So You Want to Go Camping, Volume 2

Welcome back. 

Glamping. Also more blankets than I recommend.

We're glad the length and general direction of Volume 1 - Tents - didn't chase you away, and we hope that you've used the ensuing weeks between advice columns to run right out there and buy the nylon palace of your dreams! 

In the great survival question of which comes first - shelter or food - we've comfortably checked what we here at BSD think is the first most important; as we mentioned in Volume 6 of our Hiking/Not-Dying in the Woods series, one can last up to 3 weeks without food, and 3 days without water. Hypothermia and bears will kill you a lot faster. 

Speaking of bears, after setting up your grade-A shelter for the week, you'll certainly be as hungry as one! We here at BSD have some amazing tried-and-true camping recipes of a surprisingly sophisticated nature - I like to call it cuisine d'irt - and in fact shared our cooked-over-a-campfire chili recipe lovingly called "Dad's Extra-Fart Chili: Campfire Option." There will be, for our loyal readers, many more where that came from.

Recipes, not farts. Well...let's be honest: both.

But this Volume is about the things with which you cook and eat your haute - and hot - cuisine. Today, we're talking about the Camp Kitchen!

Remembering my general refusal to use a camper, we can all safely assume together that a full-on electric or propane oven and stovetop is right-out; however, we already covered the meager and survivalist methods by which we cook when on the backcountry trail. This, my friends, is a solid in-between, by which we show off our cooking chops by making Very Advanced Food using very basic equipment.

Cooking at Camp Smitty requires 3 heat sources for making food less gastronomically dangerous:

1. Propane burners
2. A grill
3. A fire ring. With a fire in it.

I am informed, before I get too deep, that perhaps my posts can get a tad...Tolstoy. I don't mean "spiritual transformation," or "morality," or "militarism." Though, witness us whilst camping, and you may notice a healthy dose of the former, a nearly total lack of the middle, and a decent helping of the latter (especially during set-up- and tear-down-day). I digress: I mean length. I mean that I get verbose. I have Very Important Information to convey, and I get lost in...wording. 

So this time, let me get right away to the meat of this advice column by way of a picture. Here, campers and outdoors enthusiasts, is a picture of my humble camp kitchen:

How many Michelin Stars do I get?

Fire. Fire.

Hereupon this modest space, we cook full bacon-eggs-and-pancake breakfasts; barbequed chicken thighs; chili; burgers and corn on the cob; breakfast tacos; french toast and sausage; loaded baked potatoes. And it even turns out edible!

This much propane should be sufficient
for a week at camp

Now, sure, I could get one of those propane griddle tops, and a propane oven, and a propane coffee maker, and a propane refrigerator, all of which exist for real in reality, probably. However, I am limited to what I can carry in and on top of my vehicle - a Chevy Traverse. I also need to put 4 people in said vehicle, or I'll get super lonely, and as a card-carry extrovert and Secretary of the worldwide collective of extroverts, I don't do "alone" very well. Perhaps soon I'll buy a trailer to haul more camping stuff in, and then the world will be my oyster.

At any rate, as one can see, the vast majority of my cooking equipment is Coleman. Weight isn't an issue and bulk is only a minor issue, and I love Coleman's stuff for its affordability and durability. People are camping with their father's and grandfather's Coleman equipment like it's an heirloom. I could wax nostalgic about my Coleman Series 5459 2-burner stove that I don't think the company even makes anymore, and yet it is one of the centerpieces of my camp kitchen. I also use the Coleman 2-in-1 burner and mini grill, which is also something they don't make anymore, but that still works like a charm for me. Sure, they have adjustable knobs that give the illusion of minutely-controllable flame output, but I'd be lying if I said that's accurate. These burners and grills, as you adjust the knobs, have 3 settings: off; kinda-medium; full-blast. You adjust your cooking to the flame, not the flame to the cooking.

How I picture myself

The only other thing I use for cooking - meaning for producing heat and placing things on that need heat or transfer heat - is an actual camp fire and a plain old Coleman campfire grill grate. It's not adjustable. You make a fire, you put the grate over it, you cook. You adjust the flaming logs or smoldering coals under the grate, and adjust your cooking to the heat, not the heat to the cooking. 

In other words, cooking at Camp Smitty requires attention and fiddling, which, if I'm being totally honest, and I usually am unless I'm telling a funny story, is time away from modernity and worry and the constant anxiety of life in the modern era. It's poking fire with sticks. It's stirring and flipping and watching food cook with a mind away from chores and projects and the looming shadow of career and 24-hour accessibility. I'm outdoors, under blue sky and amongst the trees, cooking chili in a cast-iron pan over an open fire the way god intended.

Which brings me to: when I cook over the camp fire and need a pan, I use The Lodge. I picked this 12" (it's actually 14") skillet with a bear on it, because it has super tall sides for making chili, and it has a bear on it, which I felt was thematically-appropriate for outdoor cooking. And I grab it with fireproof oven mitts. I grab and move flaming logs with the same. The way god intended.

Why are stock photos?

Though there are full modern bathrooms when we camp at Wilderness, there are no water hookups. You get your water from community potable water taps scattered about the campground. We fill two Coleman 5-Gallon water carriers (with taps!). We use these super-handy Field and Stream collapsible sinks to wash and rinse the dishes, and we use Dawn dish soap. If it's gentle enough to wash animals after oil spills, it's gentle enough on campsites when we finish washing. And our wash rags and dish towels hang on this handy gear line.

And I can't tell you how much I love the Pack-Away Folding Camp Kitchen table. Holy crap. I hang all my cooking utensils on it, do food prep on it, it's got room and a handy stand for my stove/grill, and I can even hang my lantern on the hanger at night. It's the coolest piece of gear. This table goes next to it for more stove and prep space, and I bring along a plastic 6' folding table like you use for parties and banquets for "counter" and cleaning space. 

Not a "time-out" tent

Look back up at my camp kitchen picture, and you'll see a tiny 2-person Youth tent, rated for 2 whole children, backyard camping. Why do we have that, who sleeps in it, and is it creepy? No one, and no. That tent...is our pantry! Rather than haul stuff in and out of the back of my vehicle all week, we store everything - from paper towel, heavy-duty aluminum foil, and cleaning supplies to non-perishable foods - in plastic totes, and put all that in that handy little tent. Keeps it out of the sun, out of a car that gets one-billion degrees in the sun, and keeps curious and hungry woodland creatures out of our food and out of our sleeping tent. Perishable food and drink goes in Coleman Xtreme Series or Yeti coolers, and we're only replacing ice once on a 5- or 6-day trip. Now, my vehicle is empty of all camping-related stuff so that my boys can start to fill it with 16-tons of "wow this is a cool rock" that they find at the beach over the course of 5 days.

Eat at a table outdoors, like you're civilized

The rest? Use your head. We eat on cheap plastic "outdoor dining" plates, bowls, and cups. We have
inexpensive utensils that you'd buy for eating on your back deck. Don't bring your Wusthof or Miyabi knife set to camp; find a cheap-ass santoku-style chef knife and a cutting board you don't mind throwing away every 2 years. Stirring spoons, slotted spoons, flippers, spatulas, measuring cups...just get whatever generic kitchen crap Meijer sells, and that's good enough. Everything you need to cook and clean at home, get for camping. Just...buy inexpensive stuff, because nature is harder on your stuff than your climate-controlled house.

And everything, all those utensils and supplies and things all pack into big plastic totes I shove back on shelves in my basement to haul back out again the next time we hit the road.

And there you have it. I have again utterly failed at a brief post, but we're talking kitchens and organization, and you're here for advice. The meals can be as extravagant as you like, but don't think you're limited to hotdogs and brats for a weeks'-worth of food. 

And speaking of food: how about I share some of my favorite camping recipes? Yeah? Tune-in next time for So You Want to Go Camping, Volume 3: haute cuisine for the discerning camper.