Food for the family road trip

I've been on a lot of road trips (as you know), but this will be my first family road trip; my 13-year-old stepson will be along. Also, the road-tripping is the vacation this time; rather than driving straight through to some far destination, we'll be meandering through Montana, Wyoming, and the Dakotas, spending several hours each day driving, but also stopping to eat, sleep, and see things.

But we're still trying to keep this economical. Thanks to our Prius, we can cover close to 4,000 miles on $300 in gas. We'll stay in the nearest Motel 6 each night. My annual National Parks Pass (last year's birthday present from my parents) means we can skip paying admission at all the national parks we plan on visiting.

Which just leaves food. We can eat at least two meals a day out of the cooler in the backseat, stocked with sandwiches, fruit, homemade cookies, and road-trip staples like beef jerky and trail mix. We'll have a couple of picnics in the great outdoors. Dinner will be eaten in an actual non-chain restaurant each night.

I've written about road food before (and here), but with a kid along, we'll need more kid-friendly fare.

How do you go about stocking a cooler for minimal expense?

1. Buy bottled water on sale, and freeze the bottles. These will be the ice for your cooler; they can be refrozen each night (thanks to the microwave-fridge that comes with each room at the Motel 6) or drunk as they melt. In a pinch, the hotel can provide ice for the cooler. Refill empty water bottles and Camelbaks each night in the sink.

2. Sandwiches and wraps. I'll buy a loaf of bread, some sliced turkey and cheese, a package of large tortillas, and a big box of salad greens at Costco. Add a small jar of mustard and a jar each of peanut butter and jelly and sandwiches are taken care of. The salad greens will go inside the tortillas, along with bacon and some shredded cheese, to become wraps. (And a much-needed source of greenery.)

3. A variety of other stuff. I made two batches of chocolate chip cookies. Costco also provided apples, bananas, beef jerky, granola bars, and the base ingredients for some homemade trail mix (nuts, dried fruit, chocolate chips). In addition, I packed some dried fruit, a small bag of baby carrots, a box of cereal, a bag of pretzels, and some crackers.

4. Caffeine. This can be slightly tricky, depending on how you feel about cheap truck stop coffee. Normally tea is the basis of my road trip caffeine; hot tea bags are cheap and easy to pack, and I can throw one into my refillable mug every morning and top it off with free hot water at the nearest gas station. Ditto iced tea bags--throw one into the Camelbak, add water, done. But my husband is a coffee drinker, and I'm getting back into drinking coffee myself. So we'll need a way to get decent coffee while on the road--that's not from Starbucks or a gas station.

I think the way to solve that problem is with iced coffee. I can make two large Thermoses of good coffee before we leave home, and doctor them up with cream, simple syrup and an orange peel. Then each morning we'll fill the Camelbaks with free hotel ice, add the coffee, and away we go. I'm not sure we'll have a full ten days' supply  in those two Thermoses, but I can go back to drinking tea when it runs out and my husband can drink gas station coffee for a couple of days.

Regardless, if we're carrying our own coffee and tea supplies, and our own food supplies, we'll never need to buy anything at a gas station that isn't gas.

So breakfast can be wraps, fruit, and iced coffee; lunch can be sandwiches and more fruit; and there will be an infinite variety of snacks.

Other things we'll bring with us, rather than buy on the road:

Sunscreen and bug spray
A couple bottles of wine (for picnicking purposes)
All the Camelbaks, water bottles, Thermoses and travel mugs (no need to buy any beverages, ever!)
Guidebooks from the library
Tissues, paper towels, wet wipes, and Febreze (for the car)
Laundry detergent and quarters (just in case)
Silverware (rather than buying plastic)
Stamps (for postcards)

Road food

Usually when we travel, we take a bunch of stuff from home (pasta salad, sandwiches, fruit, nuts, etc.) and try not to buy very much. This time, however, since we were moving, we didn't exactly have a store of food to choose from. So we bought food.

We had a rotating store of chips, protein bars, dried fruit, fresh fruit, cookies, a box of Cheerios, and sandwich fixings--a loaf of bread with different kinds of meat and cheese, and a small squeeze bottle of mustard--supplemented with the occasional meal out. We spent a couple of dollars a day on hot coffee. We kept a cooler with frozen water bottles in it; the cooler held the meat and cheese, and we made sure to get hotels with a mini-fridge and cooler.

So every morning, we'd start with a protein bar and a piece of fruit (sometimes we'd get a little free breakfast with the hotel room). Lunch would be a sandwich with chips and whatever else we felt like eating. Ditto dinner, except for the nights when we ate out. I made sure to select food that could live in a car in subzero temperatures overnight, if need be. Warning: bananas won't work. The first bunch of bananas I left in a subzero car froze completely and turned black. After that, I stuck to apples.

Water bottles got refilled every night, and a couple would have a cold-brew iced tea bag added to them, so I could have iced tea. I also kept some tea bags, for hot tea. (Free hot water at the gas station plus my own tea bag = free hot tea.)

I was also keeping the cats in cat food and litter; even so, our food expenditures weren't any more than they usually are, even with all the coffee and fruit and whatever money spent each day.

Some lessons learned:
1. Try to stick to hotels with mini-fridge and microwave AND a coffeemaker or free coffee/breakfast in the mornings. Free coffee/breakfast means that's one less meal you have to worry about; a coffeemaker means you can at least make your own. (If that's the case, make sure you have a little good ground coffee with you.)
2. Bananas will freeze, and bruise easily. Buy them one at a time from gas stations (expensive) or stick to apples.
3. If you have pets in the car, be careful of the loaf of bread. It will get squished.
4. Cookies can make a fine breakfast.

We're currently staying with friends in a semi-finished guest house; there's no bathroom or kitchen facilities in the guest house, and we're spending quite a bit of time in Seattle looking at apartments, so we're now in the position of either having to eat out quite a lot or continuing to subsist on sandwiches and chips. I see a lot of cheap noodle bowls in our future. I'll keep you posted.

The late-night wrap

I engage in quite a bit of late-night dining. Waiting tables is like that. I eat staff meal at 3 pm, and then nothing. I run my ass off for the next eight or ten hours, and then I need to eat something as I'm driving an hour home. Preferably something with protein.

These days, it's a wrap, a piece of cheese, and an apple. The wrap (Stop n' Shop-brand flour tortillas, $1.50 for 8) is filled with salad greens, maybe some nuts and/or dried fruit, and either a cooked egg or some cheese, for the protein. I roll that up, wrap it in plastic wrap, and leave it in the car--it's cold enough to do that now. I keep a water bottle in the car, too. When snack time comes, I can cover all the major food groups--I have fresh fruit, greens, dairy, and protein (eggs and cheese).

Most importantly, none of these things will make a mess in the car.

Lemony lentil salad

Typically, I work Saturday nights and then a Sunday double. Rather than drive an hour home, and an hour back, between 1 am Saturday (when I get off work) and 9 am Sunday (when I have to be back at work), I'll just crash with a friend of mine in Boston. That means I spend a minimum of 36 hours away from home, which means I bring a lot of food with me. Lentil salad is one of my favorite things to pack--it doesn't have to be refrigerated, tastes good at room temperature, and provides much-needed protein.

1 cup dried lentils
1 clove garlic
1 bay leaf
2 lemons
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon capers
1/4 cup minced chives
Salt and pepper

Put the lentils in a saucepan, cover with water, and add the garlic and bay leaf. Bring to a boil, then cover and simmer 15-20 minutes or until tender.

Juice the lemons and put in a bowl along with the olive oil, capers, and chives. When the lentils are done, drain them, and add them hot to the dressing. Stir to combine with salt and pepper, and let sit. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Road food

It's challenging to make for a road trip when there isn't much food in the house to begin with.

The usual stuff, right? Sandwiches, chips, fruit, water, drinks.

Except I don't have sandwich bread, sandwich meat, chips, or drinks.

I'm okay on fruit and water.

So, in preparation for our annual 21-hour drive to Missouri, I had to get creative. (Why be creative?, you ask. Why not just buy some sandwiches and call it a day? Well, a) to use up what I did have, and b) I can't afford to spend money on sandwiches since I'm losing a week of income this month. See above-referenced drive to Missouri.)

I used leftover stale restaurant hamburger buns and rolls as sandwich bases; the rolls got mustard, cheese, and bacon, and the hamburger buns got cheese, bacon, and scrambled eggs mixed with fresh spinach and herbs from my container garden. Bonus: used up all the eggs, bacon, and stale bread. And those will be some kick-ass egg sandwiches.

Next, I made a bag of snack stuff. Popcorn, apples, dried mango slices, almonds, granola bars, graham crackers, plenty of tea bags (both hot and iced) and chocolate chips.

Drinks will consist of bottled water (frozen, so as to provide ice for the sandwiches, and also they'll melt slowly and stay cold for the whole trip) plus two large thermoses; one with hot water for tea, one with pre-made coffee.

We won't have to buy food or caffeine at any point; our only stops will be for gas and bathroom breaks.

Missouri, here we come!

Cleaning out the perishables

Since we have to move in ten days, it becomes imperative to clean out what's left in the freezer/refrigerator. Made more difficult by the fact that they were full to begin with.

So here's what I've got in the freezer, and here are my options:
1 whole chicken: probably chicken salad (bonus points for using up some of the celery and mayo)
Frozen corn, frozen spinach, potatoes: corn chowder (bonus points for bacon and vegetable broth)
More frozen corn, frozen lima beans: more lima bean, corn and bacon succotash
4 lbs of Italian sausage: this will be harder to use up, since I typically only use a link or two at a time, for flavoring. I may leave this alone and see if it can survive cross-country in a cooler.
4 lbs of andouille sausage: ditto above.
3 boxes of puff pastry shells: harder since these are shells and not sheets. I may have to resort to a whole crapload of eggs benedict served on the shells, with frozen spinach, without hollandaise sauce (since I don't have enough eggs to go around).
13 bags of frozen peas: sigh. So far I've got peas and proscuitto; peas and feta (got a half-pound of feta that needs to go); and just peas. Ideas, anyone?
1/2 lb of parmesan and 1 pound of pecorino romano: see above re: sausages.
Several pounds of butter: ditto.
The rest of the frozen spinach: okay, now I'm done. My brain hurts.

I do have a block of mozzarella that'll need to be used up, so maybe I can make a couple of frozen spinach, feta and bacon (or proscuitto) pizzas. Which will also use up some of the parmesan. And maybe I can use some butter and the rest of the cream to make a nice alfredo something-or-other. (I've got a bunch of penne...)

This doesn't even begin to cover what I'll make to take with us for road food, but I can't think about that right now. I have enough to worry about with the packing.

So, dear readers, if you have any suggestions on how to use up all this stuff, and/or for good road food, let me know!

Road food

As I prepare to go off into the wild blue yonder with my sweetie for Thanksgiving weekend ("wild blue yonder" = Joshua Tree National Park, Sequoia National Park, Yosemite National Park, and Big Sur), I'm preparing a lot of food to take with us. The plan is to be out seeing things all day long, sleep in cheap hotels, and not spend any more money than absolutely necessary. I spent much of the summer eating out and eating classic road food like beef jerky; I'm excited to be able to travel with "real" food in tow.

My family couldn't go shopping for the morning without bringing enough food for each person to eat at least two meals, "just in case." It's ingrained; my in-car road-trip food stashes are bigger than a lot of people's entire pantries. I fully expect to have more than enough food to feed two people 3+ meals for 3 days on this trip, with plenty to spare. It sounds like a lot of effort and planning, I know. Many people wouldn't bother, would take a bottle of water and eat a lot of fast food. But this food is way better than that, and guess what? cheaper. Plus, it really doesn't take long to assemble. How long would it take you to pull off the road, find a restaurant, and eat crappy food for 3+ meals a day? Times however many days? Wouldn't you rather spend ninety  minutes at the front end, before you leave, and not ever have to worry about it?

I'm taking the usual stash of non-perishables. Water, juice, powdered Gatorade, Emergen-C, tea (iced and hot), coffee. Granola bars, chocolate bars, nuts (almonds, pistachios, peanuts), dried fruit. A couple bottles of wine. Napkins, cups, silverware, trash bags. In addition to that stuff, here's what I've made:

A batch of blueberry muffins, for breakfast. Can be eaten cold or reheated in the motel room microwave.

Pasta salad: orzo, feta, black olives, sundried tomatoes, mint, basil, a little red onion, some olive oil and red wine vinegar.

Quinoa salad: quinoa, edamame, a little red onion, dried cranberries, some reconstituted dried mushrooms.

Potato salad: I left the skins on, for extra fiber.

Burritos: a big batch, filled with a combination of black beans, brown rice, corn, cheese and salsa, wrapped up in big flour tortillas and then individually wrapped in plastic wrap. These can be eaten directly out of the cooler or reheated in the motel room microwave for a quick, filling dinner.

Sesame noodles: just like the kind you get with Chinese take-out. Combine peanut butter, sesame oil, chili oil, soy sauce, a little fish sauce, cayenne pepper, and sesame seeds into a smooth sauce, and add cold cooked spaghetti. Garnish with more sesame seeds (and more chili oil, if you like it hot, like I do).

Between all of this, plus all the aforementioned non-perishables, we'll be able to road-trip for three days solid without purchasing one. single. thing.

Cost: in a sense, nothing, since I already had all the ingredients in my pantry and all I had to do was combine them. But if I had to guess, I'd say the entire stash didn't cost more than $10, and that's including all the granola bars and coffee and stuff (all purchased in bulk, natch).