Quality Coolers are a Must Have

When I’m teaching outdoor cooking skills, I often get asked what are the essential items to get started? One of the must have pieces of camping equipment are a couple of good coolers. Cold foods should be kept below 40°F. So, unless you regularly camp in temperatures below 40°F, you need to have good coolers. And the higher the temperatures, the better the coolers need to be.

Coolers are one place where you want to spend the money and opt for the highest quality you can afford. You want rugged, hard-shell, well insulated coolers with tight seals. Lockable ones are even better. Trust me, most raccoons are pretty smart. You want coolers that will keep your foods cold at least 4-6 days. This will get you easily through a long weekend. If you like to take longer trips, there are more options.

I advocate for multiple, smaller coolers as opposed to one big cooler. Smaller coolers are easier to lift and pack into your vehicle. Packing the vehicle is always a game of Tetris, isn’t it?

Smaller coolers allow you to separate your foods by type, i.e., all your proteins in one, all your fresh produce in another, all your cold beverages in another, etc., or you can separate by meal so that the Sunday morning breakfast cooler doesn’t need to ever be opened until Sunday morning.

The best brands on the market today include Yeti, Orca, RTIC, Engel, Xspec, OtterBox, Cabela, Igloo, and Coleman. There are more brands but the ones I mentioned consistently get high marks from hard core campers. Each of these lines have multiple models with varying features to fit your needs. Figure out how and where you like to camp and what’s important to you.

Even if you’re just a weekend camper, go for something that will keep foods cold (below 40°F) at least 4-6 days. This will ensure that even on a long weekend, your foods will still be cold by the end of the trip and the return back home where anything that did not get eaten can be safely returned to the refrigerator.

If you live in bear country, you might want to check out coolers with IGBC certification. Yes, that’s a thing. A certification from the Interagency Grizzly Bear Committee verifies that the product in question has been tested by said committee and meets minimum standards for design and structural standards that are considered “bear-resistant” by a team of grizzly bear experts. The IGBC specifically states that this does not mean the product in question can’t be opened or destroyed by a bear, nor does it mean the product is leakproof. With that said, even the minimum construction standards required to deter a hungry 900 lb grizzly lend a lot of credibility to the durability of a product.

Do your research. Quality coolers are a good investment and, once you’ve made your purchase, treat your cooler as just that: an investment. Store it in a safe place, clean it out after every trip, take good care of it, and it will last a long, long time. A quality cooler will keep your foods safe and cold, and that includes your beer because after a long hike who wants a warm beer on a hot day?!

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Summer Chilling in Your Cooler

In the Northern Hemisphere, summer officially began June 21. Summer is the best time to go camping, but it is the worst time for keeping cold foods cold. In order to keep foods out of the “danger zone” we need to keep them below 40°F. Our coolers are our best friends when it comes to keeping our cold ones cold, but we need to help them out as much as we can. Here are some tips to help coolers do their job.

Pre-Chill the Cooler

The day before you go, pull your coolers out of hot sheds, attics or garages and store them at room temperature. Pre-cool them with ice overnight before packing them the next day.

Load Cold

Make sure all foods and beverages are chilled or frozen. Typically, we tend to pull canned beverages out of the garage or pantry and load them into coolers; however, it can take more than a pound of ice to cool a six-pack that started at room temperature. So, chill everything before you load it into coolers. Freeze meats and any foods that you won’t need right away and load them frozen. They will function as ice as they thaw.

More is Better When it Comes to Ice

Try not to overload your coolers, leave plenty of room for ice. The ideal ice-to-contents ratio is 2:1. It’s better to use more coolers so they all can be adequately iced.

Top Off Your Coolers

If you have any extra space in your cooler, add more ice. Extra air space will accelerate ice melt because a portion of the ice will be used to cool that air.

Not All Ice is Created Equal

Ice from your refrigerator is not as cold as ice from a commercial freezer. An ideal combination is dry ice mixed with regular cubed ice. The cubed ice will chill the contents faster and the dry ice will last longer. If dry ice isn’t available, block ice will last longer than cubed ice. Be advised that cheaper plastic coolers can crack if used with dry ice. Check with the cooler’s manufacturer before using. Always wear gloves when handling dry ice.

Keep Coolers in the Shade

When setting up camp, try to find a shady spot for your cook shelter or position your pop up to provide shade all day long. Always have an extra tarp with you so you can hang it off one side of the cook shelter to make more shade. If you can’t do this, you’ll need to be moving your coolers throughout the day to keep them in the shade. When purchasing coolers, choose coolers that are white or that have light colors as these will absorb less heat from the sun.

Don’t Drain the Water

A lot of folks believe draining the water from the cooler will help, but it doesn’t. The water is almost as cold as the ice and can help insulate the remaining ice. Make sure all your foods, especially raw meats, are not exposed to the water. When packing, transfer foods that are stored in cardboard to plastic containers that will not turn to mush in the cold water.

Keep the Lid Closed

Each time the lid is lifted, warm air enters the cooler, which speeds up ice melt. When you need to open the lid, quickly grab everything you need and then close the lid tightly. When packing your coolers, designate one cooler just for beverages, knowing it will get opened more frequently. You can also pack your coolers by meal. For example, all items for Sunday morning breakfast are loaded into their own cooler, which doesn’t ever get opened until Sunday morning.

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Chillin’ with Your Cooler

When we’re camping, our cooler is our refrigerator, but unlike our refrigerator at home, our cooler has a limited ability to cool and keep foods cold. And, we’re not doing it any favors by constantly opening it or leaving it sitting in the blazing hot sun. And, the last thing we want is to be two days into our trip and have warm drinks and spoiled food.

These tips will help you help your cooler to do its job and make your trip a bit more worry-free and enjoyable, not to mention, healthy.

Pre-Trip Check
Regularly inspect your coolers for cracks, broken seals, broken latches or anything that might compromise their cooling ability.

Pre-Chill the Cooler
The night before you leave, drop a bag of ice in your cooler. This will drop the internal temperature of your cooler and help keep things cold. Also, make sure all the items that need refrigeration have chilled at least overnight in the refrigerator before you load them into the cooler. Also, freeze anything you won’t need right away. These items will act as ice and will most likely be thawed by the time you need them.

Avoid the Danger Zone
Don’t overload your cooler with food. Leave room for enough ice to do the job. For proper food handling, you want the temperature of your cooler and the food in it to stay at or below 40°F.

The More the Merrier
If you can, having more than one cooler is ideal. We designate one just for drinks that will be opened more often. We have one or more designated just for food that will stay closed most of the time. If we’re bringing a lot of items that need to stay cold, we’ll divide the food among multiple coolers by meal. This way, the Sunday morning breakfast cooler doesn’t get opened until Sunday morning. Doing this will help ensure the important stuff, food, stays cool and doesn’t spoil.

First in, Last Out
Try to pack things in such a way so that the food you use the soonest is on top. This will help keep you from spending more time with the cooler lid open digging around for what you need. We’ve also been known to label each cooler with its contents so, again, you’re not cooler diving looking for that one ingredient.

Block vs. Cubed
Block ice, though bulkier, melts slower. Cubed ice will cool items faster, but they melt faster. A mix of both is ideal to keep up your ice retention.

To Drain or Not to Drain
There is no question here. Do not drain the cold water. It will help the ice retention of your remaining ice because it will be close to the same temp as your ice.

The Sun is the Enemy
When in the shade, ice retention is almost twice as long as when your cooler is in the sun. Try to keep your cooler shaded or, when traveling, pack blankets or sleeping bags around and over the cooler to keep it insulated. When setting up your camp kitchen, know how the sun will track during the day and find or create a shaded spot to store your coolers.

Helping your cooler do its job better will make for a healthier and happier camping experience. Now, get outside and cook something! And, have some fun!

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Think Inside the Box Part 3-Your Camp Refrigerator

Coolers serve as your camp kitchen refrigerator, but for the coolers to do their job they can’t be overloaded. They need to have enough ice in them to maintain foods at 40°F or below; otherwise, bacteria starts to grow. Keep your coolers in the shade to help them keep their cool.

Coolers are one place where you want to spend the money and opt for the highest quality you can afford. Hard-shell coolers are best. While soft-sided coolers may be fine for short day trips, hard-shell coolers will insulate far better and protect foods from being crushed in a fully packed vehicle.

When packing your coolers, be sure to isolate meat packages in plastic bags to prevent contaminating other foods like fresh fruits and vegetables. Freeze any fresh poultry or meat that will not be used within two days. Not only will this keep meats from spoiling, but they are now working as ice to help keep your cooler cold. If you’re packing in water for drinking and cooking, freeze some of the bottles and use them in your coolers as ice.

If you are bringing eggs to camp and you don’t need them whole for frying, instead of trying to transport fragile eggs, you could just bring a carton of egg beaters. Or, at home, you could crack your eggs into a plastic container and bring them to camp that way. If you do need to bring whole eggs, transport them in a hard plastic container to prevent breakage.

And, just as you do with the refrigerator door at home, discourage people from standing at the cooler with the lid open. Know what you want, get in, find it, and get out. Ice is melting! Organize your cooler so that foods you will be using first are on the top and foods you will be using last are on the bottom, or do the same thing going left to right. Find a system that works for you. The goal is to minimize as much as possible the time that the lid is open.

Here’s another option to limit the amount of lid lifting: Rather than bringing one giant cooler, bring smaller ones and designate each one for a different meal or different day. The cooler that is designated for Sunday breakfast never gets opened until Sunday morning.

If you plan on packing lots of canned and bottled beverages, consider bringing a beverage-specific cooler. Beverage coolers are opened and closed frequently, which allows chilled air to quickly escape. If your food is stored in a separate cooler that is opened less frequently, your temperature-sensitive foods will stay chilled for a longer period of time.

And, just like we discussed in “Think Inside the Box Part 2-Your Camp Pantry,” remember to secure or store your coolers against critters.