I don’t have an answer to your question specifically, but food will keep longer if you keep it under water, while in water proof containers.
Almost no cold is lost when you open the lid. The chest configuration is far superior to the cabinet configuration in terms of efficiency and keeping the temperature constant.
Anyway, he said that he kept food cool in his cell by wrapping it in wet cloth. That doesn't specifically answer your question, and I don't even know how true it is. But I'm throwing it out there to see if anyone knows anything about this.
Kudos to your frugality!
You have the most concern with uncooked meats, in my understanding.
Get a small chest freezer, put a Refrigerator or Freezer Thermostat (Temperature Controller) on it. When you open it the cool remains inside. Uses less energy, door types let all the cool air out.
after 24 hours figure the inside is probably the same as if it were stored at room temperature. Here in the Philippines we run 3 to 4 hours a day on our generator to keep it cold. But not freezing. For longer term survival, you just learn to cook around what you have. In the US I would advise cans not a fridge. Here in the rural Philippines IT means few veggies and lots of rice and dried fish.
I have no experience with ice boxes...but you keep different foods in different places...even older refrigerators keep meat and cheese right under the ice.
for off grid refrigeration, try a kerosene run refrigerator.
You can store stews for a few days at room temperature if you reboil it daily and keep it air tight. My Filipino husband kept his stews for 5 days like this in a heavy dutch oven with a heavy lid. I refused to eat it after day 3 but he never got sick.
Well, eggs can be dipped in water glass (aquas sodium silicate) and left un-refrigerated for months on end. Same with hard boiled eggs.
Prepper ping
Nothing will kill you if you boil it in water for 1 hour.
Find yourself an RV refrigerator. A 6-8 cubic foot fridge has a freezer on top and a large regular refrigerator on the bottom. There are also much smaller RV refrigerators. They are designed to run on propane. All that is required is a flame that is much, much smaller than the flame on a Bic lighter. You can even run them off a barbeque size propane tank for many, many months.
Forget the apartment size unit. If TSHTF, there will be little electricity but plenty of barbeque grill gas tanks to be scrounged up. Or, store a few filled ones. You’ll be surprised how long a small propane tank will last. And, you can trickle charge the Marine battery from a solar trickle charger. Start with a new battery.
You will need a marine battery to hook up to it to ignite the flame as the thermostat requires
Garden fall harvest in a deep root cellar and a dehydrator for drying summer crops when its hot. Use glass storage jars for storing your dried crop. Also consider a few 60” tanks of Co2 from your local welding supply for making dry ice in emergencies. Always go with a chest type freezer as suggested in a post above.... and learn to cure and smoke beef , fish, pork . Small chicken coop will keep you in fresh eggs and a fried chicken now and then. Consider as well a small pond you can stock with pan fish. Rainwater collection will keep water available for irrigation of the gardens etc....
Frugal ......just my suggestions, ideas.
First, IMO to get a true reading of the temperature of food in your refrigerator, put a spear-type thermometer (something like this: http://www.amazon.com/Thermometers-Habor-Thermometer-Anti-Corrosion-Best/dp/B0198473E4?ie=UTF8&keywords=thermometer&qid=1462677804&ref_=sr_1_2&s=kitchen&sr=1-2) in a glass of water in the refrigerator. Just keep it in there all the time. You’ll notice that after you open and close the door the temperature doesn’t drop. A refrigerator thermometer isn’t really an accurate measure of the temperature of the food in it. Also, the cheap ones can go bad easily and give false readings.
Second, I’ve kept cooked chicken in the refrigerator for over a week and it was fine. Interesting, and I’ve tested this, food keeps longer in the refrigerator in glass containers. It spoils much faster in plastic.
I highly recommend doing your own testing. All those experts and recommendations are fine, but I’ve found they are often wrong, or misguided.
The units in an above post are very pricy. Shop around on the internet. New small Domestic or Norcold RV units can be found for less than 1k. I know that an RV Store in Theodore, Alabama has small Norcold brand units for less than 1k plus shipping.
If it is for emergency survival, stick with canned goods and rice for minimal shelf loss.
For meat I would dry age it. Worked for our ancestors. No?
I’m pretty brave about what I’ll eat and I’m still alive. (If it doesn’t kill you it will make you stronger.)
However, that doesn’t mean it’s safe to eat anything. Acting on other people’s general experience with pushing the boundaries may kill you.
Be as safe as you can, increase your odds:
http://www.fda.gov/downloads/Food/ResourcesForYou/HealthEducators/UCM109315.pdf
Imho of course.
5.56mm
Most things ‘spoil’ because they become oxygenated, ( exposed to too much oxygen, ). For example, cheese will last longer if placed in an air-tight container. Plastic bags, tightly wrapped will make things last longer.
I grew up without electricity- very small propane fridge and general rules my mother taught me: Things we were extra careful about- raw hamburger, raw chicken, milk and soft cheese spoil fast if not kept properly, we didn’t try to keep them at all in the summer. Larger cuts of beef don’t spoil as fast. Ham was ok, fry it before eating after the first few days. If you use your eggs pretty soon it is not critical for them to be as cold as they say. Hard cheeses were pretty good to keep. Cooked chicken and pork and other meats weren’t bad to spoil.
In the summer we ate a lot of canned meat. A lot of things she only made enough for the meal we didn’t try to keep like salad dressing, mayo, cole slaw dressing from scratch and only enough for the meal. She used canned milk or powdered milk we didn’t keep milk.
Beans- pinto beans or cowboy beans we got chilled on the porch at night and mother would heat them for supper only- boiling them for a while before we ate them. She said you had to boil them for a while every day and then be able to chill them at night for them to keep for several days.