Campy Food...or the Wonders of Hot Charcoal and Cast Iron...

we recently went car camping with about nine other families... pretty fun...

it's been awhile since i did any camp cooking. prolly at least 10 years or more? and the things i cooked then were pretty basic or at least, mostly somewhat pre-prepared or packaged foods. not that there's anything wrong with that...just wanted to try my hand at a bit more...difficult? challenging? i duuno. i settled for the middle ground.

the most challenging thing i think we tried was using the dutch oven. i am 150% glad we bought that! it was totally awesome! we used it three times for biscuits which came out excellent 2 of the three times. we left 'em in a bit long once and the bottoms were a bit black...but it was still fine. i would continue to take that along just for the biscuits alone. oh what a few hot briquets and some dough will do...awesome!

jane (user of the dutch oven) also made a apple/pineapple dump cake. this consisted of 2 boxes of yellow cake mix, a can of pineapple chunks and a can of apple pie filling....oh, and a few pats of butter. it didn't turn out to her expectations but still tasted pretty damn good. instead of a cake-like top we got more of a crumble like top. this is one we'll experiment with since the basic premise was easy and with so few ingredients...it is ripe recipe for jane to experiment with. i'm looking forward to sampling the future permutations of this one...oh yes i am...

we did the basic hobo stew for dinner the first nite. potatoes, ground meat, carrots, onions. wrap it in tin foil and throw it in the fire. ok, some of these burned. but they still tasted pretty stinkin' good. here's the changes for the next time for this one...

ground beef (or turkey)
ground sausage (the calabrese seems best but i think chorizo would work just as well)
chopped onions
chopped bell peppers
baby carrots
sliced mushrooms
sliced bacon

season w/ salt, pepper, garlic powder, worcester and steak sauce

instead of throwing directly in the fire...i'll place it on hot coals instead and check after 15mins rather than 20.

breakfasts were the best. besides the biscuits, we made skillet potatoes as well as scrambled eggs and sausages. i placed the cast iron skillet on the grate while i was building the fire and cooked the morning bacon in it. all that bacon fat rendered was put to good use with sliced potatoes roasted in foil from the previous nite. add onions, thyme, rosemary and some more diced bacon and it's ready to go. the last morning i added some cheddar cheese...yeah, beat that Denny's...

dinner the 2nd nite was chicken skewers...meh and all my fault that it was meh. the chicken pieces were way too small. i marinated them in white wine, olive oil and lemon juice w/ just a bit of soy sauce. i think bigger chunks would've cooked better and tasted better. again, my lack of foresight and it will be corrected next time around. i did also bbq a tri-tip. easy peasy and oh soooo good. i'll remember that as well.

the ahn's also provided kimchee jigae...camp style, which i guess means kimchee jigae w/ leftover meats. you know what? excellent!!! spicey-salty goodness! however, you gotta eat it w/ rice...otherwise the experience isn't the same. not sure i'd like it w/ vienna sausages but Spam is a winner as well as i would think would be regular hot dogs. i think that's one i'll put down as one to learn to make...

next time?

well... i think main dish-wise, i'd stick to roasting or bbqing larger portions of meat. those seem to be the best for campfire cooking. tri-tip, leg of lamb, beef or pork ribs, short ribs all would be easy to prep beforehand and cook. i would prolly just use the camp stove for cooking vegetables if not roasted. the cast iron skillet is awesome...i may get another one...a bigger one since it's so awesome!!!

stews...

we talked about doing more stews. i may want to get another dutch oven just for that....or at least a cast iron pot. something i can throw on the fire, add meat and vegetables to with a bit of water and just let simmer until done. the other dutch oven could be used for bread or dessert...

speaking of the dutch oven...

yeah...me like...

a friend gave me a pasta recipe that i'd like to try. lasagna in a dutch oven. sounds easy and delicious. there are also the bread possibilities and dessert possibilities that i'm dreaming of tasting. that's jane's territory... i can't bake to save my life.

hash of some sort is another possibility. roasting beets and potatoes to make hash would be awesome...hmmmm....yeah...

all in all, a good experience with lessons learned to be corrected the next go around...hopefully sooner rather than later...

...and oh yeah, grabbing logs in the pit are best done with gloves on or using utensils. bare hands no matter how careful leave lasting impressions...