Railroaders' Nostalgia > Did You Cook Out There?

Making a PBJ as I wait for Army/Navy to kick off, I started thinking about eating at work.

Eating is important to a railroader. I had an old head hogger tell me one time that when you can eat soup and switch boxcars at the same time, you're an engineer.

Did you cook (or at least re-heat stuff) out there? In the cab, weather permitting? How about back in the engine room? If you are really "seasoned", did ever cook on a caboose stove?

Or (my American friends), did you ever catch a Canadian locomotive with a hotplate in the cab?

What were your favorite "hot spots" (not counting the microwave in the yard office)? Some days (or nights), that piece of leftover whatever, wrapped in foil, was pretty tasty.

The " slope tank " on the 645 EMDs and SD60s.Top of the oil filter tank on the ACes.  GE Dash9s the water filler door. GEVOs theres a heat exchanger on the conductors side that would hold a large pizza. Tier 4 GEs are hard to find a spot on. 

I worked a hauler from LA to West Colton. The power was mostly SD 60$. Our crew would cook tri tip, chicken on the headlight housing inside the front entry door. One crew member used to cook okra in a glass jar on the side wall heater. Couple of times were brought along a mini webber bbq.

One trip on the older units SD45$ i put a Jack in the box burger on the water expansion tank. I arrived at Bakersfield and forgot the burger. 10 days later was in San Luis Obispo awaiting my eastbound train. The lead unit was the same unit that I had on the Bakersfield trip 10 days earlier. First thing i did upon boarding the engine was to check the water level in the expansion tank. Low and behold the burger was still there. I opened up the foil wrapper and the burger was still there but had shrunkened to the size of a silver dollar. It looked like a doll house sized toy burger.

Posted from Android

When I was firing E-units in passenger service in the wee hours of the morning,  I wired a half-frozen pizza to the firepot dome of steam boiler I was working.  It turned out pretty good.  It was my breakfast after we swapped out at our away-from-home terminal.  I offered my old engineer half, but he was going home to get a good breakfast.  Once the first trick yard engineer I regularly relieved left me a big batch of deer jerky wrapped in foil on the sidewall heater.  Tasted real good to this Cherokee boy with no lunch.

I have warmed on side wall heaters, cooked on the engines, the headlight resistors on a SW 9 worked good and took a small Weber on work trains. I like fried chicken, but it gets old on a week long work train. Was eating soup to start a trip and throwing out bad orders on a hopper train one day and the trainmaster called down my train handling for shaking the yard office. If he had gotten on the engine I would have told him where he could shove it.

Sam

I remember "cooking" all sorts of stuff, especially caned goods, on the turbocharger after coolers of EMD GP30s, GP35s, and DD35s during my rider days. Many a tasty meal enroute. Always remember to open the can first! I carried an Army can-opener, among other utensils, in my grip.

I couldn't run and cook at the same time, so I took the easy way. When I got called, I'd stop at the store on the way to work for fruit, veggies, v-8 juice, lunchables, a fried chicken breast maybe. Etc. I'd get on the engine, put it in the refrigerator and munch on it if needed. The bonus round was when the last guy forgot and left his lunch. Sometimes, I'd buy a few cups of Chili at Wendy's, freeze them at home, take one with me to work, warm it on the sidewall heater.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 12/09/23 20:22 by LocoPilot750.

I've seen a few, but never used, the hot plate (and sometimes tea kettle) on Canadian engines.  I think the CN ones outfitted for Canadian service also now have a microwave.  Some UP engines have hot plates, tea kettle, and stretcher for Canadian interchange.

The other day I was surprised to see a microwave on a CSX engine.

I usually only catch something with a microwave when I don't have anything to cook in it.  All my on board "cooking" has been on the sidewalls.

I always brought at least two meals with me and mostly used the water pump where whatever I wanted heated up would stay put. More than once brought all ingrediates for tacos enjoying them while making the San Bernardino pick up. Unlike MOST of the train crew who didn't seem to mind waiting twelve hours to eat, I wanted to go straight to bed on arrival at away from home terminal.
JB

Re: Cooking stuff on the engine.  I can tell you from personal experience that the bursting radius for an unopened can of Beanie Wienies is about 20-30 feet. And it makes one hell of a mess too.

https://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,2037470

Regarding heating unopened cans: It isn't a railroad tale, but I suspect you might enjoy it anyway.  When I was a young boy scout our troop went on a backpacking trip out in the desert.  Needless to say young teenagers aren't necessarily savy about things like opening cans before they go over a campfire.  Well, one patrol had a good fire going and one scout put a 10oz can of beans in it to get warm but got distracted (likely by other scouting antics) before it got hot enough to blow the bottom out of the can.  The can took off like a rocket, flying high in the air and making quite the spectical.  As it emerged from the fire, that can left most of its contents in the fire, fortunately for the scouts, or perhaps unfortunately, because another scout in that patrol got to thinking that an even larger can might make an even more impressive display.  Well, the second, larger can sat in the fire awhile before it too blew, but when it blew up it was the top end that gave way.  The whole patrol had burn welts all over themselves the next morning from flying hot beans, and I suspect still haven't lived down the episode.  Years later when I was an assistent scoutmaster, I made sure all the kids on trips I lead heard that story so as to understand what would happen were they foolish enough to repeat the episode.

Kit Courter
Menefee, CA
LunarLight Photography

Heck I still cook out here…my hog and I have a warm meal every trip…and not just warming up leftovers. It makes such a huge difference in attitude having warm food on an engine in the winter time.

An old BN conductor that I trained with 15 years ago…Dan “The Galloping Gourmet” taught me all the good spots.

Dash 9’s are about the only good thing left to cook on, on top of the oil pump is the best spot. I’ve cooked steaks there, potatoes, omelets, brats and kraut, and even whole chickens and Cornish game hens. The chickens take about 5-6 hours to cook through, but since all of our trips over the Cascades are 12 hours…we have plenty of time to eat.

The newer stuff doesn’t have any good spots to cook…inbetween the cylinder heads are good for warming up things however.

As for the Canadian engines with the hot plates…I made a pot of tea one time in one. The tea kettles are pretty “iffy”….no telling who pee’d in one.

>
> As for the Canadian engines with the hot
> plates…I made a pot of tea one time in one. The
> tea kettles are pretty “iffy”….no telling
> who pee’d in one.


Which is why I never use the coffee pot in the hotel room.
JC

used the sidewall heater for most heating and the manifold for some items. Also used a ice cream mixer on the front porch when working locals in summer . had to give the fireman a job to do 

   One time, while working as an SP conductor between Palmdale and Indio, I had a brakeman of Hawaiian ancestry working the caboose with me.  When I rolled a westbound train out of Indio Yard on a cold winter night, I swung on the caboose, and when I opened the rear door, the smell about knocked me over!
   Mr. Hawaiian had the stove red hot, and was frying something on it.  "What the hell is that?" I enquired.
   "Squid," he replied. "Want some?"
   That caboose reeked of that stuff all the way to Palmdale.  Sure didn't smell like any Calmari I'd ever been around.  Even the outbound crew at Palmdale remarked about it.

Brian Black
Castle Rock, CO.

tehachcond Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>    One time, while working as an SP conductor
> between Palmdale and Indio, I had a brakeman of
> Hawaiian ancestry working the caboose with me. 
> When I rolled a westbound train out of Indio Yard
> on a cold winter night, I swung on the caboose,
> and when I opened the rear door, the smell about
> knocked me over!
>    Mr. Hawaiian had the stove red hot, and was
> frying something on it.  "What the hell is that?"
> I enquired.
>    "Squid," he replied. "Want some?"
>    That caboose reeked of that stuff all the way
> to Palmdale.  Sure didn't smell like any Calmari
> I'd ever been around.  Even the outbound crew at
> Palmdale remarked about it.
>
> Brian Black
> Castle Rock, CO.

Haha Pineapple Eddie

Posted from Android

SD40 or other second generation EMD sidewalls used to be nice for cooking Kielbasa or other sausage in foil. Most of my cooking is sidewall warm up anymore, some prime mover cooking in summer. There were some guys that really cooked a lot on the engine but most of them have retired the last 15 years or so.

The Canadian engines with the hot plate and microwave are GREAT. Even used the kettle on one once.

This reminds me that I need to get my winter rations packed into my grip, ‘tis the season!

Regards

Posted from iPhone

SanJoaquinEngr Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> tehachcond Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> >    One time, while working as an SP conductor
> > between Palmdale and Indio, I had a brakeman of
> > Hawaiian ancestry working the caboose with
> me. 
> > When I rolled a westbound train out of Indio
> Yard
> > on a cold winter night, I swung on the caboose,
> > and when I opened the rear door, the smell
> about
> > knocked me over!
> >    Mr. Hawaiian had the stove red hot, and
> was
> > frying something on it.  "What the hell is
> that?"
> > I enquired.
> >    "Squid," he replied. "Want some?"
> >    That caboose reeked of that stuff all the
> way
> > to Palmdale.  Sure didn't smell like any
> Calmari
> > I'd ever been around.  Even the outbound crew
> at
> > Palmdale remarked about it.
> >
> > Brian Black
> > Castle Rock, CO.
>
> Haha Pineapple Eddie
>
> Posted from Android

"Winjner winner squid...I mean chicken dinner!

Brian

I set up for an ordinary, ho hum grade crossing railfan shot of a Guilford freight in the 1980s, a train that  had been in the hole at Delanson for a couple of hours, only an hour or two into his southbound run from Mechanicville. The conductor popped out of the cab and very politely asked me to hold off taking a pic for a few seconds until he could take the charcoal hibachi off the nose of his lead unit (a nice, flat nosed GP39-2) He and the engineer were cooking steaks, suspected that they were going to be there for a while, and didn't want to leave any evidence of what was probably an actionable offense. 

I,  of course, complied. They offered me a serving, which I declined.