Packing for a camping trip is not quite as fun as the camping trip itself, and the items people seem to have the most trouble packing are food and drinks. Non-perishable food items can be heavy and cumbersome, but perishable items have to be packed carefully so they do not spoil. The question becomes, “How do I keep my food cool, so it does not spoil?”
To keep food cool while camping, the first step is finding the correct cooler, and buying or making large blocks of long-lasting ice to use in the cooler can help. Other things you can do are pre-cook your food, freeze your drinking water, freeze your food, and use ice packs.
The remainder of this article will go a little more in-depth into each of these suggestions, including several tips and tricks on keeping your food cool. We’ll even talk about some of the best coolers and the best types of ice to buy.
How Do You Keep Food Cold for 3 Days of Camping?
If you’re planning on a multi-day camping trip, properly packing your food is going to be even more important than it would be if you were on an overnight trip. We’ll also discuss overnight trips a little later. For now, however, let’s get into the steps you need to take to keep your food fresh for three days.
Don’t Skimp on the Cooler
The first thing to do if you want to keep your food as cold as possible for as long as possible is to buy a good cooler. Good camping coolers can be expensive, but you should look at them as long-term investments because as long as you take care of them, they should last for years. A good cooler is going to do a much better job of keeping your food cold and fresh than a cheap one.
And, if the cooler you choose doesn’t keep your food cold for very long, you’ll spend more money, in the long run, buying fresh food during your camping trip.
Any of these coolers would be a good choice for an overnight, weekend, or multi-day camping trip, but here are the three best possible camping coolers:
Yeti Cooler
Yeti coolers are some of the best, most durable, and most long-lasting coolers on the market today. There are several different options when it comes to Yeti coolers, but they all have the same “fatwall” design that adds up to two inches of insulation, added permafrost insulation, and extra-tough, nearly indestructible construction.
For extended camping trips where you can drive your truck almost right to your campsite, you might want the Yeti 160 Cooler, which is one of the bigger models that holds a lot, which also means it can hold plenty of ice – 159 pounds (72.12 kilograms) of it, in fact.
If you have to travel on foot for a considerable distance, you might do better with the Yeti Haul Cooler, which is smaller but has wheels and is easy to drag along behind you. Because of its smaller size, it’s better for shorter trips.
Orca 75-Quart Camping Cooler
The Orca 75-Quart (70.98-liter) Cooler is another excellent option, as the capacity is perfect for a multi-day camping trip because it keeps your food cool and fresh for up to ten days. It features durable, roto-molded construction and extendable handles, making it much easier to carry and move around from place to place.
The lid uses a gasket seal, which is a tight, effective seal that keeps the cold air inside. There’s also a cargo net on the back of the outside of the cooler, which adds a little bit of extra storage for equipment, camping utensils, or other things that don’t need to be kept cool.
RovR Camping Cooler
Like most companies that make coolers, RovR has plenty of options from which you can choose. One of the better ones is the RovR RollR 60, but the company also makes smaller and larger options to better meet your specific needs.
The RovR coolers are excellently made and super durable. In particular, this one has heavy-duty, puncture-resistant tires and a pull-beside dual handle that makes it easy to drag around with you on your way to the site. The 60-quart (56.78-liter) capacity keeps ice frozen for seven to ten days.
Although you have to buy the extras separately, there are places on the cooler to attach both a dual cup holder and a cutting/prep board.
Use the Right Ice
Selecting the right ice is another important consideration that most people often get wrong. Many campers, especially inexperienced ones, stop by the gas station and pick up party ice from the freezers outside, but this type of ice is not good ice for camping.
What Type of Ice Should I Use in My Cooler?
If you’re comfortable using dry ice, it’s a good option, as it’ll definitely keep things cold. However, some states don’t allow it, and some people aren’t comfortable with it because it can be dangerous. It can hurt you or crack your cooler, so only go this route if you’re very comfortable and experienced using dry ice.
You could also try making your own ice. Make large blocks for the bottom of your cooler and for layering. Then make large and small cubes to fill any crevices between the large blocks.
If you don’t know how to make large blocks of ice, The Boat Galley has a great how-to guide you can follow.
Use Enough Ice (The 2:1 Ratio)
Use enough large blocks, large cubes, and small cubes to cover all your food effectively. The 2:1 ratio might be the easiest way to remember how much ice you should use.
You should include double the amount of ice for the amount of food you plan on taking in your cooler. For example, if you have 12 pounds (5.44 kilograms) worth of drinks, you need 24 pounds (10.89 kilograms) of ice. If you have eight pounds (3.63 kilograms) of food, you need 16 pounds (7.26 kilograms) of ice.
Add Salt to Your Cooler
There’s a reason you add rock salt to an ice cream maker. It makes things colder! The same principle applies to ice in a cooler. If you want to keep your ice colder for longer, add rock salt to it. Many people wait until they’ve wholly packed their coolers and then sprinkle rock salt over the top of them.
However, you might want to lightly salt each of your layers with rock salt; then add another generous helping of it on top of the final layer of ice.
You may be thinking, “But doesn’t rock salt melt ice off the roads?!” You have a point, but adding salt to your cooler still works because rock salt actually lowers the ice’s freezing point, making things much colder, even after the ice begins to melt.
Bring Two Separate Coolers
Depending on your financial situation, how many people are on your trip, and how large your coolers are, this may not be an option for everyone. However, if you can bring two coolers, it’ll be very beneficial to you.
You should add meats, frozen foods, and other items that you won’t often need in one cooler, which should be the cooler that contains your camp meals and other things you’ll only be getting out once or twice a day at specific times.
Fill your second cooler with your drinks and any cold snacks you may want throughout the day, which allows the cooler full of your meats and other frozen foods to remain closed most of the time because people aren’t constantly opening it to grab drinks, cheese snacks, or sandwiches.
Prepare Your Food in Advance
Prepare as many of your meals as possible in advance. Doing so cuts down on the number of loose ingredients you’ll have to store in your coolers, and it will keep your food fresh longer. Finally, if you pre-cook your food and then freeze it, that’s extra “ice” for your cooler.
Layer Your Food Carefully
Correctly layering your food will also help ensure everything stays as fresh as possible. At the bottom of your cooler, start with your large blocks of ice. Then, your first layer of food should be the things that need to be kept the coldest. You’ll want to put them on the bottom because cold air sinks while warm air rises.
Any frozen meats that you have should go on the next layer. If your cooler allows it, add another layer of ice on top of the meat, even if you only have room for smaller ice rather than large blocks. Next comes your dairy and pre-prepared foods (bagged sandwiches, pre-cooked meals, etc.). If possible, add more ice on top of them.
Your top layer of food should be things that you and your fellow campers will eat soon or often, which is why two camping coolers are best. However, if that’s not possible, then most of your drinks should be on this top layer, too, since people will consume them more often than they will the food.
Here’s a great video demonstrating how to pack your cooler properly:
Freeze Your Food
Anything you’re bringing along that can be frozen should be frozen. Not only will frozen food stay cold longer, but the food then becomes “ice” as well, which creates the perfect win-win situation. Many types of meat such as hot dogs, deli meats, or pre-cooked chicken can be frozen without damaging the quality of the food.
Plenty of other things do well if frozen also. Pre-freeze all the food that you can, transferring it directly from the freezer to your cooler right before you leave. The more frozen things you have in your cooler, the longer everything will take to melt or thaw.
Freeze the Majority of Your Water Bottles
You’ll need to keep some water bottles unfrozen because you never know when you’re going to get thirsty and need a nice, cold bottle of water. However, much of your water can be pre-frozen.
Over time, the bottles will start to thaw even inside the cooler, but if you know you’ll need a few of them sooner, you can always take them out when you get to the campsite to let them start thawing.
Make Liberal Use of Ice Packs
Ice packs are another way to keep things cold. Everyone on your trip should bring along an extra personal cooler, like this Carhartt Vertical Insulated Lunch Bag, full of ice packs, which can serve two purposes. As you take things out of your cooler, leaving empty space, you can fill that space with the still-frozen or cold ice packs.
Additionally, if you need to take a frozen water bottle out of the cooler to let it thaw, you can put it in your personal cooler a couple of hours before you need it. It’ll melt faster away from the tightly packed ice of the cooler, but it won’t get as hot as it would thawing out in the sun because the personal cooler will keep it cool as it thaws.
How Do You Keep Food Cold for 12 Hours?
Keeping food cool for 12 hours is much easier than keeping it cool for multiple days. You can still use all of the tips and tricks listed above, but you don’t have to be quite so fastidious in your preparation if you’re only going on a quick overnight camping trip. Aside from those methods listed above, here are a few other things you can do.
Keep Your Cooler Out of the Sun
Whether you’re camping for a day or a week, another thing you should do is to keep your cooler out of the sun. Find a nice, cool, shaded area, and park your cooler there, which might mean moving it around throughout the day because as the sun changes position, areas of shade will change, as well.
The more often you’re able to keep your cooler in the shade, the longer it’ll take for things to start melting inside of it.
Don’t Over-Drain Your Cooler
One mistake people often make with their coolers is draining them too often. They think that just because the ice has melted, they need to drain the water. When ice melts, the water is still cold inside that cooler. Unless it’s getting to the point where your food and drinks are literally swimming in the water, leave it alone. You don’t have to empty it every time it gets a little water in it.
Pre-Cool Your Cooler
Pre-chilling your cooler will also help keep the cooler itself cold for longer, and the colder it is, the longer it’ll keep everything inside of it cold, as well. Orion Coolers has a quick little video that tells you exactly how you can do this (spoiler alert: It’s so much simpler than you might think!):
How Do You Keep Milk Cold While Camping?
Milk isn’t one of the best drinks to take with you on a camping trip, so unless you just have to have it, it’s better to leave it at home. However, in situations where you just can’t camp without milk, you can do a few things to help keep it cold. You might want to follow all the advice listed above for dairy products.
But here are two more things you can do to keep your milk cold while camping.
Use Powdered Milk
You might take powdered milk with you instead, as you can mix it with water whenever you need a little milk. Many campers complain that powdered milk just doesn’t taste the same, but most of those campers haven’t tried Milkman Low-Fat Milk.
The company uses real cream to make it, and it’s surprisingly good. More importantly, it eliminates the need for keeping your milk cold.
Freeze Your Milk Beforehand
Finally, if you insist on bringing “regular” milk, try freezing it ahead of time. Frozen milk can last for several months in a freezer, and while it won’t last nearly that long in a camping cooler, it should last at least a few days, especially if you pack it at the bottom layer of the cooler surrounded by thick blocks of ice.
Wrapping It Up
There’s nothing worse than enjoying a camping trip and then discovering that most of your food has gone bad. Luckily, there are plenty of things you can do to make sure this never happens to you. Using all of the above-listed tips and tricks will ensure your food and drinks stay frozen or cold for as long as they need to stay that way.
However, the first step to making any of these tips work is to invest in a high-quality cooler. If you’re using a subpar cooler, most of these tips aren’t going to do you any good.
