I have been debating the number of vinegars I should take on the journey. There are many uses for white or apple cider vinegar. Aside from eating there are no additional uses for basmati vinegar. That will have to be left home. Here are 10 that are applicable to truck camping.

1. Keep car windows frost-free
If you park your car outdoors during the cold winter months, a smart and simple way to keep frost from forming on your windows is by wiping (or, better yet, spraying) the outsides of the windows with a solution of 3 parts white vinegar to 1 part water. Each coating may last up to several weeks.

2. Remove bumper stickers
Saturate the top and sides of the sticker with undiluted distilled vinegar and wait 10-15 minutes for the vinegar to soak through. Then use an expired credit card  to scrape it off. Use more full-strength vinegar to get rid of any remaining gluey residue.

3. Disinfect cutting boards
To disinfect and clean your wood cutting boards wipe them with full-strength white vinegar after each use. The acetic acid in the vinegar is a good disinfectant, effective against such harmful bugs as E. coli,Salmonella, and Staphylococcus.

4. Remove odors from your hands
It’s often difficult to get strong onion, garlic, or fish odors off your hands after preparing a meal. But you’ll find these scents are a lot easier to wash off if you rub some distilled vinegar on your hands before and after you slice your vegetables or clean your fish.

5. Ease sunburn and itching
You can cool a bad sunburn by gently dabbing the area with a cotton ball or soft cloth saturated with white or cider vinegar. (This treatment is especially effective if it’s applied before the burn starts to sting.) The same technique works to instantly stop the itch of mosquito and other insect bites, as well as the rashes caused by exposure to poison ivy or poison oak.

6. Keep out four-legged creatures
Some animals — including cats, deer, dogs, rabbits, and raccoons — can’t stand the scent of vinegar even after it has dried. You can keep these unauthorized visitors out of your space by soaking several recycled rags in white vinegar, and placing them around. Re-soak the rags about every 7-10 days.

7. Make a trap to lure flying insects
Keep the gnats, flies mosquitoes, or other six-legged pests at bay . Place a bowl filled with apple cider vinegar near some food, but away from you and guests. By the evening’s end, most of the gnats, flies mosquitoes, or other six-legged pests will be floating inside the bowl.

8. Get rid of rust
To clean up those rusted old tools  soak them in full-strength white vinegar for several days. The same treatment is equally effective at removing the rust from corroded nuts and bolts. And you can pour vinegar on rusted hinges and screws to loosen them up for removal.

9. Clear dirt off PCs and peripherals
Before you start cleaning, make sure that all your equipment is shut off. Now mix equal parts white vinegar and water in a bucket. Dampen a clean cloth in the solution — never use a spray bottle; you don’t want to get liquid on the circuits inside — then squeeze it out as hard as you can, and start wiping. Keep a few cotton swabs on hand for getting to the buildups in tight spaces.

10. Deodorize lunch boxes, footlockers, and car trunks or truck bed/home
Soak a slice of white bread in white vinegar and leave it in the malodorous space overnight. The smell should be gone by morning.

Also, I have found that wrapping cheese in a vinegar soaked cloth retards mold.

Well, apple cider and white are going with me for sure. Balsamic is out. Mirin is out.