Cooking on the Campfire

I do a few simple things. One is what I call banana boats. First slice a banana lengthwise then place mini marshmallows and chocolate alternating the length of the banana. Wrap in tinfoil and place next to the fire where the marshmallows and chocolate melt together. Unwrap and enjoy.

I also like what I call mountain pies. Get 2 slices of bread and spread butter on one side. This will be the outside of the pie. Place each slice of bread, butter side out in a pie iron, spoon a generous portion of your favorite pie filling onto center of one slice. Close the iron and cook over the fire turning often to prevent burning.

And of course the traditional smores. But to make it easier we use cookies witha layer of chocolate on one side, instead of graham crackers with a bit of chocolate broken onto it.

Moved from ATC

If you use cast iron utensils, this can be your main style or fuel for cooking.

:B

Here are some pics that really need no explanation :B ;















Ever made pizza on a campfire?

Here's how we've done it.

Thin cut steaks, sauteed veggies, vegetables steamed in foil, apples and cinnamon steamed in foil. My favorite veggie for this is fast becoming asparagus. Burgers, hotdogs, chicken tenders. Anything you can cook otherwise can be cooked over a campfire you just have to start the fire early, produce some coals and adapt a bit. For making hot water or cooking eggs and sausage or bacon you can't beat a hobo stove which uses less wood for those meals than you'd need just to get a campfire started.

We like a campfire too for bacon or side pork;

A traditional dutch oven (the cast iron kind with stubby little feet and a rather big rim around the outside of the lid) makes for a lot more campfire cooking flexibility. You basically put a few coals underneath, somewhat more on top (generally), and can bake most anything although obviously things that aren't especially sensitive to precise temperature and time constraints are easier. I've made a tasty pineapple upside down cake in a dutch oven, with the only difficulty being that it wasn't quite level so the pineapple part tended to slide off the cake when served upside-down. Potatoes and roasts and baked beans and so forth are super easy in a dutch oven, and biscuits or rolls or bread not too hard.

Campfire donuts/crullers are fun and pretty easy. Basically take a bit of biscuit dough, wrap it (in a thin spiral layer) around a stick or camp fork, and cook it rather like a hot dog. Moderate temperature for a relatively long time works better than high heat and quick cooking, which leaves the middle doughy often. Once cooked, roll in a bit of butter and then cinnamon sugar and eat. Canned biscuits, the kind that you thwock the side of the can to open, work pretty well for this if you don't feel like mixing something up.

Wrap some potatoes in foil and put them right on the coals of the fire, turn a couple of times, great baked potatoes!

I don't normally cook over the campfire but when I have Ribeye steak and burgers turned out great. Also I have cooked my baked potatoes in the coals as already mentioned.

And let's not forget what is maybe the first thing many learn to cook on a campfire (after hot dogs).

Lay out a piece of HD foil. Place some hamburger, a diced potato and sliced carrots/corn in the middle. Season with some butter, salt and pepper and then fold the foil and seal up as best you can. Then do the same with another piece of foil, only make the fold point on the bottom. Lay on the coals and use tongs to flip once in a while. The burger will cook fastest so try to keep the veges on the bottom most of the time, next to the coals.

We made these in Boy Scouts and thought we were really on to something. It tastes surprisingly yummy. Great if you have kids. They each get to make and cook their own.