Food for Crossing

[Atraxia]

Hi forum friends,
I am crossing next week from Tortola (BVI) to Colon, Panama. We will be 6 on board and it's a 8-10 day crossing non-stop. Any suggestions, tips (even recipies) on what to take, how to prepare.... will be most appreciated and thanked.
Ron

[barnakiel]

Take little and re-provision in Panama. Better prices and choice there.

b.

[szymk]

Hi Ron!

Look what I found the other day:

Menu Planning and Provisioning - resources for cruising sailors

There are plenty of links, some with recipes, some with general advice.

Regards,

Szymon

[Maren]

Originally Posted by SY CoSinus

Any suggestions, tips (even recipies) on what to take, how to prepare.... will be most appreciated and thanked.

Just two offhand with perhaps more to follow.

Try to match the expectations and workload of meal prep and crew. If you are doing all the cooking and love to cook, you might be willing and able to do a fair amount for each meal. But you might have others who are fine with just a sandwich and some chips... and can't make much more either. (this is the implied, "who is cooking, how good are they, and what are you all looking for food-wise?")

Plan for a few meals you can make in rough weather. So, spaghetti with all the boiling water and hot liquid sauce ... might want to wait till things are much calmer.

[Tom Hildebrandt]

I often have mixed crew on passages, and everyone cooks. Even the non cookers can read a cook book and do ok! And in time even the non coookers make meals that are quite elaborate, even at sea, especially on the down wind legs!

But for guys/gals who are not born cooks, here is what is usually served and it always works.

The easiest mains are the pasta dishes with a salad. Any pasta type dish works. It can be as simple as pasta with a bit of olie oil and some fresh herbs or a putanesca style (my favorite, a basic tomatoe sauce with anchovies, black olives and capers) or alfredo types. I have a book I bought at a second hand store, 365 pasta dishes. Most can be done in 20-30 minutes and in almost any sea condition.

Back up for ruff weather is some pre done lasagne or chili. But if those are gone then
I also have had good success in bad conditions with boiling a potatoe and just mashing a can of that mystery meat like Spam into it. Serve in a bowl and have something like a nice jar of chutney to add to the mix for a warm and filling and sort of tasty meal! Not high cuisine, but it does the trick!

The salad for passages is cabbage, carrots, onions, sweet peppers, radishes and the like, chopped or shredded, your choice. Take a small sauce pot for the sauce, heat some water a little sugar and white vinegar, add what ever herbs (fresh or dried) you like and/or a bit of hot sauce. Heat till the sugar is disolved and pour over the salad. The longer it sits, the better.You can make the salad in huge amounts, it will store without refrigeration for several days in an air tight container but is best if you can find a way to keep it cool!

Breakfast is fruit and cheese or granola/muesli cereal with tea or coffee.

Cheeses and sliced bits meats like pepperoni and salami served with crackers serve for lunch or snacks any time. Olives dress it up a bit.

I will stress, these are those things that my crew often do when they are not inclined to try to make the eating experience more fun, it is sort of the minimum level I see on Juno. Often the crew take some pride in cooking, or trying to cook, a really interesting meal from the basic stuffs on board. There are the breads, home made tortillias, soups of all types from simple onion to spicy german style, italian chicken dishes (my favorite is lemon chicken with capers) to all types of roast with all the trimimingss, just about anything you can fix at home you can fix at sea, if you are a bit organized about it. .

The trick is to buy the basics, (I seldom buy prepacked stuff or even prepared sauces,) then challenge the crew to show off for their mates. It becomes part of the joy of the sail if properly handled, ie, lots of compliments even if the dish did not turn out just like your grandmothers cooking!

Cheers

Tom