We have come up with some simple food packaging ideas, recipes, and creative container solutions to share that might help all campers well beyond allergy sensitive explorers.
Our food storage concerns always begin with keeping food at the appropriate safe temperature during the time away from the kitchen. The most important tool for us is an ideal cooler, which we usually stuff full with our to-go foods.
In lieu of ice packs we often put frozen spring water bottles. Although we primarily drink water from our stainless steel canteens, the frozen plastic bottles are there for us if we need them as emergency water. We also go to the plastic bottles when we want to carry in some cold water and leave the plastic in a recycle bin on the way out as we carry a light load.
On our most recent trip to Disney, we packed our backpack full of food so as to be completely self-sufficient for most of the day. In our backpack we opted to keep things light and efficient. We packed some plastic bags of popcorn, several frozen water bottles, and two packages of store vacuum sealed frozen sandwich meat. The sandwich meat (ham, turkey, etc.) is our primary secret weapon. It is easy to grab from the freezer, stuff it in a bag and head out the door with an apple or banana. The frozen package doubles as an ice pack and is usually perfectly thawed by the time lunch or mid-day arrives. We only use prepackaged meats so we can check the ingredient list and confirm no allergens have made their way into the product, but you can bag and freeze deli sliced meats if you wish.
Preplanning our travel day meals is challenging as well but possible with some effort. Days when we are in between camping spots, setting up the kitchen slide outs etc. is a task we try to minimize. On days that we know we will be traveling longer than 6 hours, we need to have a meal ready that is quick and easy to assemble at a rest stop or parking lot. One of our go to road meals is Chicken Lime Pasta. It can be pre-made and served cold.
