean triple check your locks are safe on your doors and cupboards. We have learned the hard way. Almost all of our cupboards have one to two locks to hold them shut when we are travelling. However, some of them had strong shut seal doors. These had worked 90% of the time. But we have had a handful of times were the pressure of the storage will knock them open. This is certainly something you do not need while travelling and is not safe at all. So be sure to take a good look at your cupboard lock system. Also, it is a good idea to be careful with the space left in each storage. For example in your kitchen storage when we are low on bottles, cans etc the cupboards will have allot more space. This is not a great idea, especially when glass could be sliding around when travelling. You may have a different set up in your vehicle. But in these cases we simply place a towel or tea towel in the space to prevent any movement and breakage.
We really hope some of these tips came in useful and you have a handful of new tricks up your sleeves to keep that beautiful produce as fresh as possible. Happy trekking and packing all.
PEACE X Kirsty, Brent & Alfie