Naturalpath

A meal in the outdoors is something special. Even ordinary fare can taste sublime at day's end in a natural setting.

But nothing will ruin your magical, great outdoor experience quicker than food poisoning. Avoid this summer tragedy by following a few simple food safety camping tips and principles.

Summertime camping brings a heightened risk of food poisoning not only because bacteria grow fastest in warm, humid weather, but also because when we camp, picnic or barbeque we abandon safe kitchen routines. So adopt a new food safety camping routine.

Food Safety: Camping - Top 10 Tips

• Plan it don't wing it: decide what you are going to eat and how you are going to cook it; then plan what equipment you will need.
• Bring a cold source: Never bring meat or poultry products without a cold source to keep them safe.
• Careful with Leftovers: Put leftovers back into an ice chest or cooler immediately after eating. If using a cooler, leftover food is safe only if the cooler still has ice in it. Otherwise, discard the food. In any event, don't leave food out for longer than two hours when the temperature's under 90 degrees or more than an hour when the temperature reaches 90 plus.
• Separate the Raw: Keep raw foods (meat, not veggies) separate from other foods.
• Wash Your Hands Frequently When Handling Food: Bring disposable wipes or biodegradable soap for hand and dishwashing. And wash your hands thoroughly before and after handling food.
• Don't Drink Wild: Either bring bottled water for drinking, boil water, or use water purification tablets and a filter (see below).
• Keep a tidy campsite: Don't leave trash in the wild and clean up food surfaces.
  
• Don't Guess Meat Temperature: Bring along a meat thermometer to make sure meats and poultry are cooked to a safe internal temperature (see below).
• Ice that Catch: Put freshly caught fish on ice immediately after cleaning.
• Know Your Wild Foods: Don't eat any nuts, berries, mushrooms, or other items in the wild that you don't recognize and know are safe.

Food Safety: Camping - Key Principles

So you want to go deeper than our Top 10 tips and understand the key principles behind Food Safety Camping?

Cold Food Principles

Bacteria is generally kept in check at temperatures below 40 °F or above 140 °F. Above 40 degrees, bacteria multiply rapidly and can reach dangerous levels after 1-2 hours. Therefore, you need to keep foods either hot or cold. Since it is difficult to keep foods hot without a continuous heat source, consider bringing pre-chilled foods and a cold source. Refrigerate or freeze the food overnight. For a cold source, bring frozen gel-packs or freeze some box drinks (see below).

Car camping offers more flexibility, of course, than backpacking, as you can easily bring a cooler. Other cold sources include block of ice which keeps longer than ice cubes. One tip is to use milk cartons filled with water to make blocks of ice, or use frozen gel-packs. Fill the cooler with cold or frozen foods. Pack foods in reverse order. First foods packed should be the last foods used. (One exception: pack raw meat or poultry below ready-to-eat foods to prevent raw meat or poultry juices from dripping on the other foods - better yet separate them into different containers -- see below). Take foods in the smallest quantity needed.  At camp, insulate the cooler from the sun with a blanket, tarp or some other covering.

Going vegetarian or bringing camp-convenient foods (see list below) offers advantages as they don’t need to be cooler stored. These include whole fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, trail mix, canned meat spreads, and peanut butter. (After canned foods are opened they need to be placed in a cooler.)

Cleanliness Principles

The next principle is that bacteria present on raw meat and poultry products can be easily spread to other foods. Cross-contamination can happen, for instance, when meat juices drip from packages, hands, or utensils.  When transporting raw meat or poultry, double wrap or place the packages in plastic bags to prevent juices from dripping. Wash your hands before and after handling food, and don’t use the same platter and utensils for raw and cooked meat and poultry. If soap and water aren't available, disposable wipes can serve as a substitute.

Washing dishes or cookware should adhere to several guidelines. To protect the environment, use only biogdegradable soap which is widely available at stores that sell camping supplies. Use soap sparingly and be be sure to keep it out of rivers, lakes, streams, and springs -- even biodegradable soap will pollute. This means washing pots at the campsite, not at water’s edge. Dump dirty water on dry ground, well away from fresh water. Baking soda can also be used to wash utensils.

Pure Water Principles

Pathogens exist even in remote mountain lakes or streams so bring bottled or tap water. For longer trips, purify water from streams, lakes, and springs. The surest way to make water safe is boiling it, which will kill microorganisms. To do so, bring water to a rolling boil, and then continue boiling for at least 1 minute at sea level altitudes. Before heating, muddy water should be allowed to stand for a while to allow the silt to settle to the bottom. Dip the clear water off the top and boil. At higher elevations, where the boiling point of water is lower, boil for at least several minutes.

As an alternative to boiling water, use water purification tablets and water filters. The purification tablets — which contain iodine, halazone, or chlorine — kill most waterborne bacteria, viruses, and some (but not all) parasites. Because some parasites — such as Cryptosporidium parvum, Giardia lamblia, and larger bacteria — are not killed by purification tablets, you should also use a water filter. These water filtering devices must be 1 micron absolute or smaller. Note that purification tablets lose their potency ove rtime, so maintain a fresh supply.

Camp Cooking Principles

Bring along a portable stove, as many camping areas prohibit campfires. It's a good idea to assemble and test your camp stove before your trip. If you build a campfire, extinguish the fire complely and dispose of the ashes before breaking camp. Leftover food should be burned, not dumped. Lastly, be sure to pack garbage bags to dispose of any other trash, and carry it out with you.

A food thermometer may be the most underappreciated piece of equipment for food safety camping. If cooking meat or poultry on a portable stove or over a fire, you’ll need a way to determine when it is done and safe to eat. Color is not a reliable indicator, and under camp site light it can be especially tricky to tell the color of a food. Ground beef, in particular, may be contaminated with E. coli O157:H7, a very dangerous strain of bacteria. Illnesses have occurred even when ground beef patties were cooked until there was no pink showing.

Cook all meat and poultry to safe minimum internal temperatures:

• Beef, veal, and lamb steaks, roasts, and chops may be cooked to 145 °F.
• All cuts of pork to 160 °F.
• Ground beef, veal and lamb to 160 °F.
• All poultry should reach 165 °F.
• Heat hot dogs and any leftover food to 165 °F. Clean the thermometer between uses.

• peanut butter in plastic jars;
• concentrated juice boxes;
• canned tuna, ham, chicken, and beef;.
• dried noodles and soups;
• beef jerky and other dried meats;
• dehydrated foods;
• dried fruits and nuts; and
• powdered milk and fruit drinks.
• powdered mixes for biscuits or pancakes
• pasta, rice, quinoa