Fridge or no fridge? How to manage the cold on board
Fridge on board? No problem. You can keep food and drinks cold on board without a huge fridge and with low energy. Tips for your next cruise.
Sabbatical year on a Catamaran: How do you preserve your food?
I rented a catamaran for a sabbatical year in the Caribbean. So I managed the cold on board, without asking too many questions, we had a refrigerator on board: the usual catamaran fridge. You know the with the products that ended up swimming in the water because we lacked energy!
What others do with to keep their food cold?
I met a lot of friends on boat. Some with a large families who had left with a refrigeration equipment, which broke down during the sailing trip and was never replaced. The beer was warm on board.
I met other boat with nice coolers, a good refrigerator and a nice freezer: the cocktails had ice cubes on board!
But all of those sailors said they were happy with their situation with or without a decent working fridge.
The right questions to choose a good fridge
Today, if I had to rethink the cold on board a cruise ship, these are the questions I would ask myself:
- What volume of cold or ice and for what usage?
- Refrigerated or domestic refrigerator?
- What impact on space?
- What impact on energy on board?
- What impact on total weight?
- What is the cost?
Each person has their own answers at a given time and for a given boat. Nevertheless, here are my thoughts to date.
Adapt to your program
For a one-week summer cruise with family or friends, a large cooler or a cold storage box for food and another for drinks, if well managed, are sufficient. Ice blocks are always available for purchase in marinas almost everywhere.
For a longer cruise in the Caribbean or in the Med, a fridge makes for a more peaceful voyage, even if after 2 weeks all the perishable food is generally eaten. This leaves the pleasure of a cold drink and the preservation of the fish caught during the crossing…
For a program where provisioning is going to be more difficult and where the pleasure of eating is an essential element of morale on board, the freezer can be a wise choice. You can have meat, vegetables, ready-made meals… and ice cubes!
What about the size and volume?
As for the refrigerator size and volume, it depends on your habits. In the USA, eggs are washed to avoid contamination with salmonella, so they must be kept in the refrigerator. In Europe, hens are vaccinated against salmonella, and eggs are naturally protected by their intact shells, so it is not necessary to keep them cold. But the bigger your fridge, the more you can put in it. The smaller it is, the more you can find other ways of preserving food.
For more technical questions such as compression refrigerator, separate-unit refrigerator/freezer, absorption refrigerator, I have no opinion, but two points are important to me: the ability to detect breakdowns and find spare parts , and the question of energy (power supply) .
Space, Energy and Weight
The impact on space, energy and weight depends on how you use the boat/sailing program. If you use your boat primarily for sailing, racing or mooring and docking (with or without a mains connection), the choice of cooling will be different. The cooling unit accounts for more than a third of the total electricity consumption when sailing and more than half when moored.
Tips to save money and energy while using your fridge on board
Here are some tips and tricks to make your fridge last longer, not lose food and limit its consumption.
- Maintain a bearable temperature for the crew and less stress (and consumption) of refrigeration equipment for sensitive foodstuffs.
- Don’t load your refrigerator for nothing. Use a net to put your fruit, vegetables and eggs in.
- Let food cool down before putting it in the fridge. (If it is hot, the fridge uses more energy to cool it down and its heat generates humidity.) Let food defrost in the fridge to benefit from the released coolness.
- Do not store food in its packaging: it takes up space and insulates the products from the cold. It can also attract small creatures.
- Clean your fridge regularly (thoroughly once a month) as fresh produce contains bacteria.
- Properly package opened food and leftovers in airtight boxes/bags, or even vacuum-sealed.
- Choose your dessert or drink before opening the door: every time you open the door, warm air enters… and it takes energy to make it cold again.
- Don’t wait until the freezer door won’t close anymore to defrost it. A 3 mm layer of ice consumes 30% more energy.
- Store the oldest products at the front.