Campfire Cooking

Campfire White Whole Wheat Bread

2 Jul 2012

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Besides Okra Stew, I also took on the challenge to make homemade bread in the dutch oven on the campfire. I have seen some really great looking recipes online like this one from Mother Earth News. I was anxious to try it. We were camping, of course and I realized, while making my no-knead dough, I did not have all the right ingredients. Luckily, the most useful advice I have gotten from Chef Kevin is to just wing it. I had my doubts during the process, but at the end of the day, this hearty dense loaf of wonderfulness was the pleasantly surprising result.

White Whole Wheat Camping Bread
No-Knead Dough:
3 cups White Whole Wheat Flour
3 packets of active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups of luke warm water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt

Directions:
1. In the morning, combine yeast and salt in the look warm water mix until dissolved.
2. Add flour, this will be a sticky wet dough.
3. Cover and put in your tent to keep safe from natures creatures. Go enjoy your day!
4. Before dinner, oil your dutch oven.
5. Shape dough as much as possible and place in the dutch oven. Let rise another 45 mins. (you can add seeds to the top at this point if you would like, we had pumpkin seeds available) and prepare coals.
6.  Once coals are gray, place them in a circle on the ground. Set the dutch oven on top.
7. Cover and load the top with coals.
8. Let cook approx. 30 mins or until it starts to brown.
9. Take out of the dutch oven and let stand for 10 mins. before cutting.

Happy Camping!

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Campfire Okra Stew

28 Jun 2012

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This is the perfect dish to comfort your taste buds after a long day of hiking or biking. You can prepare a packet of spices ahead of time and bring frozen Okra in your cooler.

Adapted from Paleo Comfort Foods by Julie and Charles Mayfield, Okra Stew

Before your trip, combine the following ingredients in ziplock or jar:
1 teaspoon of fresh cracked pepper
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon fresh oregano
1 teaspoon fresh thyme

Add to your cooler:
1 package frozen okra
2 cloves garlic

You can pre-cut:
1/2 red bell pepper
1 large onion

And pack:
28 oz whole canned tomatoes
1 tsp Better than Bullion (Veggie)
Olive oil or butter

If you don’t like okra, you can easily make this dish with zucchini, summer squash or pretty much any veggies. We had fresh okra available to us, but not enough, so I added zucchini to this batch.

Directions:
1. Prepare coals, once they are grey, set up 15 in a circle. Set dutch oven on the coals. Add two tablespoons of oil and onions. Stir until soft (you can place the cover on at this point, but don’t add coals to the top yet.
2. Add garlic, all veggies, tomatoes, spices, 1 cup of water and better than bullion. Stir well and cover.
3. Add coals to the top.

The more coals you add, the quicker it will cook. If you have more time, use less and let it simmer. Cook until all veggies are soft and enjoy!

This soup is full of fantastic flavors and is a very easy dutch oven recipe. We served it with a dutch oven White Whole Wheat bread. I will be posting that recipe soon too!

Happy Camping!

 


 

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Campfire Cooking – Spoon Bread

9 Mar 2012

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As I mentioned in my last post, last year we purchased the Camp Cooking cookbook by The National Museum of Forest Service History. As a side dish to compliment our Campfire Yum-bo, my hubby decided to try the Spoon Bread recipe (on page 27 of Camp Cooking) in our dutch oven.

This was the hubby’s first campfire cooking challenge. He was sure that the coals were all set for cooking.

It starts with bacon (how could it ever be bad?), corn muffin mix, and blue cheese.

This dish smells amazing cooking in the open air.

Once it is no longer soft in the middle, it’s ready to scoop out. This is a melt in your mouth corn bread.

Fantastic. This is one on the list for this year as well. I’ve been craving it!

Happy Cooking!

 

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Camping Tip – Meatloaf Burgers

20 Aug 2011

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Before going camping, make a meatloaf and freeze it. This will make it last longer and help keep your cooler cool. When you are ready to eat it, simply cut into slices, add some BBQ sauce and put it on over coals to heat up. No worry about if it is safe because it is precooked. Serve on burger buns. A simple and tasty camping dinner.

By: Category: Food, The Pomegranate Chronicles Tags: , ,

Camping Tip: Eggs

1 Aug 2011

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I read this tip on a camping site and I tell you, it was the best. I emptied a dozen eggs into a mason jar for easy travel.  They fit perfect in the cooler without the worry of breaking them. You just pour them out as you need them. It was a great tip so I figured I’d pass it along.

 

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Campfire Yum-bo

19 Jul 2011

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Although our Campfire Cheesecake was AMAZING, I have to admit, this Gumbo dish was my favorite! So get your coals ready, here comes the BEST campfire dinner recipe I have ever had.

Campfire Yum-bo
By Chef Kevin

Ingredients:

1 large onion diced
4 stalks of celery diced
2 green peppers diced
2 links of chorizo sausage cut in half the long way and then sliced (half circles)
1 lb. small peeled and deveined shrimp
1 lb chicken meat diced
1 bag frozen slice okra (about 12 oz)
1 big can diced tomatoes in juice
For seasoning; salt pepper, gumbo file (not easy to find, we substituted cajun seasoning)

Directions: Brown up the veggies in the dutch oven (cover if needed for more heat, stirring often). Then add meats.

Finally add tomatoes, okra, seasoning and simmer with coals on top and bottom for about an hour (or until chicken is cooked), stirring when needed. You can also add rice at this point if you would like.

It may take longer depending on coals and how full you fill the dutch oven. Ours was a bit high, so we omitted rice and ate it more as a stew. We added rice to the left overs the next night and got two meals out of it. Did I mention how amazing this was? What also makes this a great dish is that all the prep can be done before you leave. You can cut everything up, place in ziplocks and put them in the cooler. This will take up less space and makes it easy to just dump the ingredients into the pot.

As if this amazing dish wasn’t enough, we had it with Bacon Gorgonzola Cornbread. Also made in the dutch oven. I’ll be posting that soon too. This can also be done on the stove if you would like to make it in your home dutch oven. Once we get through this heatwave, I think I will be trying it again.

Happy Camping!

 

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Campfire Cheesecake

Campfire Cheesecake

6 Jul 2011

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Yep. You heard right, Cheesecake by the campfire! This was a fantastic dessert served in our dutch oven. Although, this recipe came from our extreme camp cooking friends, I did find the recipe here for Dutch Oven Cheesecake. The crust was made by crushing the graham crackers and adding sugar and butter. It is added to the pot and placed on top of the first set of coals.

Then the filling was started. It was all whipped together until fluffy.

Once the crust had baked a bit, the filling was added.

The top of the dutch oven was added with coals on top and cooked for about an hour (or maybe a little more). It was set aside to cool for a bit, then the cherry topping was added.

Really? Look at that!!! Does camping really get better than this?

It was served warm, which I was curious if I would like or not. Oh my gosh…it was FANTASTIC!

Ahhhh, campfire cheesecake, I’m in love!

Happy Camping!

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Camp Pizza

30 Jun 2011

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Okay, I have to dive into our camping menu. I have been itching since I got home to start uploading these pictures and recipes for you! Gosh, did we have a great vacation. I hope these recipes will inspire you to get creative with your camp cooking.

The main cooking component that we used through our whole vacation was our dutch oven. At first, I was skeptical about using a dutch oven. To be honest, I just didn’t want to clean it. I was SO wrong. As it collects the oils from cooking, it becomes easier and easier to clean. Cleaning the dutch oven is the easiest clean-up after dinner!

Our dutch oven had its maiden voyage our second night. Our friends (the camping pros!) wanted to try pizza. They are very adventurous when it comes to camp cooking. We just sit back in awe and enjoy the results. The “head chef” decided to use both dutch ovens. First he oiled the inside of both. Then proceeded to spread out small pieces of dough. The good thing about dough is that he froze it before putting it into the cooler. When he needed it, he took it out a few hours early and it was thawed out for use.

He added our favorite toppings. While preparing the pizzas, he started the briquettes (this was a safe environment- remember briquettes are HOT and can start dry pine needles, wood or anything else flammable to burn, NEVER leave dutch ovens unattended, okay, mama bear is done with her disclaimers!)

With 17 briquettes on the bottom he added the dutch oven. He then added another 17 or so to the top. Then he stacked the second dutch oven to the top and added the final layer of briquettes on top of that.

It took about 15-20 mins for the pizza to cook. Once it was golden brown, they easily popped out of the dutch ovens.

Total campfire yumminess. Happy Camping!

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Now This is Camping

17 Aug 2010

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We took another camping trip this weekend with our favorite camp family. They were there for the weekend, but we only invaded their space for one night. What a night it was!

For my knotty friends, I took this pic for you. I was able to almost complete my fingerless mitt original pattern while I was there. I’ll be writing it up soon.

Dinner was the best part of this trip. We started early with all the preparation.  Fresh zucchini from my friend E’s garden and Summer squash from the neighbors garden. I also picked up some local corn on the cob. Totally easy to cook on the fire. Just soak in water for 20 mins with the husks on. Then place on the fire, rotating when needed for 20 mins. Corn has never tasted so good!

In honor of Summer, we decided to bring lobster to camp. Who needs burgers and hot dogs?

Oh, you know what these ingredients mean? CAMPFIRE CAKE!!!

The kids were really enjoying the dinner.

What’s not to enjoy, right?

There was low lighting, but you can see my silly husband in the back making the lobster wave (oh boy!)

Campfire cake time! This time around we used black forest cake and cherries.

Bake for 45 mins.

Ohhhh, the lusciousness…

Topped with cream cheese frosting! Can this seriously get any better?

Oh yes, it can. The next morning for breakfast, the Eagle Scout himself “threw” together another tantalizing dish of yumminess…

This is the makings of a French Toast Bake.

Bread, cinnamon, eggs, and I am not sure what else. He does it so fast, it’s hard to get the recipe! But it is cooked on the coals until golden. Served with maple syrup and fresh percolated coffee.

All followed by midday naps.

Summer is whizzing by, but we are hoping to squeeze out one more camping adventure. Are any of you camping? Where are you going next? Any suggestions for us?

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Campfire Cake

28 Jun 2010

3 Comments

We recently went on a camping adventure. I know the consensus  is that making all you guys relive our vacation isn’t always exciting. Don’t worry, I wont bore you with the hundreds of pictures I took of the G-man, but I had some fun stuff to show you. We camped with friends of ours who are just amazing. Both are chefs, he is an Eagle Scout and chef by profession and she teaches wine pairing at a prestigious culinary school. They have been camping for quiet a while now and have it down to a science. I will definitely write another post later this week on the menu we had, but I had many requests to see the cake baked on the campfire. Now, I didn’t get all the details on how they did it, I think this is a boy scout camping recipe. Either way, I assure you, it was the best cake I ever had.

First they make yellow cake mix in a cast iron campfire dutch oven. Then I think they swirled in some cherry filler.

Then they carefully set it level on the campfire. They had all the levels of “coal” to “btu” ratio down. They knew exactly how hot to make it to bake and not burn.

Then set some of the hot coals on the cover of the pot and let it cook.

When the top came off,  it smelled amazing.

It was served hot and prepared with a dollop of vanilla frosting.

I really, really wish we had “smell-a-vision” so that I could have bottled this up to share. This was the most amazing cake I have ever had. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any better- the next night, we had Banana Boats (a story for another time!)

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