What’s cooking?

What is it like cooking in Dora?

I get that question from readers occasionally. It was certainly one of my worries before we set off. How are we going to cope with cooking in a one square metre space?

I was also worried about where we were going to manage to store our food, or what sort of crockery should we take and how much?

We had limited space, so heavy pots and pans weren’t practical, they would just add weight to the van; glasses were out of the question, they would break as soon as we left the house.

Okay, before we go into the actual cooking system we have created, let’s go through our cooking material and where do we store our food.

Dora has two high level cupboards above the sink and stove. These are  30cm wide by 20 cm deep and 30 cm tall. Gary has installed a shelf in each.

In one of them, we store glasses, mugs and small plates.

We put plastic padded mats underneath to stop the rattling when driving. We bought two sets of mats but we also  inherited some from Dora’s previous owner.

For the glasses, we have plastic compartments, in the photo on the bottom shelf. Our glasses and mugs are plastic, except for the wine glasses. We refused to drink wine in plastic ones.

These were left by the previous owner and have proved useful. We did amend then quite a bit though. GDR

You may have spotted that there is only one glass wine in the photo. Yes, that is right. This is because we broke one. Well, I broke it. It only happened a couple of weeks ago. So not bad. In fact, they have actually lasted quite long, knowing us.

When we bought the crockery set, we chose it the same colour as  Dora’s covers. We are so stylish! We kept the set to a minimum. Two small plates, two big plates, two mugs and one big bowl.

In the other cupboard, we store dry food like coffee, tea, cereals, pasta and spices.

We secure the containers in which we store the dry food with a elastic bands. Things tend to move around quite a bit when we drive Dora. And inevitably, when we open the cupboards, things get thrown at us. On one occasion, the sugar container fell and the sugar was all over the floor. You learn quick in Dora, elastic bands soon prevented her from ‘throwing her toys out of the pram’!

For food storage, we also have another small compartment underneath the two we have mentioned above. This is only for small tins such as tuna tins and olives. We like having our olives as an aperitif before dinner, whilst we update the blog. This is only 10 cm high by 10 cm deep.

Underneath the sink, we have a cupboard with a couple of mesh drawers where we keep the fruit and vegetables. We put leftover plastic padded mats underneath to avoid the items falling through the holes.

 

Underneath the meshes, we keep the cleaning stuff and oils for cooking, upright and in plastic bags in case they spill.

Stacked behind the oils and cleaning stuff, we lay the long life milk and juices. We have space for around eight cartoons, three for juices, and the rest for milk. You can never store enough of it for Gary, he is a heavy milk drinker.

Dora had a TV cupboard with one of those solid blinds that you open it and close it by pushing up and down. We don’t have a TV so we use it for storing the pots and pans.

The pans were also from the previous owner and are aluminium so quite light. We have the minimum we can get away with: two frying pans; one small, one big, and three saucepans with their own lids, to reduce cooking time. And obviously plastic cutting mats, colander, coffee machine, grater and cutlery.

Now, let’s get down to the point of this post. How do we manage cooking in Dora.

This is her worktop.

The worktop opens up in two areas. On the left hand side, there is the actual cooking area, with three stoves.

Having three stoves is good, believe me. When we were going looking to buy a motorhome, most of them came with only two. An extra one makes a big difference, even if it is a small one. The stove on the right hand side is small, but still useful. We use it for slow cooking or to keep dishes warm.

Originally the two back burners were slow, on purpose, part of the design. Then for some reason the front one got blocked. I had anticipated a large repair bill, however we found a French DIY store. Bizarrely the shop assistant was Scottish , but he was able to find me a strange Allen key which was star shaped. A coup[le of hours later and I was able to disassemble two of the burners, clean them thoroughly and increase the size of one of the burners slightly using a needle. We now have two normal burners and a slow burner. GDR

On the right hand site of the worktop, there is the sink, with a foldable tap.

So, what do we cook? Because of the lack of facilities such as oven and microwave, our menu is slightly limited but not boring.

Also, because of lack of space, cooking times of our dishes are down to 30 minutes, which is fine with me. I don’t generally like spending much longer time in the kitchen.

So, here is some of the dinners we normally have:

Pan fried fish

Pan fried chicken and turkey fillets

Boiled, pan fried or stir fried vegetables

Chips, sautéed or mashed potatoes

Rice, such as risottos or arroz a la cubana (a Spanish rice dish with tomato sauce and fried egg on the top)

Italian dishes such as spaghetti, gnocchi, ravioli…

Very rarely fast food. We had paella in a couple of occasions, from Lidl (simply because we like the dish and my paellas are rubbish, I never learnt to cook one).

 

So, how do we cook? Let’s take you through what we are cooking tonight and you will see.

We are having pan fried trout with sautéed potatoes.

Gary and I like cooking together but we can’t in Dora, the kitchen is two small for two people. Tonight we cook together but we have to alternate. I am in charge of the potatoes and Gary is in charge of the fish. Because both dishes have different cooking times – mine would take longer – I start first, and by the time mine is almost ready, he can start his.

We chop the food on the worktop. We don’t need to keep both sides of the worktop. We can prepare the food on the right hand side, as we wouldn’t need the sink just yet, so we can open the kitchen area and start cooking if we want to.

“If you have the sink closed, where do you put your dirty dishes?” You may ask. We have a plastic bowl, which we keep on the floor, where we can store the washing up. This acts as a second washing up sink.

So I better start, otherwise, it will get very late and Gary is getting quite hungry.

While I chop the potatoes I heat the oil in the big pan.

Put the potatoes in the pan, medium heat, stirring them every now and then.

I can leave the potatoes to cook whilst I go for a shower and continue to update the blog.

Potatoes are nearly ready. Gary can now cook his fish.

He needs my big pan. My potatoes are finished so I transfer them to the  small pan and put them on the small hove to keep them warm whilst he fries the trout.

The fish is cooked so are my potatoes.

Nice, ready to eat.

Bon appetite!

Easy or what??

SM