Camp cooking
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There is nothing better than the taste of a meal cooked over a camp fire. Camp cooking isn’t hard, but it does take a little practice and planning. Before you leave, make sure you plan your meals and have all the ingredients and equipment required. Just because you are camping doesn’t mean that you have to live on baked beans! You can eat the same as you do at home, you just need a little more planning.
Cooking Techniques How you cook may depend on where you are staying. For example, camp fires are quite often not allowed in National Parks and in a lot of caravan parks. Also, fire bans can ruin your planned camp fire at any time. Caravan parks and camping grounds may have a gas or electric BBQ for your use, but keep in mind that you may need to pay for this and you will be sharing it with other travellers. If travelling remotely or in the outback you may plan to cook over an open fire and utilise your camp oven. Keep in mind that you may have trouble finding suitable wood at times. Make sure you only use dead wood and don’t pull branches off trees. Also remember that you cannot take any wood from within a National Park. Carrying heat beads with you is a good idea. |
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Carrying your own LPG stove or BBQ is an option, but can take up space. LPG is fairly cheap and easy to get a hold of. Cooking on these is the same as any other BBQ or your stove at home, so cooking with frypans, grill plate, saucepans is all fine.
One of the easiest options to use is a Butane stove. These aren’t expensive to purchase and the butane cans are fairly cheap too. Not too big so easy storage and you can get these stoves in varying sizes, ie 1 burner, 2 burners, grill plates etc. In my opinion, one of these is essential, even if you are using purely as a backup when fires aren’t available. One downside is that the canisters don’t last for an overly long period and they do struggle a little in the colder weather.
Food options
When it comes to camp cooking, you can be as fancy as you like. If you have a camp oven, you can basically cook anything you could do at home in your oven. Ideas of meals are:-
-Roasts
-Stews
-Chilli Con Carne
-Fajitas
-Tacos
-Chicken Schnitzel
-Grilled Chicken
-Hamburgers
-Hotdogs
-BBQ - Sausages, Steak etc
-Omelette
-Roast meat and vegetables
-Grilled Fish
-Spaghetti Bolognaise
If cooking isn’t really your thing, there are plenty of packaged foods available that just require reheating. Ready-made meals that simply require you to heat in boiling water and serve. Your other alternative is freeze-dried, add boiling water and let stand for a few minutes and it’s ready to go, can’t get much easier than that!
Click here to get an idea of some recipes.
One of the easiest options to use is a Butane stove. These aren’t expensive to purchase and the butane cans are fairly cheap too. Not too big so easy storage and you can get these stoves in varying sizes, ie 1 burner, 2 burners, grill plates etc. In my opinion, one of these is essential, even if you are using purely as a backup when fires aren’t available. One downside is that the canisters don’t last for an overly long period and they do struggle a little in the colder weather.
Food options
When it comes to camp cooking, you can be as fancy as you like. If you have a camp oven, you can basically cook anything you could do at home in your oven. Ideas of meals are:-
-Roasts
-Stews
-Chilli Con Carne
-Fajitas
-Tacos
-Chicken Schnitzel
-Grilled Chicken
-Hamburgers
-Hotdogs
-BBQ - Sausages, Steak etc
-Omelette
-Roast meat and vegetables
-Grilled Fish
-Spaghetti Bolognaise
If cooking isn’t really your thing, there are plenty of packaged foods available that just require reheating. Ready-made meals that simply require you to heat in boiling water and serve. Your other alternative is freeze-dried, add boiling water and let stand for a few minutes and it’s ready to go, can’t get much easier than that!
Click here to get an idea of some recipes.