Keeping take-out barbecue warm ?


 
Lynn Dollar

Lynn Dollar

TVWBB Emerald Member
Everybody is doing more take-out due to covid. And we should be helping the restaurants who are struggling in any way we can.

But also, I'm hungry for somebody else's barbecue other than my own. In the past two weeks, Mrs Dollar and I have gotten take-out from a couple of chain barbecue joints that are close to the house. But I want to venture out to some really good places that I've not been to in a long while. One is an hour away, another is 45 minutes away, and a third is a new place that I've been dying to get to, that's 25 minutes out.

We took a small styrofoam ice chest to a taco place that was 15 minutes from home, but it really did not do a good job of keeping the tacos hot, they were still warm but it could'be been better. And tortillas don't handle that well and don't re-heat well either. I need ideas to improve on that ?

I'm thinking of some kind of portable cambro out of an ice chest that has some kind of heating source, like a heating pad that would run off the car's 12V system. Heating up some bricks might help the shorter runs, but I gotta wonder about a 2 hour round trip ?

Neither me nor Mrs Dollar are comfortable with indoor dining. Just no need to take that chance at our ages. I'm also thinking bout eating in the car or finding a nearby city park, if the weather allows.

Or maybe just let the food cool down and then re-heat ........ but I really don't like that idea. This is not fast food, its quality barbecue meats.

Ideas ?
 
You might want to contemplate a thermoelectric cooler. Depending on how you connect the Peltier device, it'll either warm about 40 degrees over amblent, the other way will cool about 40 degrees below ambient. You do not use ice in these, you'll probably destroy the device. There are a lot of different manufacturers, I have an Igloo brand that's at least 15 years old and still going strong.

I've been picking up barbecue at Dickey's (Eagan, MN outlet,) they consistently have pretty decent 'cue, and about 20-30 minutes north of here. If we're going to eat in less than an hour, I'll just throw the hot food in the oven set on warm. More than an hour, and I'll wrap the proteins in tinfoil before throwing them in the oven.
 
We use a small Omaha Steak Styrofoam cooler (not the bigger ones) for take out. Works pretty well for the two of us. There is a Sicilian style (pan) pizza we like but the place is about 10 miles away. We pre-heat a cookie sheet in the oven at 350 before going to pick up the pizza. When we get it, we open the lid to keep it from getting steamed on the way home. Then put it in the oven for 6-7 minutes to offset the 25 minute ride home.
 
Lynn Dollar said:
I'm also thinking bout eating in the car or finding a nearby city park, if the weather allows.
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This popped into my head before I even read it. Absolutely my first choice.

I have a 5-city, 2-day carryout fried chicken trip all planned out for when it's safer...
 
The other consideration to eating in the car or a park, is I'm gonna be bringing food home. We always order far more than we can eat in one setting because we want to try as many meats as possible. And going to Butcher BBQ's place in Wellston, OK is an hour trip. And possibly having to stand in line for up to an hour just to order. But we are sooo hungry to get back there, its been too long.

I've wondered if wrapping the serving containers in foil and then into an ice chest or a cooler, would help. And I'm thinking about separating the sides and the meats.
 
I would consider the extra carryout food to be leftovers, the same as you'd have if you'd gone inside and had a sit-down meal, so my approach would be to take along a good cooler and a few ice packs (or go a little more uptown with a thermoelectric cooler like JKalchik suggested) because once you get home they're going in the fridge anyway.

Butcher BBQ is on my radar, if I ever get back down that way.
 
Brad Olson said:
Butcher BBQ is on my radar, if I ever get back down that way.
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Butcher is an hour away and really, its gonna have to get warmer before we can make that trip. They now have an enclosed dining room with large garage doors that can be opened in warm weather. For covid reasons, its gonna have to wait till they can open it up.
 
Something like this might work:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000Q753B8/?tag=tvwb-20

Brad Olson said:
I have a 5-city, 2-day carryout fried chicken trip all planned out for when it's safer...
Click to expand...

I hope the Old Country Store in Mississippi is on your itinerary.

https://www.natcheztracetravel.com/natchez-trace-mississippi/lorman-natchez-ms/oldcountrystore.html

We’ve been telling everyone it’s the best fried chicken long before Alton Brown started crowing about it. Our plan was to finish the drive to Natchez and eat at a park. Most of it did not make it to Natchez. The rest of that trip, our rental car smelled like that fried chicken.
 
Lynn Dollar said:
That's interesting
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Lynn, that uses a thermoelectric device that I mentioned above, technically it's called a Peltier effect device. I don't agree that it'll go nearly 60 F over ambient, 40 F is more like the effective limit for the warming function. It should work very nicely.
 
I'm gonna experiment with some bricks wrapped in foil then heated in the oven to 300* , and placed in an ice chest. See what kinda temps I get and for how long.

But if that does not go well, I'll be looking for something like that.
 
Lynn, that's a great heat sink, but the thermoformed interior of most ice chests (and foamed polystyrene as well,) will start to deform below boiling water. I'd wrap those bricks in a couple of towels as well.
 
If your driving solo or not just put the take out containers on the floor with the heater on the passenger side.
I reheated lunch on my defrosters but I wouldnt reccomend that while driving.
 
timothy said:
If your driving solo or not just put the take out containers on the floor with the heater on the passenger side.
I reheated lunch on my defrosters but I wouldnt reccomend that while driving.
Click to expand...

That's another idea that might work here in the winter. And this is not gonna be an issue when weather gets warmer. Some of these places will have picnic tables outside and if not, I can find a city park.

And hopefully , I will get the vaccine by the end of this month.
 
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