My most frequent "Scratch made" meals

During my 2 month 2020 cruise  Covid-19 restrictions meant that until the last couple of days in Blyth when the yacht club reopened, I only got to eat ashore once and had just one fish and chip takeaway. With rising costs and time in the wilderness I rarely east ashore these days although a take away is often a nice change, Newlyn, Ardglass and Port Ellen are particularly good for this.

I am rarely away from a shop for more than a week or so and am now cooking fresh so often I have loads of rusting canned food that have been on the boat for years.

Here, to show that you can do few things on a small boat, is a list of my most frequent "scratch made" meals beyond salads, sandwiches, cured meats (which I take a lot of), meals from a can (often perked up a bit), pies etc. I am not including recipes, just look up dishes on the internet and go from there, the biggest problem is scaling them for one, often I cook two portions and keep one in the electric cool box to east the next day or more usually the day after that. Even in the electric cool box raw meat, especially chicken and mince once opened, quickly spoils so making two portions at once is also a good idea to reduce wastage and avoid stomach bugs:

• For a treat, rarely now as it is difficult to get good meat at a sensible price, Steak, the following were usually just with fresh bread but occasionally with rice, slicing the steak makes cooking a lot quicker and easier, it’s not as succulent but the sauce tends to be better.
• Fried with tomatoes, onion & garlic,
• In a cream and mustard sauce (cream left over from some I got to go with strawberries and some from long life).
• Strip steak with unions or horseradish in a baguette. One decent sized steak will make a couple of light meals.
• Philly cheesesteak (using a baguette and not too much chilli).
• Spaghetti with meat balls in a very herby home made tomato sauce, ready made standard meat balls are OK, spicy ones found in Scotland are better..

  

  Meat balls in tomato sauce

  
  
• Curry, based on spam or preferably chicken, beef or hard boiled eggs, I use a medium powder cooking the onion with a lot of garlic and a little ginger.

  

  Chicken Curry
• Corned beef hash.

  

  Corned beef hash. This one can be made with all
  canned ingredients, but fresh is better.

  
  
• Egg fried rice with water chestnuts and chicken (fresh or pre cooked from the shop) or fresh / cooked king prawn.

  

  Egg fried rice with prawns.

  
  
• Spag Bol, mince often has a very long shelf life but doing it properly uses a lot of gas so I just cook for 25 minutes after browning etc. Also you can’t really make just one portion so one goes into the electric cool box.

 

Quick Spag Bol. Scratch made with some leftover
red pepper, tinned baby carrots, onion, fresh mince,
fresh tomatoes, red wine etc.

• For the more ambitious Beef bourguignon, although strictly speaking this is Beef “COOP Chilean Red Blend” but very tasty even so. Diced beef is of variable quality from the shop so simmering for longer than my standard 25 - 30 minutes cook time for diced meat may pay dividends. Goulash can be made in much the same way adding Cayenne pepper whilst browning the beef and not putting in all of the herbs. Use a reasonable quantity of potato, carrot and preferably fresh mushrooms and it is a one pot meal.

Scratch made with all fresh ingredients. Another 
portion in the cool box.

• Not strictly scratch made but a good meal: Sweet and Sour chicken, pork or prawns using a cook in sauce (preferably the one with extra pineapple) and an onion and / or Pepper, useful to use up half a pack of meat without duplicating a curry. 

Sweet and Sour Chicken.

• Pork loin in apricot sauce on rice - you really need brown sugar for this but it was OK with white. I forgot the picture last time I made it.

Also see my page SV Sancerre: Eating at Sea