Cooking Outdoors While Camping: Everything You Need to Know

Cooking outdoors while camping covers a lot of ground and encompasses a lot of different types and styles of cooking.

For instance one of my favorite ways to cook outdoors is cooking directly over an open fire either using a cast iron pan or aluminum foil pouches. However, depending on the type of camping you’re doing, campfire cooking might not always be practical or the best choice.

In this article, we will go over not only the different options for cooking outdoors but also everything you need to know from choosing the right heat source to cleaning up after the meal and everything in between.

Cooking Outdoors While Camping: Complete Guide

To start off we will be going over the basics of outdoor cooking as well as some dos and don’ts in order to provide a good foundation of knowledge about cooking outdoors.

Choosing the Right Type of Outdoor Cooking for Your Camping Trip

There are three main types of outdoor cooking to choose from depending on what type of camping you’re planning on doing including campfire cooking, camp stove cooking, and backpacking cooking.

So the first thing we need to do is pick the appropriate type of outdoor cooking depending on how you intend to camp.

Car Camping and Outdoor Cooking

The most popular type of camping and the one most people are familiar with is car camping. Car camping as the name implies is simply camping near where your car is parked. The most popular form of car camping is camping in a designated campsite in a campground.

While there are some variations to car camping typically space or weight is not your primary concern when car camping as comfort and luxury usually take center stage. To this end when it comes to car camping and outdoor cooking either campfire cooking or camp stove cooking are the most popular choices as they allow for the broadest type of cooking while outdoors.

Really if you are car camping you can choose from any of the three or a combination of them all.

When car camping it is really more about what type of cooking you prefer to do or enjoy the most.

Some people such as myself prefer to cook predominately over an open campfire while car camping while others choose to use a Coleman 2 Burner Camp Stove like this one on Amazon to do most of their cooking.

There really is no right or wrong answer as it is more about personal preference than anything. No matter which option you choose though know that you can make incredible camp meals with either.

One more thing to remember when car camping is that while you can pretty much bring the kitchen with you if you choose, it’s important to exercise some level of constraint when car camping to help keep things more simple and to maintain your sanity while camping.

Always remember that simple and less complication is usually better when it comes to camping.

Large Group Camping and Outdoor Cooking

When you are camping in large groups it’s important to choose the type of outdoor cooking that can prepare large meals while camping. So cooking over a single burner for cooking is out because you just won’t be able to prepare enough food at a time or fast enough to feed a large group of people while camping.

Instead, when cooking for a large group of campers you want to be able to utilize more than one cooking surface at a time so that you can prepare larger portions of food.

When it comes to cooking larger meals while outdoor cooking you really only have two main options which is campfire cooking over a camp grill or using a larger camping stove with a least two burners. More times than not though you will usually find yourself using a combination of the two to have more cooking surface options.

Backpacking and Outdoor Cooking

Backpacking is the type of camping that will put the most constraint on the type of outdoor cooking you can do. This is because when backpacking or hiking into a campsite you only have so much room in your pack for cooking gear, which means that size and weight become the most important factors when choosing outdoor cooking gear.

Because of this large camp stoves and cast iron cookware is going to be out of the questions because they are just too heavy and bulky when backpacking.

Instead, when backpacking most backpackers will use a small portable camp stove that either runs off a small portable propane or butane bottle to cook their meals while camping.

Also, when backpacking it is more important than ever to keep things simple. So most backpackers will usually cook much more simple meals compared to car campers such as one-pot meals or Mountain House Pouches where all you need to do is add hot water directly to the pouch for a warm meal while on the trails.

For even more great information and best practices for cooking outdoors while camping check out this helpful video, I found on YouTube.

https://youtu.be/g0h7Szg0bWk

Best Practices for Safely Storing Your Food Outdoors

One of the most important aspects of cooking outdoors while camping is making sure that you safely store all of the food you plan to cook and eat while camping.

Storing food safely while camping can be broken down into two main categories including keeping foods that will spoil cold and keeping your food undetectable and out of reach from wildlife.

Best Ways to Keep Food Cold While Camping

Make sure to use a quality cooler such as a Yeti like this one on Amazon or another quality brand as they will keep your food colder much longer than your basic cheap cooler.
Freezing your food before bringing it camping is a great way to keep your food colder longer and reduces the amount of ice you will need.
Don’t just freeze your food before going camping but also freeze most of your drinks as well as they will help to keep the cooler colder longer.
Always bring two coolers with you while camping to use one for drinks and one for food. This way the food you bring camping will stay colder longer as it won’t be constantly exposed to warm air as people are grabbing drinks throughout the day.
Block ice lasts longer than cubed ice. So if you have a choice always go with block ice.
Be mindful of where you place the cooler around your campsite. Keeping your cooler out of the sun and in the shade will help keep your cooler colder and also allow you to use much less ice.
If you want to keep your cooler and the contents in it dryer opt for ice packs instead of ice.
Make your own ice packs to save money by freezing a zip log bag full of dish soap. The bonus is when the dish soap melts you have soap you can use around the campsite.

How to Store Food to Avoid Attracting Wildlife

Whether you are camping in a campground or backpacking or camping in bear country or not it’s always important to store your food properly to avoid attracting wildlife.

Below are some helpful tips to make sure you don’t attract wildlife while camping.

Never store food in your tent or backpack.
Always make sure your food is stored in an airtight container such as a cooler or airtight storage bag.
When you have food out around your campsite always make sure to have it within arm’s length and never turn your back on the food.
Never store or leave food in the back of an open truck bed while camping.
Don’t forget about the garbage around the campsite as it can produce just as much odor if not more as the food itself. So always make sure to secure garbage and remove it from the campsite as often as possible.
When you are done eating wash any pots, pans, or dishes immediately.
Always store food out of sight and this includes storing food in your car.
If your campsite or campground has bear lockers always use them.
Don’t dispose of food waste in the wilderness around your campsite.
If you are backpacking or dispersed camping always store your food away from your campsite and hang your food in an airtight container out of reach from wildlife.

Choosing the Right Outdoor Cooking Gear

Choosing the right outdoor cooking gear will depend largely on what type of camping you are planning on doing. As mentioned above if you are car camping size and weight does not matter much if however, you are backpacking these two factors matter a great deal.

While there is really an endless amount of options when it comes to outdoor cooking gear in this article I am going to focus on just the main staples to get you started.

Then once you have a few camping trips under your belt you can decide what works best for you and potentially add to this list or remove from it.

Cooking Over The Campfire Cooking Gear

If you are planning on cooking over the campfire and car camping then I believe there are a few staples that every camper needs.

Portable grill or grate to place over the campfire. While many campsites might have one already there for cooking over the fire I would bring my own as the ones at the campsite are either too small to do any type of decent cooking or are so rusted and in such bad shape, they are almost unusable.
A basic set of cast iron cookware. While you can certainly use other types of cookware when cooking over a campfire why would you want to as cast iron, in my opinion, is the best cookware to use. Some basic cast iron cookware you should have to cover most of your cooking needs include a medium-sized pan or skillet like this one on Amazon and a large pot or dutch oven.
Plenty of Aluminum Foil. When cooking over an open fire aluminum foil is your best friend as there are so many different uses for it, including making aluminum foil pouches to cook with or to lay down over the grill to act as a barrier to keep your food from falling through the grates into the fire.
A set of sturdy metal cooking utensils. A few utensils I would keep close by while cooking over the fire include a set of metal tongs, a metal spatula, and a metal ladle.
Good pair of oven mitts or heat resistant gloves. Since you will be cooking over the fire its important to remember that everything will be extremely hot and this includes the handles and lids of cast iron so always make sure you have a good pair of oven mitts or heat resistant gloves before touching the cast iron to avoid burns.

Cooking with a Camp Stove Cooking Gear

While campfire cooking is great and produces some of the best-tasting food while camping it’s not for everyone as it requires more work and effort while cooking outdoors.

Because of this when car camping another great option for cooking outdoors is the trusty camp stove. If I am going to cook using a camp stove below is a list of some basic cookware I would bring to get me started.

A quality two-burner camp stove. When car camping size and weight are not an issue so I would definitely opt for a quality well made two-burner camp stove such as the Coleman Two-Burner Camp Stove that has been around forever.
A basic set of quality cookware. While I still prefer using cast iron over a camp stove if you want to keep the weight and cost down you could opt to use another type of metal including aluminum, stainless steel, or titanium cookware just know the cast iron cookware will be the most resilient and provide the most consistent and even heat while cooking.
A few basic metal cooking utensils. While you could get away with using some plastic cooking utensils while cooking over a camp stove I would stay opt to use metal as they will hold up better over time.

Cooking Gear for Backpacking

When backpacking camping cooking gear needs to be light and compact so I would keep the cooking gear simple and to a minimum. Below is what I bring in regards to cooking gear while backpacking.

A compact backpacking cooking stove. My favorite compact cooking stove is the MSR PocketRocket 2 on Amazon but any other type of small single burner camp stove would work.
A few small pots. While backpacking and cooking I keep things super simple so I usually just bring one or two small pots for heating up water or food that can also be used to eat out of as well.
Use a foldable spork as a cooking utensil. When backpacking I don’t bring separate cooking utensils such as s spatula or ladle and instead just use my foldable spork to stir the food while cooking.

How To Cook Outdoors Over a Campfire

To cook successfully over a campfire you need to follow a few basic principles.

Using and Creating the Right Campfire to Cook Over

For the best results when cooking over a campfire you must make sure that you have the correct type of campfire to cook over.

While you might think you want a raging fire with flames licking up into the sky while cooking. All this will do is give you a very inconsistent heat and a very difficult campfire to cook over.

Instead, you actually want an established fire with very few or small flames and you want to do most of your cooking over the hot coals as this will provide the most consistent heat to cook over.

The reason you want a nice steady heat to cook over is so you don’t scorch or burn the food or end up with food not fully or unevenly cooked.

In order to illustrate this point imagine your cooking at home.

When cooking at home on the stove or in the oven you don’t wildly throw the heat to the highest setting only to lower it to the lowest setting a few seconds later and then rocket it back to the highest setting a few minutes later, do you?

No, of course not but this is exactly what you’re doing when trying to cook over direct flames as opposed to hot coals.

So before you start to cook over your campfire you want to give the fire at least 20 to 30 minutes to establish itself.

Then you want to let the fire die down a little bit raking the coals out a little away from the logs and flames to provide a nice consistent heat to cook over.

Have an Even and Sturdy Surface to Cook On

When cooking over a campfire you want to have a solid cooking surface by either using a portable camp grill like this one on Amazon or laying a grill over a handful of sturdy rocks. Otherwise, your food could tip or fall into the fire meaning you might have to go hungry for the night.

Personally I prefer to bring along a nice sturdy portable camp grill because I know no matter what the campsite looks like that I will have a nice cooking surface to cook on.

Slow Cook is the Way to Go When Campfire Cooking

While it might be tempting to create a raging hot fire so the food cooks faster when campfire cooking especially when you are starving from a strenuous day of camping and hiking activities. It is always best to cook the food more slowly over a campfire to provide better tasting and more evenly cooked food.

So remember patience is a virtue when cooking over a campfire.

If you’re looking for some ideas on easy and fun things to cook over a campfire check out this YouTube video.

https://youtu.be/xBus4AS7lkE

Tips for Cleaning Up After Cooking Outdoors

While no one enjoys cleaning up after a meal outdoors there are a few tips you can follow to help make it less painful and help to get it done faster so you can get back to enjoying time around the campfire.

Always clean up right away and wash the dishes immediately after the meal to not only make the job a lot easier as the food won’t be as stuck on but to also help keep bugs and wildlife away from your campsite.
While you are eating place a pot of water over the campfire that way when you are finished eating you will have a hot pot of water ready to do the dishes with.
Don’t forget to use cooking oil when cooking outdoors to avoid stuck on messes in pots and pans.
Always use non-stick cookware when cooking outdoors to help make the clean up go a lot faster.

Tips for Cooking Outdoors While Camping

Always cover your food while cooking as this will not only help to keep bugs out of your food but it will also speed up your cooking times.
Do as much meal prep as you can before going camping. Including cutting up vegetables and meats so they are ready to just be dropped into the pan or pot.
Freeze as much of your food and drinks as you can as it will allow them to stay cooler longer and help to use less ice.
Remove food from its original bulky packaging as it will allow you to pack your food into a much smaller space.
Put everything you can into reusable squeeze bottles to avoid having to use silverware.
While not the most eco-friendly use paper plates and cups when you can to avoid spending your whole camping trip doing dishes.
Only bring what you need for cooking while camping and try not to overpack.
Plan your meals ahead of time before you go camping to make sure you have everything you need for your meals while camping.
Always make sure to keep your food covered while camping and put away after each use.