Cooking on the Camping Trip

Ahhhh, the lake life. Relaxing. Soaking up the sun. Time to unwind. The biggest worry being did I cover everything that needed to be covered with sunscreen. But the most conversation about what to cook next. When I am at home, I like to cook - but get so tired of making decisions about WHAT to cook. Maybe that's why I like the lake so much. There is conversation about the menu for each meal. We decide one thing, then everyone adds to the menu with items from their stash. When I'm camping with family, we really have some great meals. We plan very little before we go. Everyone just brings what he/she has, and we mix and match our menus. For the girl's trip, there was a little more planning; they try to know what each person is bringing so that there is variety without too much duplication. A good idea for a short trip.

Each morning we had bacon or sausage, fried eggs, and biscuits. We cooked the meat and eggs in an electric skillet. Most of the time when camping with my family, we use the electric skillet to cook the biscuits. Turn it on very low temp and flip the biscuits about halfway through cooking time. They turn out just right.

But Liz has a toaster oven, and for our small group, it was just the right size to bake the biscuits. Whop biscuits are really good for camping breakfasts. Just whop 'em, pop 'em in to cook, and by the time everything else is done they are ready.

I made a chicken salad before I left home and packed it in the cooler. This made for an easy lunch each day.

I'm all about easy for supper too. One night we had pork loin, baked beans, salad, and bread. Yummy.

Liz put the beans in the crock pot that morning. Notice the liner? After supper she just tossed the liner and no cleaning a dirty crock pot! At lunch I put the pork loin in the rotisserie and let in turn all afternoon. My sister and I both have rotisserie ovens - they are great for camping. Just like the commercial says, "Set it; and forget it!"

Just before we ate, I mixed up a strawberry salad. Spring mix greens, sliced strawberries, yellow grape tomatoes, a red onion, feta cheese, and a vinagrette (I had almonds to go in too, but left them at my camper and was too lazy to walk back and get them).

We had friends come for supper that night. And Belle brought some great bread. These cheesy jalapeno rolls were my fav. And we heated the bread in Liz's toaster oven.

For our supper on the last night, everyone brought steaks. We grilled them on the fire. I packed a potato casserole from a local market, and brought some veggies to grill. Liz had some garlic bread to heat on the grill too.



I just pulled up a chair and did the grilling sitting down.

How 'bout that camping hair? Fresh out of the shower, trying to let it dry before pulling it up. And here is another camping tip - go sleeveless. It's amazing how much cooler you are with no sleeves.

Do you camp? What do you cook? Share some ideas.