My little family recently took a weekend trip to Shawnee National Forest in Southern Illinois. We arrived on Friday afternoon and left on Saturday afternoon, which left us with 2 breakfasts, 2 lunches, and 2 dinners to plan and execute. So, here's what we ate!
For our first dinner, we decided to go classic camp food: Hot dogs made over a fire. To add a little extra substance to our meal, we also made a pasta side on our camp stove. And of course, S'mores for dessert! This was an easy, yet delicious, meal.
The next day, we woke up and made pancakes (with mini chocolate chips for my son) with some warmed up, precooked sausage on the side. And of course, we had to have some coffee to wake us up!
Tip: Make your meals as uncomplicated as you can. While we loved our breakfast, the pancakes took way longer to make than I had anticipated since we could only make 1 pancake at a time.
For lunch, we just made sandwiches with lunchmeat and cheese and had an apple and chips on the side. (We were in a hurry though, so I didn't take any pictures.)
Next up: dinner! We made some campfire dip, which was absolutely delicious! Here's the recipe:
In an 8x8 foil pan, spread a brick of cream cheese on the bottom. Pour a can of chili beans in chili sauce on top. Spread a pound of pre-cooked ground beef cooked in taco seasoning. Then, top with 2 cups of taco cheese. Cover with foil. Cook over a fire, or on a camp stove, or any way that is available to you. Stir a couple times so that nothing burns. Eat with Frito Scoops.
To make this just a smidge healthier, we made it with Neufchtel (1/3 less fat cream cheese), low fat taco cheese, and turkey instead of beef.
Tip: Don't forget about the dishes you'll need to do! Because we didn't want to handwash plates with tons of cheese dip on them, we just ate right out of the foil pan and then threw away the pan when we were done.
Tip: Prep what you can in advance. Yes, we could have made the taco meat at our camp, but it was way faster and way less effort to just make it at home, put in in a sandwich bag, and then pull it out of the cooler when we were ready to make it! Easy peasy!
The next morning we made scrambled eggs and turkey bacon with coffee for breakfast. It was so simple, yet so great to have hot breakfast to start our day with.
To make scrambled eggs for 3, I whisked together 6 eggs, 6 Tablespoons of milk, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/2 teaspoon pepper together. Cook over medium heat, stirring often, until eggs are the texture you enjoy.
For our coffee, we used these pour over filters from Amazon and just made some hot water in our little kettle on the camp stove.
Our last meal for this trip was lunch. We stopped at a picnic table before our last hike and ate some sandwiches and veggie straws. Super simple. And easy to make out of the back of our car in just a matter of minutes.
That was all the food we ate! Well, except for a couple oreos and some popcorn we had packed for snacks. Camp food shouldn't be complicated. And it helps to prep some stuff in advance. And worse case scenario, go find a restaurant. Don't be scared of cooking while camping, just make sure you leave yourself plenty of time in your schedule. and ENJOY!
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