USVI-On-Line

cindygad wrote: I think the biggest price shock is crackers and chips.I bring enough small bags of chips, granola bars, peanuts for a snack everyday in our checked luggage.

I agree, the low density packaged foods seem to have the highest price difference. I guess it takes up a lot of space on the boat. We bring the granola/oatmeal bars and nuts also and we bring microwave popcorn to supplement our snacking instead of buying chips. They pack well into empty places in the luggage.

Chateaubriand or Fillets for the grill

Salsa from our favorite Mexican restaurant, suck-sealed in a pouch.

Parmesan-Reggiano cheese for grating

My Bolognese Sauce for pasta (also suck-sealed and frozen - just put the pouch in boiling water)

Bacon

Breakfast Sausage Links

Johnsonville Sausage for noshing


Brick cheeses for noshing

Love the cookies, Margo!!!

Margy Z wrote: suck-sealed in a pouch.

Margy, you have such a way with words! LMAO!

Margy Z wrote:Love the cookies, Margo!!!

I just adapted the "make them ahead & freeze them" Christmas cookie idea that I got right here on the forum! It seems so logical, no?

I just found this in my notes from my January 2010 trip. 10 days at a villa on Bordeaux Mtn. with our then four year old. We didn't eat out much and I made chix salad with 1/2 the chix
3 pck. of Bacon
1 lb of Boars Head Turkey from our local deli
1 lb of American Cheese ""
1 lb of Black Forest Ham ""
Cheese (cheese and cracker style)
6 frozen steaks
6 frozen packages of chix breasts BJ's
Bubba burgers (frozen) must haves
4 filet mignon's
1 pck all beef hot dogs (that's all the four yr old eats_
1 lb of butter

We filled a small/med size cooler with this and put it at the bottom of one of my suitcases. I also have a list of the dry goods and what to purchase at Starfish... Can you say OCD?

This past January we didn't bring any food because it was just the hubby and myself. $11 for a lb of bacon!!! yikes.. I really don't need bacon.. definitely NOT at this price

How come so many people bring butter? Is it the cost? I remember buying some at Love City Mini Mart, but I don't have a clue what I paid 4 yrs. ago!

Meats (Steak, Chicken)
Burgers
Brats
Butter
Cheese
Hot dogs(for my kids)
Yogurt Tubes

I buy Market Day products through my kids' school. The meats are individually frozen and shrink wrapped so there is no danger of leaking. Very easy to pack them in a cooler to check. I remember butter and cheese being expensive, I usually pick some up on sale at home and toss the butter in the freezer to bring along. I don't freeze the cheese, I just toss it in with the frozen items. I also bring Coffee in my suitcase and a bag of cereal if I have room.

California Girl wrote:How come so many people bring butter? Is it the cost? I remember buying some at Love City Mini Mart, but I don't have a clue what I paid 4 yrs. ago!

I bring butter you cannot buy on the island--Vermont Butter and Cheese company cultured butter, and Plurga.

I forgot to add bacon to my original list. I always bring bacon--the thick cut Neiman Ranch kind--again, something you cannot buy at the St. John markets.

Mostly meats and cheeses, locally produced stuff that we prefer over the standard products available on STJ.

Breakfast meats such like bacon, sausage and ham
Smoked meats and cheeses for beach snacking

When the grandparents travel with us, I meal plan for them and our son. I bring the meat and all dry ingredients (spices) for each evening meal and compile a grocery list based on the menus of anything I needed to buy on island.

When my son was younger and feeding him was more of a job, I would take specific items for him so I always had qood quality, satisfying snacks for him at the beach. Now that he is older and can eat anything, I don't worry about this.

P-600, I hear ya on the list, I admit to being an OCD lister.

French Brie, gouda, blue and chedder cheeses, lox, cream cheese, thick West Virginia bacon, a couple pounds each shrimp and sea scallops, hamburger and chicken, steamable vegies, raw almonds and crunchy peanut butter, fresh lychees. I will have a bumper crop of tomatoes and am wondering can I bring these on my carry on or do I need to pack in checked(very carefully)? Laura

We bring one stick of butter cause that's all we'll use in a week, and it's sitting right there in our fridge, so why buy a pound of it on St. John?

We take chicken breasts (only because I get our chicken from one place near me)

Porkroll!!! It's a philly thing. Scrapple, again a philly thing )

Hot sausage, again, because we can only get it here.

Spices, but we went to the craft store and bought tiny little zip lock bags and we label them. So easy for space.

I also make a snack bag which includes pretzels, raisens, cheeze crackers, nuts. Comes in handy.

Besides that I think we can find everything we need on Island and we don't have to carry anything that's really heavy.

Connie,

So glad to see that you bring scrapple too!! We will be there in June, and scrapple is on the top of the list for our cooler. Nothing better than well cooked scrapple!

I am finding this discussion interesting as I am hearing about lots of food I have never heard of before! LOL Its is odd how different parts of the US have their own foods specific to their culture.
Scrapple sounds somewhat similiar to 'touche pie'... who knows what that is?! hehehe

Thanks for the bacon tip. .Will DEF. bring that .. $11 a pound holy s*** !!!

Scrapple! That is one breakfast thing that doesn't make it into our cooler. My hubby loves it, I do not.

We take a lot of breakfast "treats" because in our real lives, none of us have time to sit down together in the morning, let alone cook breakfast. Making a really big breakfast and eating outside is something we love to do on vacation.

PaminMaine,

Don't ask what is in scrapple!!! It's definitely not something you want to ask the recipe for. Scrapple is definitely a Delaware/Philly thing.

I was born and raised on scrapple, but lots of people I know won't touch it. Come to my house and I'll show you good scrapple!!

Even better....if you're on island June 11 - 18, come to our villa and I'll cook some for you!!

Cathy