Yummy Camp Menu Ideas

Here’s a weekend’s worth of camp menu ideas. These recipes, which are linked to in the titles, serve four to six but can be easily adapted to whatever size camping group you have. Bring lots of fresh fruit and vegetable in addition to the ingredients listed for each recipe — it’s important to have some raw food and extra snacks as part of the daily menu for camping.

Day 1

Breakfast: Dutch Oven Sausage & Eggs

Lunch: 3-minute Pita Pizzas

Dinner: Baked Bean Chili

Day 2

Breakfast: Sausage Egg Potato Breakfast Bowl

Lunch: Scout Barbecue on buns

Dinner: Enchiladas in a Dutch Oven

Day 3

Breakfast: Omelets in a bag

Lunch: Skillet Beef n’ Noodles

Dinner: Vegetable Steak Stew

Do you have any camp menu ideas to share? Have you tried freeze dried camping food? I’d love to see your favorite recipes in the comments section, below.

When planning your menu it is important to plan your allotted space. If you are limited, your cooking utensils and food needs to be sized accordingly. Quick and easy hot dogs on a grill are great, but so is a pot of chili hanging on a hook over a fire.

Hanging-kettle cooking brings back the old west and pioneer days and some really good food. You can make a great pot of chili in one and it is quick and easy to prepare.

Camp Chili recipe

2lbs. ground beef browned in the Dutch oven over the fire

1 diced pepper and 1 med. onion diced added to the meat

1 can of RoTel tomatoes, with your choice of seasoning

1 6oz. can tomato paste

4 Tbsp. chili powder 2 Tbsp. cumin

salt and pepper to taste

hot sauce if you like.

This recipe will serve 6-8 depending on the size of the appetites in your party.

Mix it all in the pot and let it simmer while you are enjoying other camping activities.

Beverages are sometimes cumbersome. Prepackaged sweetened drinks are a plus. They don’t spoil, take up much room, and only need water to be complete. Coffee prepared over an open fire has a taste some never get to experience. If you don’t have a stovetop percolator, you can bring a pot of water to a boil and then add your grounds directly to the pot. Let it cook awhile. Remove the pot from the fire and put a burning stick in the pot. The majority of the grounds will go to the bottom of the pot. All of the packaged beverages can be brought in the container you will be preparing them in.

Quick snacks that are healthy and very portable include dehydrated fruits, trail mix, and seeds. In addition to being nutritious, they are easy to pack. Fresh fruit is good but bulky. Meats such as the ground beef should be frozen at home. This serves two purposes. It acts as another ice source and can be cooked from a frozen state.

Quick Breakfast Burritos recipe

Flour tortillas

eggs

precooked bacon, crumbled

cheddar cheese or Monterey jack

frozen seasoning mix that includes peppers, onions. They are available in just about any grocery store.

Quart size zip-loc bags

Give each person 1-3 eggs to crack and put in their own bags.

Bring a kettle of water to a boil.

Add frozen seasonings and bacon to the eggs along with some salt and pepper to taste.

Kids love to squish the eggs in the bag and add their own ingredients. Let them. Then put the bags in the boiling water for about 3 minutes. You can pull the bag out with tongs to see if they are done.

While this is going on, wrap your tortillas in heavy-duty foil and place it on the fire while the eggs cook. Remove the tortillas, put the eggs on them, and roll them up for a great breakfast.

While sitting at home making camp menu plans, plan for your space, unique needs and tastes, and for larger meals and more snacks per person than you would normally serve — your campers will have larger appetites than you might expect.

Have you ever sat down to plan meals for a camping excursion or other family trip and wondered where to start? Or searched for good camping recipes that are nutritious, tasty and easy to prepare with limited tools and cooking options? I certainly have, and decided to blog about the good tips, recipes and ideas I’ve found, for other families looking for camp menu ideas.

Please share your tips and ideas as well, using our comment section after every post.

Happy planning!