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My family, friends, and I love camping and camp all summer long.
I usually end up the one who does most of the cooking. While I
love to do this, I have learned some tips that have helped me
along the way. 1. Be prepared and have a backup plan for
those rainy days. I learned this lesson on a camping trip
where it down poured everyday of our trip. I thought I had done
a great job planning every meal. Unfortunately, almost all of my
meals included a dish that needed to be cooked. Not to mention
we really had no other place to eat but the tent. With the rain
and nothing "good" to eat, everyone was miserable. What I
learned from this experience is to always have some food that is
already prepared and is easy to eat while sitting in a tent.
Some foods that I make sure I am never without while camping
include: pop tarts, cheese and crackers, ingredients for
sandwiches, fruits and vegetables (either fresh or dried), trail
mix, granola bars. For drinking, juice boxes are a nice
alternative for children. They are harder to spill while eating
in a tent. 2. Cooking and storing chicken is easier if the
chicken is parboiled before your trip. What better way to
eat chicken than cooked over a campfire. Sounds good but you
need to be careful how you store and cook raw chicken. I have
found that it is much easier to bring chicken along when it is
parboiled at home. This eliminates the need to store it in a
separate cooler. No more drippy raw chicken juices all over the
bottom of your ice chest. Also, the chicken only needs to be
reheated. No more worrying whether the chicken is cooked
thoroughly. From a cook's point of view, this makes life while
camping much more pleasurable. 3. Bring oven mitts or pot
holders. I could not tell you how many times I forgot the
potholders and I have the scars to prove it. I went out and
bought the silicone oven mitts. Most of the silicone mitts can
withstand temperatures up to 550 degrees. These are also great
for doing anything around the camp fire: adding wood, roasting
marshmallows, and putting out the fire to name a few. 4.
Lighters or matches. I guess this would be a matter of how
you are camping or what you prefer. I prefer to use the long
handled lighters rather than matches. I find it is easier to
light either a fire or your charcoal with a lighter. I can
control the lighter better and you don't have to worry as much
about a lighter getting damp.
These were just a few hints and tips that I have gathered
over the years. I hope they have helped you make your camping
experience a little less stressful and a lot more fun. Happy
Camping!!
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