Favorite Camping Meals and Snacks

[Mabelline]

Just some miscellany: Carry one heavy-weight welder's glove, at least, with you, so that you can work your fire, grab dutch oven bails, arrange coals without various poking tools or sticks. Once you use one and find out how exceptional they work at getting you home with no burned body parts, you'll make room for a pair. Hobo packs are SOOO good when out camping, and one year my daughter decided to make a different S'more. She used strawberry preserves, saltines, and marshmallows,and damnme if they weren't excellent!

[docsconz]

We just returned from camping on an island in Lake George along with another family who had a nearby campsite. They had a device that was phenomenal for camping. It was a Pie Iron. One would put some PAM or similar for non-stick coating then bread and whatever filling one desires, then stick it directly into the campfire, wait and check frequently until done. They made great grilled cheese sandwiches as well as "pies" with chocolat, peanut butter or fruit fillings. I have to get one for myself.

[oceanfish]

For me, there are two types of camping: hiking, where everything fits into a backpack and that means dried mixes, mostly non perishables. The other kind, "car" camping, means I bring a cooler and various equipment.

The best stew I have ever made (and I am a professional cook) was on a camping trip, and I didn't even bring stock! I made it in a cast iron pot over the fire which was very rustic, wedged between two rocks. I brought cubed lamb and some already chopped vegetables and herbs, added water after a good searing of the meat and let it simmer away while we drank wine. The taste of the stew I think was so fabulous because of the pot (which was worth lugging) and the fire.

Another meal which even works in the rain, if your fire is protected somewhat, is a fish smoked on a soaked cedar plank. I brought a marinated salmon and put it on the wet plank over coals. By the time the plank burns, your fish is wonderfully smoked. Vegetables wrapped in foil can be wedged against rocks at the same time and be ready when your fish is. One small downer: your clothes will be fishily smoked as well!

I have dried many items to pack on hiking trips...fruit and even cured meats. A stick of duck jerky can be a practical and satisfying snack, even lunch. Spaghetti sauce can even be prepared this way, only needing water, and if you dry garden tomatoes and herbs it can be better than any jar, and lighter in the canoe!

[Mayhaw Man]

Tabasco.

No matter what. Tabasco can make it edible.

[Marlene]

I now define camping as going somewhere in our RV (I keep telling people I'm a princess). We have the benefit of having a fridge and a freezer and an oven. During our last camping trip, one of the things we made for a snack was Baked Brie in Puff Pastry, and then we had marinated maple glazed steaks for dinner. This is my preferred mode of camping

[GG Mora]

When we camp, it's car camping, with cooler, 2-burner Coleman stove and small 1-burner backpacking stove. Anything I cook has to be made in my #10 Griswold cast-iron skillet. And I have a medium sized stainless bowl for prep.

The backpacking stove is strictly for coffee – a thick sludge of Cafe Bustelo cooked up in my 25-yr.-old Moka pot. Thinned with 1/2&1/2.

Breakfast is usually french toast, sometimes with bacon, sometimes with sausage. Dinner might be steaks (steak au poivre is pretty easy to do at camp), might be paella, but my fave – and the kids', too – is "campfire choucroute". I bring along a big pouch of sauerkraut, a few cans of whole peeled potatoes, and some knockwurst, weisswurst or bratwurst. Brown the sausages, add the potatoes to brown them slightly, then add sauerkraut. Season with S&P and dump in either beer or white wine to moisten. Simmer for about 20 minutes.

[chile_peppa]

Have anyone here tried Dutch oven cooking over a campfire? Stews, cobblers, beans, and biscuits all turn out nicely.

[PCL]

I thought it might be interesting to see how different people approach food and cooking when camping. To kick things off, an overview of what we do might be appropriate.

It occurred to me that whenever we go camping, I stop cooking. Mrs PCL takes over food duties. I pitch the tents, cut firewood, build big fires, catch the fish, stock the esky with beer, but almost never cook. Unless it’s the camp oven or griddle, and we do like a bush chilli or stew or something, maybe damper (unleavened bread), with the coals in a separate fire pit.

A few definitions might be useful here as some of the items/equipment I’m used to might be uniquely Australian, though I doubt it.

Camp oven: cast iron pot, seasoned, un-enamelled, with heavy flat lid which may be used as a griddle.

Griddle: cast iron flat plate on one half, grillage on the other for direct heat.

Fire pit: separate to main camp fire, usually a dirt pit about 2 ½ feet in diameter, about 3-4 inches deep, filled with hot coals (red) either transferred from main fire or reduced within pit. The former is preferable, with auxilliary coals from the main fire as needed.

Esky: a portable keep-cool unit, filled with ice packs and used for storing beer, beer, beer, some meat and milk etc. May also be used as foot-stool, extra seating, low table… whatever! Legend has it that when properly seasoned and treated, beer cans actually reproduce in one of these things.

My wife would usually work the gas stove and rustle up some easy nosh, usually just for dinner. Hot lunches when camping are rare for us, usually some bread and cheese, dried sausage, or something else quick from a can. Hot meals from the stove for dinner might comprise::

- pan fried sausages with onions

- pan fried cutlets/chops (usually lamb) with onions

- easy pasta (usually penne) with a canned sauce fortified with garlic, onions, spices

- instant noodles (chicken flavour is always a hit, and it must be Maggi!!)

- re-heated Stroganoff with pasta/quick-cook rice

- salad

- corn on the cob

- canned sweet corn/baked beans/peas

If the camp oven is in use (sometimes weather conditions do not permit open fires of any description, or I might just be plain lazy), the following may be prepared, provided we’ve packed the ingredients:

- chilli, with beans, ground meat and other goodies

- pot roasted joint of beef (lamb doesn’t take to camp oven cooking)

- camp bread with raisins (called damper which is just flour water and salt, and some sodium bicarb)

- braised chicken with french onion soup mix

- a stew/braise depending on what’s on hand

- baked potatoes/corn/carrots

The usual standards would be prepared on the griddle. It should be noted that the lid of the camp oven can double as a fry pan too, if rested directly on the hot coals of the fire pit.

- chops and cutlets

- steaks (usually T-Bone)

- pancakes

- bacon

- eggs

- sausages

- fish (if I catch some!!)

And we’d usually pack a couple loaves of sourdough or rye in addition to that great stand-by, fluffy white bread.

Some staples that always make it into the packs are Nutella (hazelnut chocolate spread), marshmallows, Cherry Ripe chocolate, drinking chocolate and jelly babies.

Breakfast would usually be pancakes (just add water pre-mix) with maple syrup and bacon, with coffee or tea brewed on the stove. Usually, if brewing leaf tea, a handful of gum leaves (from eucalyptus trees) are chucked in for that authentic bush cuppa flavour.

What do you eat when you camp? What do you bring? How do you cook?

[reesek]

last year we took a camping trip in oregon.

we hit part of the oregon wine country first though and stocked up. i brought a pantry including aluminum foil, plastic baggies, spices, oo, vinegar, pasta, tea, & sugar and a cooler with butter, cheese, eggs, fresh herbs, & milk. cooking implements included a cutting board, chefs and paring knives, frying pan, 6 quart pot, spatula, can opener & wooden spoon.

we cooked on a wood fire exclusively - and brought our own rack to place on top of the fire or (if we were lucky) the rack in the fire pit.

i remember buying mussels at a local fish shop and cooking them up with scallions, wine, and garlic.

i remember roasting (and burning) potatoes in foil in the embers. cooking scambled eggs with smoked salmon and mushrooms we got at farmstands. one night we made thai tom yum soup with herbs i'd brought from home...knew that coconut milk would come in handy.

and of course - there must be smores. i am the marshmallow toasting master.

we drank a lot of wine that week, and our hair reeked of wood smoke even after repeated washings. i'm smiling at the memory.

[misstenacity]

I have only done limited cooking in the outdoors, but I have a few reference books that have given me great ideas for future trips (book titles are listed from memory, but shouldn't be hard to find on Amazon):

NOLS Outdoor Cookery

Gorp, Glop, and Glue Stew

The Well-Fed Backpacker

I'd love to do a long backpacking trip this summer so I may actually be putting some of the ideas into practice.

Andrea

http://tenacity.net

[zeitoun]

My wife and I did close to three weeks of camping in northern California last summer. We hit about four to five Parks and wilderness areas. Our cooking needs differed drastically according to the type of camping we did (with drive in campsites vs. hike in ones). In the case of drive in campsite, we pretty much cooked and ate whatever pleased us. We had no real restrictions in terms of choices of food since we didn't have to carry everything on our backs. We went food shopping before each trip and simply packed everything in the back trunk of the car. We used a portable stove, one deep pot, one frying pan.

In the case of backcountry camping where we were self-sufficient for a couple of days, it was trickier. If we were out for 3-4 days, we obviously could not bring anything perishable, so our list of food items was cut short significantly, however this did not prevent us from eating good food. We still think we ate better food camping than when we were making quick stops in little towns (to clean up and enjoy the luxury of a mattress for a night) where food served in restaurants/diners was close to abominable.

Here is an example of what we lived on (from what I still can remember):

Root veggies such as carrots for salads (salads served with drizzles of lemon/ olive oil)

Avocados (we served this with soy sauce and wasabi)

Oranges

Apples

Corn (boiled in water)

All sorts of dried or cured meats (saucisson, bresaola etc…)

Cheese!!! (which we had purchased at nearby farms)

Bread

Pasta with packaged quick sauces (sea urchin, pickled plums etc…) we bought at Japanese markets

Japanese "rice packs" which you dip in boiling water, open and serve.

We served these with canned japanese bbq eel, sardines etc…

Wine

[Lone Star]

We camp on our place in South Texas several times a year during dove and deer season, sometimes just our family, and sometimes with a crowd.

Dove season in September is much more of a social event than the more solitary deer hunting, and the meals usually revolve around a grill. If everyone has had a good hunt, the doves are cleaned and a jalapeno is inserted into the breast. Then they are wrapped in bacon and grilled over mesquite (which is everywhere!). If you don’t have many people and don’t want to grill, the dove can be roasted over the open flame of the campfire. A big pot of pinto beans cooked all day in a Dutch oven on a grate goes with everything. Add a few tortillas and LOTS of beer and you have a fabulous South Texas camp dinner and are ready for the nightly game of booray (boure)!

Breakfast is made in a cast iron skillet on the grate or a Coleman stove. Sautee onions, peppers, tomatoes until soft. Pour in scrambled eggs and strips of corn tortillas and cook until soft-set for delicious migas. Other mornings might be the usual bacon and eggs. I have not mastered the art of Dutch oven biscuit making, but vow to someday!

Lunch is usually on your own sandwiches as hunters come in.

For the cold weather deer season - rub a cold cast iron skillet with garlic and add a little oil. Salt and pepper steaks and pan fry. Remove the steaks and fry up potatoes with lots of onions. Serve with Pinto beans, and all is well with the world.

[kiliki]

Wow, PCL, that is so elaborate and so different than my camping dining! On the rare occasions that I car camp (I usually backpack, but that is a whole other food discussion), it is not in developed campsites with running water, fire pits and the like. Very often, in places I go, fires are not allowed due to omnipresent fire danger. So, it becomes all about what takes little effort to clean up, and what I can make over my one burner stove. So I like to fill up the cooler with things like good salami, cheeses, pickled things, cold noodle/couscous salads made at home, bread, fruit salads, hard boiled eggs, milk, and granola, tea, and coffee-none of which makes a big mess (since I don't have enough water to properly clean dishes). Even on the rare occasions when I do go where I could cook more elaborately, I don't want to spend the time I could be hiking/swimming/generally enjoying the outdoors, etc, cooking and cleaning up, so I still bring the prepared foods.

[PCL]

This thread is proving inspirational already!! Lone Star Pinto Beans will be on the menu next time... probably in a couple weeks!

And kiliki, I should have qualified my original post with the fact that the food I've written about is for 'journey' camping. Hiking trips are much more compact, high tech with NASA space food in those cool foil packs, and of course, a small plate to grill fish with if any are caught.

There is however, not much to beat an open fire roasted corn on the cob. Or marshmallows, or indeed chilli in a pot!

We ventured out last weekend to a favourite spot and ate loads of pot roasted beef and grilled lamb cutlets.

[Dim Sim]

I don't camp very often, but I just got back from a couple of days camping at Cumberland River in a caravan park (along The Great Ocean Rd. in the south eastern Australia), a good idea to be near water, both for washing up and a quick dip in the Australian summer's heat. we brought a fry pan and a sauce pan, a gas bottle and a 2 burners camping stove, what I would like (may be next time) is one of those Chinese triple ring wok burner and a wok, a stir fry would be more appropriate, quick, light and easy. Anyway we didn't count on the friendly sand storm on the beach, our bacon, eggs, avocado and baked beans were covered in sand, bacon and eggs flew off the plates, running around the beach chasing all the things that got blown off. the breakfast was awful after we have to rinse off the sand in sea water. yuk. All that side. I have a few nicer camping experience. I always pack a canopener, waiter's friend (a must ) self-raising flour and soy milk and maple syrup for pancakes and damper (not with maple syrup though)camp oven (mine is carbon steel) salami, instant noodle, my partner would have the maggi chicken and I would opt for the either Indo mee or one of the chinese beef version, with lots of seasonings and comes with fried shallot, lard and lots of (mmmmmm) MSG, tinned tomatoes (I like the Italian Analisa brand ) tinned tuna (Sirena brand packed in oil) and dried pasta, yes, tuna pasta. lot of eggs, dried herbs and chilli, sourdough bread, cheese, crackers, corn chips, lentil. onion, garic, ginger, the list goes on and on, usually half the car is full of food and drink,Esky and foam container with ice packs, heaps of beer, wine and we usually took a 20 litre container of Melbourne tap water. I would be the one who do all the cooking, My partner does all the washing up. On the first night we usually have a hearty meal, all ready cooked at home and put in container, like a pea and ham soup or beef with red wine and we will have it with bread, all we have to do is to sit back and drink lots. I would make a either plain or cheese and herb damper (bush breads rather like a big scone) to cook while we eat and to economised the camp fire, over the years I get to become very creative with this, I even made a lentil, bacon, cheese and baked bean version, yes, used up all the left over. so in the morning we have grilled damper and baked beans (wonder why we fart a lot ? funny that) or grilled banana with maple syrup, and for lunch any leftover pasta and odd bits from the night before can all go into a egg, pasta and odd bits frittata. Oh, did I mention a big hunk of parmasan cheese. and when we are sick of eating our own food we usually have fish and chips or go into a local pub and have some good honest food like (all those good things that my doctor want me to stay clear of) mixed grill or a chicken schnizel and wash it all down with more beer.

[Sam Salmon]

The last camping I did was this past summer on a fishing trip.

Fresh Prawns every day, fresh Lingcod/Rockfish and some smaller Shrimp.

Stir fries, Curries and steamed Prawns as I recall.

I was too tired to do Salmon up right so we froze all those daily.

I wish I remembered more about the details, 0500hr starts, 12 hours in a 16 foot boat and plenty of wine with dinner don't make for great memories.

[bottom-dragger]

with the help of our food dehydrator we make most of our camping/kayaking food. but!!!!!! each recipe is tested at home before taken to the field. swmbo made spaghetti sause, dehydrated it, and then re-hydrated it for dinner. if we could have harnessed the methane produced...............12 hours later it was voted totally unacceptable for use in a small tent.

cooked rice dehydrates and rehydrates well.

one of the tricks is to boil extra water in the morning and begin rehydrating your dinner in the morning. good, solid snap lid plastic containers work well.

joe

petersburg, alaska

[PCL]

I am seriously considering the Sous Vide approach, but cooking at home to prepare it seems, uggghhh... too much hard work. NASA grade products should work well for the time being...

[Wayne]

Interesting subject and near to my heart. I'd like to contribute a slighly different

slant to the subject: camping food in winter.

Last weekend our group of eight had a three day hut to hut ski in the Temagami

region of Ontario. A hut is a walled shelter with a wood stove and a two burner

propane stove. All gear and food is carried on your back between huts. Temper-

atures ranged from a daytime high of -15 C. to a nightime low of -30 C. We

consider this "warm" camping as we can heat the huts (at least when we're awake).

Next weekend we'll be "cold" camping in Algonquin Park for two nights. That means

we sleep in tents without an external heat source. Cooking is done on three

white gas burners.

Winter's low temperatures, with respect to cooking, results in several advantages

and disadvantages.

Advantages: Food spoilage is not a problem. Everything goes in frozen or quickly

freezes. Much is pre-cooked, vacumn sealed then simply reheated in a pot of

water. This can include meat, poultry, pasta sauces...etc...excepting seafood

which cooks very quickly.

Disadvantages: It takes a lot of fuel, either gas or wood, to cook food so the

quicker it's ready to eat the better.

The meals on these trips can be very good and keeping in mind the above points

most anything will work. It is very easy to consume 3000-5000 calories per day

and find you've lost weight.

Water: We carry an ice auger and drill for water in lakes or streams.

[MT-Tarragon]

My fiancee and I enjoy car camping also. Usually, this occurs at fairly primitive sites -- no running water (maybe a river or creek), no permanent fire pits, etc. So I usually cook over a wood fire with a folding grill. All cooking occurs in one of two cast iron pans or the coffee percolator (fire driven). <p>I like to make good stuff ahead of time, toss it in the cooler mostly ready to go and then apply fire when hungry. One of my favorites is stuffed cornish game hen. Prepare the hen any way you like and just wrap in a couple of layers of foil. Apply fire. Those do take a while to cook, though. Marinated flank steak is an easy one, too. Saffron rice is surprisingly easy over a campfire, too. We always love creek potatoes - slice your potatoes round-ways, chop some onion, add two or three slices of bacon; wrap the whole in aluminum foil and place on the coals until done. Good with a variety of spices, too. Breakfast is usually oatmeal or egg dish and sausage or bacon, although french toast, pancakes, et alii have been done. And, of course, coffee. I'm not a big coffee drinker, but when camping I've got to have it.<p> It's interesting seeing what other people are doing for food outside, too. Cooking over a wood fire takes a little practice, but it's not all that hard really.

Edited February 22, 2005 by MT-Tarragon (log)

[PCL]

Winter camping raises some interesting issues. All of which have been addressed, thanks Wayne.

While we don't get extreme cold like you guys do, it can whip up sometimes. My wife is no great fan of winter camping, but I've done it a few times while chasing fish along the coast. The rougher seas bring different species close to shore in the winter, so we'd pack up the 4x4 and head out hunting.

Food for me and fishing-mates during times like that might include the following:

compulsory sausages on the gas grill

fish over the open fire (dig a hole in the sand behind a bush, water handy)

instant pasta & sauce packets

and when it rains... get under the tarp and use the ingenious flame shield (aluminium sheet cold pressed for stiffness, shoved into ground to shield fire)

But Wayne, isn't firewood easy to come by where you go winter camping? I always have the chainsaw in the back of the truck ready to go. Fallen trunks and branches only.

[Wayne]

PCL: There is plenty of firewood unfortunatley most of it is under a meter of snow

and standing deadwood is timeconsuming to gather when it's cold and daylight is

short. Stoves allow everyone to be fed quickly and efficiently.

The situation is different if we aren't travelling every day and set up a base camp

then we depend more on wood fires.

[PCL]

We went camping & 4WD'ing last weekend and thought I'd post some pics of the food set up.

This is the breakfast set-up.

This was supper, lamb forequarter chops!!!!!

And this is an overall pic of the site we camped at. An hour out of Melbourne, 750m above sea level, next to a trout river. No fish this weekend, didn't even try, the mud and rock trails took most of our time.

[Ninjai Fanatic]

when we camp we usually cook with and in the bamboo trunk/leaves (i live in the tropics)- yummy stuff, doesn't get too smoky, and there's less to carry during the treks that way.

Otherwise- for our little picnics and stuff- we just cook at home and bring our paper plates/pots, spoons, forks and the works with us.

[Mallet]

I do mostly backpacking (4-5 day hikes), usually in areas where open fires are not permitted. I'm getting tired of eating chili... any ideas on good one-pot meals?