let's go to the store

Our commercial countertop VacMaster vacuum sealer.

We are going to the grocery store today, so I thought this would be a good day to talk about what “provisioning” looks like for us right now and how I think it might look for us in the near future, and also talk about how we store our food that doesn’t come in a resealable package.

We have quite a bit of storage room for food right now, between the cabinets, in floor storage, and under the saloon cushions, finding space isn’t that difficult of a task. While we are living on the hard, since everything is so close to us, we make a weekly grocery store run just like we would when we were living in a more “traditional” home. We make a rough plan for what we would like to eat for the week and go to the local store. We really like this little Italian market just south of Juno Beach, called Doris’. The produce is amazing, the deli is massive and has pretty much everything you could ever think of, the bakery is divine, and the prices are better than Publix (the local chain grocery store in Florida). Then, once every week and a half or so we got to Costco and/or Sam’s Club to get some items in bulk or Costco’s rotisserie chicken (its amazing). Like I said we have quite a bit of storage. On top of the dry storage we have an Isotherm stand alone freezer, and Isotherm side-by-side refrigerator/freezer, and a commercial merchandising refrigerator unit with a clear glass door like one you would see at the store with drinks in it (we won’t be keeping that, but it’s nice to have around for the time being).

The one thing that I think will be the biggest difference is that while living in a regular house or living on the boat on the hard, the grocery store is just down the street. When you're on the hook, the store may not be that convenient, or as plentiful. On land, if one store doesn’t have something you need, you just go to another one…no big deal. On the hook, especially when you’re not in the USA, the store will be a dinghy ride plus some level of walking, taxi, or scooter ride away…AND, many things may be challenging to get. Fresh produce is often sparse and what is available, is purchased up very early in the morning. We come from an industry that not only has everything you could want (almost all the time) and in massive quantity to you’d better get up and get to the store early, or you’ll go without until you do get there early enough to purchase your prize!

Now, when we do provision stateside and bulk up on things, like meats especially, we have a commercial “countertop” vacuum sealer by VacMaster. It is awesome, and yes, it will remain on the boat and be used almost daily on everything from packaging food to sealing tools and parts to keep them preserved from the harsh, salty, humid environment we now live in. This awesome machine will be an amazing addition to our “tool” collection especially when we start catching fish! For now, I think that we are really lucky to be able to have this time on the hard to be able to get used to the space that we have on our boat. We have been able to look around at everything without swaying and rocking in the water which has been very convenient. I am very interested to see how we handle having only one refrigerator unit on board once we are ready to splash back in!

We have some exciting news to share with you on Sunday! Mom has another blog post in the works to share the news!

Thanks,

Syd