Favorite Camping Meals and Snacks

[Josh]

Often travelling with a small backpacking stove and single pot, I usually take ingredients that I can re-use multiple times and in multiple ways. I start by looking at my caloric and nutritional requirement for the trip based on length, terrain, exertion, speed, etc. and then build a feast from there.

On shorter trips I'll take calorie-heavy foods such as chef boyardee raviolio (sorry, mom!) out of their cans and ziplock bag them to be used as a base ingredient. From there, I'll embellish with different spices (put tumeric in your spaghetteos and you won't even recognize 'em!), cheeses, and supplment with lightweight grains or pastas such as couscous, orzo, and kasha. Have a snack bag with walnuts, peanuts and almonds? Crush and add. Hard salamis also work well. And different instant sauce mixes can be bought to jazz things up.

Fruits and veggies are tricky. I do well with some bags of pre-peeled baby carrots, and pre-sliced onion and bell peppers which I ziploc. Yes, these are fresh, but I've found that it takes days before they go totally bad on you. Garlic travels well and is versatile. Fresh apples are heavy, but so refreshing -- I'll take for shorter trips. Otherwise I try to go for dehydrated bananas, pineapples and apples, some of which i've added to main dishes or just had on the side.

For breads, if I have an open fire, sometimes I bring a bag of flour pre-mixed with some salt and a little sugar. Add some water, make some dough, wrap it in tinfoil and just throw it into the fire to impress your friends with fresh bread (pretzels to rolls to pita depending upon exactly what happens in the fire... heh). French baguettes travel well because of their long, thin hard-shelled form.

For drinks, I'll take gatorade powder, some tea bags and hot cocoa packets. Other powdered drink mixes such as KoolAid or CrystalLight (blech!) will also work.

My favorite thing to do, especially with weight a consideration, is to hit the local asian grocery store. The options there for dehydrated foods are far greater than at your average supermarket. Soups, noodles, spices, fish, veggies... Just watch out for the sodium overdose.

[Mallet]

thanks for all the great ideas! I would never have thought to check out an asian grocery store for camping food, but it seems so obvious in retrospect.

Fresh veggies are definitely good for shorter trips, but for anything longer than a few days I usually end up dehydrating them (just slice thinly, spread out onto a pan in an oven set to its lowest temperature, leave the door slightly ajar and dry overnight). They rehydrate beautifully in soups/stews etc... You can also dry tomato sauce this way, just make sure you spread it out on a plastic wrapped baking sheet. After the process is done, you can roll up the sauce like a fruit-leather and pack it in a ziplock bag. I need to experiment more with dehydration, because I think there is some real potential there for weight savings without too much of a nutritional penalty.

[Josh]

Mallet, good tips. Sounds much more healthy and palatable than some of the ready-made dehydrated meals that can be bought in camping stores.

Truth be told, I've been reluctant to experiment because of flashbacks to an undergrad flatmate's malfunctioning dehydrator and the nightmarish things it did to his food and our electricity bill, but alas the time may have come to get over it...

[Ladycake]

You all seem to put much more time into your camp cooking than my family. We do things like a "hobo pack", which is sliced potatoes, onions, carrots, and seasonings in a foil pack thrown in the campfire. We also do trout this way, in aluminum foil with a little julienned onion, a slice of lemon and seasonings. We carry Bisquick to mix with a little canned milk and form around an oak or manzanita stick, then roast (marshmallow style) over the campfire.

My Mom is a little more sophisticated and cooks stews, beans (just the beans, onions, hamburger, a little tomato product, chili powder, and seasonings), and one pot spaghetti (hamburger, tomato product, onion, green bells, maybe a little red chili flakes), and her alltime favorite (steak)...or my alltime favorite (pork chops.)

My sis is really good at Campfire Girl stuff, like fruit turnovers. She also has worked up some techniques for berry cobbler (freshly picked blackberries with a Bisquick crust). Yummy!

As kids we routinely had Kraft Macaroni & Cheese with hotdogs for our first night in camp while setting up etc. It became tradition only when her kids complained about not having it, as we had never even recognized the routine. :-)

I am interested in hearing what kind of fish you all are catching (we go for the trout-rainbow, brown, etc. as we are in the central Sierras in California where they are native.) What do you catch and what do you prefer to eat (especially those of you who are not nearby?)

Edited March 31, 2005 by Ladycake (log)

[PCL]

Over the Easter weekend we caught the following (saltwater) while camping in a remote inlet accessible only in 4x4... mind you there was a boat involved too...

- trevally (surf fishing)

- australian salmon (really a sea perch of some sort) (surf fishing)

- sea bream (estuary)

- flathead (estuary)

- tailor (estuary)

for pics on these buggers, check out www.fishingvictoria.com.au

[winesonoma]

We got together again last weekend, Menu was, Fri dinner Chili, pork chops, salad, icecream. Sat Breakfast scrambled eggs, sausage, biscuits and gravy, fresh fruit, V8, orange juice, coffe. Lunch was hot dogs, Macaroni or potato salad, with full range of condiments. Dinner was NY steak, salad, chili, dinner rolls, corn on the cob, ice cream. Sunday breakfast was scrambled eggs, ham, hashbrowns and juice as on Sat. 457 people fed at each meal. In the middle of the desert. Sure was fun.

[indy]

I'm going a weekend camping trip and to sustain a group of 10 for three days. We hardly have the time to be true gourmets, but hefty, satisfying meals would be ideal... So, what are you favorite recipes for the outdoors? What tastes great over a campfire? Suggestions? We will have a basic wood fire pit and gas camping stoves at our disposal.

[Busboy]

I'm going a weekend camping trip and to sustain a group of 10 for three days. We hardly have the time to be true gourmets, but hefty, satisfying meals would be ideal...  So, what are you favorite recipes for the outdoors? What tastes great over a campfire? Suggestions? We will have a basic wood fire pit and gas camping stoves at our disposal.

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Quesadilla and beans, with fried potatoes on the side.

[winesonoma]

I'm going a weekend camping trip and to sustain a group of 10 for three days. We hardly have the time to be true gourmets, but hefty, satisfying meals would be ideal...  So, what are you favorite recipes for the outdoors? What tastes great over a campfire? Suggestions? We will have a basic wood fire pit and gas camping stoves at our disposal.

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Hiking or driving? I made Rubens for 20 last weekend.

[mizducky]

I bet you could find a whole lot of camping-friendly meal inspiration over in the Chili Cook-off topic currently in progress.

[scordelia]

How about Hobo Burgers? Paula Deen recently did them and claims that they were a recipe from her girl scout days.

[petite tête de chou]

I'm going a weekend camping trip and to sustain a group of 10 for three days. We hardly have the time to be true gourmets, but hefty, satisfying meals would be ideal...  So, what are you favorite recipes for the outdoors? What tastes great over a campfire? Suggestions? We will have a basic wood fire pit and gas camping stoves at our disposal.

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There's some pretty good ideas on this thread Eating in the great outdoors, What do you do?

[Chezkaren]

We always have corned beef hash with "poached" eggs on top made in a cast iron skillet with foil as the lid for poaching/soft cooking -- we use canned corned beef hash but you could make some yourself....maybe salmon? Works well for any meal of the day.

[bigbear]

Ahhh..... Fond memories of Spam slices, fried over an open fire.

[snowangel]

You might want to check out this topic on eating in the great outdoors. Lots of good camping food suggestions.

[chow guy]

One pot meals like stew, chili and Thai Green Curry are alwaysa hearty hit with our camping crowd. Where are you camping? If it's near water you can always eat freshly caught fish. Which is my favorite camping meal.

[emilyr]

As a Girl Scout camper from way back, I know it's not too hard to cook for 20 or more in the Great Outdoors. My favorite thing to do are packet meals. Toss some chicken, fish or your favorite cut of meat into some foil, add root veggies, spices and something "wet" (EVOO, butter, broth, or wine for the adults), wrap them up tight, and you're ready to go. My little Brownies like chicken, broccoli (otherwise a no-no food in the 3rd grade set) and Velveeta (ick, I know, but sometimes you just gotta cater...).

Also something the kids like, I can't remeber the name, but you cut a piece of bacon in half and start to cook it, add a piece of bread with the middle bitten out on top, drop an egg into the hole and top with another halved piece of bacon. It makes like an inside out sandwich. I think we made these on top of little stoves made out of coffee cans and a heat source made out of tuna cans, cardboard and candle wax.

[rooftop1000]

Also from girl scouts....cant forget about desset, and not smores. If you cut the top off an orange and carfully remove the pulp, you can pour in cake mix ...replace the top and bake near, on or in the fire...and baked apples stuffed with sugar and cinn wrapped in foil...and baked potatoes in the coals wrapped in foil, grilled cheese in foil packets too... we did love our packets.

And more modern...you can take some frozen boil-in-bag veggies they are even ice for the cooler for the first day

tracey

[lastmika]

Its summertime and I have a few odd camping trips planned as early as this coming weekend with the whole family. Keeping in mind that we have two little ones, what kind of creative and simple camp-food exists within the egullet community?? We're not much for simple steaks really, and the kids don't take to that so well in the first place. So far I'm taking along tons of corn and flour-based soft tortillas since they make easy quesedillas on the fire, or simple wraps with any filler. Any other great info?

[annecros]

So will you be cooking on open flame the entire time, or do you have some other equipment?

Cast iron cooking is great when camping. Bacon and eggs in a skillet, everything from biscuits to beans can be made in a dutch oven.

We like to take along homemade jerky or boiled eggs for snacks.

Are you guys hiking as well? Is space, weight and portability an issue?

[lastmika]

I'm taking along a stovetop and a tiny bbq, which has served well in the past. I might still have an open flame grill set up if the Mr. can get the fire to the sweet spot! I'm not betting on much though. This first trip is going to be mostly sedentary, but we'll be canoeing on the next one.

Homemade jerky?? I'd love to know more about that, even if it takes us off topic!

[paulraphael]

This is a great book:

http://www.amazon.com/Cookery-Library-Nati...p/dp/0811728609

I have an old (really old) edition that's bound with staples, so the new one is sure to be more complete and up to date.

Its focus is on very long backpacking trip and expedition cooking, so it will probably presume more limitations than you're facing. But it's not about roughing it; the authors find that people get bored easily with unimaginative food on long trips, and have found a million innovative ways to keep things tasty and interesting.

Lots of tips on using stoves, fires, and minimum impact, leave-no-trace techniques.

I remember learning how to bake a cake in a coffee can, and about a dozen ways to prepare all the trout that we never caught.

Edited June 29, 2007 by paulraphael (log)

[annecros]

There's some discussion of it here:

Click for Jerky Talk

But I don't think jerky is off topic for camping food!

I just bought a Nesco American Harvest Snackmaster Entree food dehydrator for my son at Amazon for $40.

It's big enough for about two pounds of meat. I think you can find them at Target and Walmart as well. If you guys are into jerky, it will pay for itself in no time. You can also use the low oven method for making jerky.

Also great for dehydrating tomatoes, fruit, making granola or homemade fruit wraps, even crackers, etc. All lightweight, wholesome, calorie packed camping food.

Camp stoves are great! You can do just about anything on them, as I found during the hurricane seasons of 2004/2005!

Stuff you can eat right out of the can is nice for camping as well. When I was a kid, we ate canned sardines, tuna, vienna sausages etc. It was the only time mom let me eat that way!

[little ms foodie]

We like making schnitzel in our cast iron- very easy and quick! also bacon wrapped trout is a favorite and so is paella! it really benefits from the smokey fire and everyone can get involved by being in charge of a particular ingrediant. and fun to eat it straight fromthe pan on a table of newspaper!

other ideas here!

[paulraphael]

Camp stoves are great! You can do just about anything on them, as I found during the hurricane seasons of 2004/2005!

it definitely depends on the stove ...

some are meant for cooking and can actually simmer. others (like mine) are climbing stoves that let you choose between Off and Blowtorch. They're great for melting snow and boiling water. But they'd be more useful for welding yourself some outdoor furniture than for making a sauce or some pancakes!