Camp Meal Planning Made Simple

Your meals can make or break a camping trip and most problems start before you even leave the driveway. We walk through the no-drama way we plan and prep food so we can spend more time hiking, paddling, swimming, and hanging out with the kids, and less time digging through a soggy cooler. Tim shares his old-school grid method for mapping breakfasts, lunches, dinners, and snacks by day, plus how that single sheet of paper prevents overpacking, forgotten ingredients, and last-minute “what’s for dinner” stress.

We get practical about the difference between car camping and backcountry camping meals, including how long fresh food can realistically last and how to stretch it with smarter ingredients like smoked meats, smoked cheese, tortillas, and hardy produce. We also dig into cooler strategy: layering food by day, choosing a quality cooler, using a dedicated drinks cooler, and why block ice outlasts cubes. If you want a lightweight hack for backcountry trips, we explain how freezing water bags can keep food cold early on and then get dumped as they melt to reduce pack weight.

From foil-packet dinners and make-ahead chili to pancake mix shortcuts, trail snacks, and classic campfire desserts, we keep the focus on simple camping recipes that match your cooking gear and your weather. If you like practical camping tips, meal prep tricks, and real-world advice for family camping, subscribe, share this with a camping buddy, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

Transcript

Welcome And The Food Mission

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and good day. Welcome to the Super Good Camping Podcast. My name is Pamela.

SPEAKER_01 0:05

I'm still Tim.

SPEAKER_00 0:06

And we are from Supergoodcamping.com. We're here because we're in a mission to inspire other people to get outside and enjoy camping adventures such as we have as a family. Today we want to talk about meal planning and meal prep tricks and execution. And our master chef, Tim, will have more input on that than I do.

The Paper Grid Meal Plan

Fresh Food Timeline By Trip Type

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Line cook, not chef. That's that'd be Tyler. So I think kind of right out of the gate, um, I'm I'm an old school guy. I tend to do things on paper. Uh killing trees. I know, I know. I feel I do. It's it's such a mixed I feel terrible. Uh for those of you watching, this is a uh a piece of paper that I use. Uh we used to have a different one and I lost it. So this one we stole from for Around the World. Uh it's perfect. It's exactly what I want. It's a grid. It basically it gives you three meals uh and snacks uh across one. If you were doing an Excel sheet, across one, whatever, row, and then and then down you're doing it day by day, whether it's Monday to Sunday or whether it's day one through eight, day three, whatever, however that plays out. Um fill them in. Fill them in however you choose to fill them in. It's you can you can always get another piece of paper and kill another tree, uh, or or do it in pencil and and erase things. I suppose the the basics are certainly regardless of whether you're front country or backcountry, the first few days can be fresh food. Backcountry in particular, you yeah, I mean, eventually you're you're not traveling with a cooler. I I hope not, because that's not backcountry camping. Um, although you you can get a small insulated bag if you uh Andy from uh recreational bear works sells them for the barrels. Um we'll get to insulating things. You can plan for anywhere between backcountry, you can plan for minimum of a day and a half if you freeze everything beforehand. Easily get three days. Thomas and I have done three solid days of backcountry uh fresh meals. You could stagger that out a little bit longer, probably by doing uh, you know, like smoked meats, sausages, uh smoked uh cheeses, doing tortilla wraps, that kind of a deal, um, like making sort of sandwich things. So you can stretch it out even longer. Eventually you'll get into backcountry, eventually you you'll get into dehydrated or or um freeze-dried meals. Car camping can be fresh. Actually, you can do car camping because we've done that way more.

SPEAKER_00 2:48

So, yeah, car camping in terms of fresh. So by fresh we mean it can be frozen food, but it's just not it's not dehydrated or freeze-dried food. Um, so it might be frozen veggies and it might be frozen fish and it might be frozen chicken and breasts. But then over the over the course of the week, if you're there, you're timing things and expecting that it's going to thaw by the time you're going to use it on Wednesday or whatever. Uh so we've done, we've done all kinds of things. So Tim's pre-prepared ribs and we've had ribs just reheated over the barbecue. We've done cedar plank salmons, we've done trout same, we've done uh fish and wrapped in foil just thrown in the fire to cook it. Same with lobster tails, we've done thrown in the fire.

Cooler Layering And Two-Cooler Strategy

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Um, so you can potatoes are great in the fire because it takes a while to do potatoes, wrap it up in some foil, slice it, throw some butter in there or whatever, whatever chives, what have you, wrap it up in foil, throw it in the fire, and go back to doing all your other stuff for the next half hour, 40 minutes.

SPEAKER_00 3:53

Uh so yeah, we Tim has said you want to layer things in your cooler so that if your Monday food is your first, if Monday's your first day, that's at the top of the cooler. Your last day food is going to be at the bottom of the cooler because you're gonna work your way down through the layers. Um, and you want that stuff at the bottom to stay frozen for longer so that there's staying frozen until it's Thursday, Friday. It has to be a good cooler. Like you can't be a crappy cooler, it's not gonna keep stuff properly frozen. We've got ones that are not so hot for that, but we've got really good Coltman coolers that are good at keeping.

SPEAKER_01 4:26

Yeah, we have some we have some smaller, like three-day coolers. We've got some some badass Coleman's that hold enough to feed a small army and we'll keep them frozen four or five days.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

And we'll take up a good part of your back seat too.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

So you have to Yeah, to figure that in. That's so that that's budgeting as part of it for your planning as well.

SPEAKER_00 4:46

Um and then uh and then Tim has suggested too having a separate cooler that might have drinks in it because that might be one that's accessed more frequently, so that you want to have that way. If it's being open and closed, you don't want your food that's in in that one being thawed too soon.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Yeah, that that's that's the big win for any kind of a cooler. The less you open it, the less that the stuff inside melts, or the slower that it melts.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Block of ice is gonna stay solid longer than ice cubes.

Calories Protein And Cooking Gear

SPEAKER_01 5:16

Absolutely. So um uh if we're gonna get into that. So on that note, you can do there's there's a number of things here. You can do bags of water and freeze them yourself. Ziplocks, and then and then once they turn in back into water and you sort of use them to keep the ingredients in your your cooler uh frozen and then cold and then not anymore, you can just unlock the bag and dump the water out. So you're not carrying weight around. And it w works both sides, works well for car camping, works extremely well for backcountry. Uh the uh whatever those meal plans are, you know. Um what are the ones, what are the ones we used to use where you ordered it and they would give you a box of things? Okay, fine. So they send bags, they now send uh bags of water that are frozen. We throw I throw them in the freezer and we don't so we don't take we used to take gel packs and stuff like that, right? Uh we don't anymore. We take those because at the end of the day, especially backcountry, if you're gonna take a few meals in, like especially if you're trying to plan to get head towards that three-day, I'm telling you, three-day fresh food at three days is so awesome in the backcountry. Like, try for that. Yeah, uh, but we take them uh and you just slice them open and poof. Or if it's a ziploc, you open it, but if the plastic you just slice it open and you're not carrying all that weight anymore, which is a big thing for backcountry. If you're gonna do activities, so whether you're you're backcountry and you're paddling for how many ever hours a day, uh or or you're just sightseeing. Uh you can do it backcountry, front country. You're you know, you're hiking, you're biking, you're you know, doing whatever those things are. Yeah, swimming. So you're yeah, uh as a general, we're not uh we're a society that tends to sit on our butts a lot and work at computers, which is sad. Um when you're out there doing those things, you can yeah, you need more calories and you need more protein. I don't profess to know all the ins and outs. Actually, you might know way more of the ins and outs. No?

SPEAKER_00 7:30

Not specifically for camping and hiking and canoeing it.

SPEAKER_01 7:34

Okay. Uh you burn, you burn more calories for sure. So plan foods that have more calorie availability and more proteins. So you can burn all that stuff off because you're going to burn more, unless you unless you're looking at a weight loss program, and that that'll work as well.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

Uh so plan meals around cooking apparatus or apparati. Is it apparatus? I don't know. I thought about the apparatuses. Um, your campfire, whether you've got a coulman or like a stovetop to cook on, a barbecue, um, a wood stove and a hot tent, an isobutane stove. So what you cook might need certain apparatus. The certainly the way you cook on that apparatus differs depending on the specific apparatus.

Simple Meal Ideas For Every Day

SPEAKER_01 8:22

Absolutely. Uh I I mean, you're doing doing steaks and pork chops and ribs and and whatnot. If I can cook it over an open fire or or you know, front country with in a barbecue or what have you, yay. Uh we have done steaks in the backcountry over an isobutane stove. The pattern, the heat pattern on those things is itty bitty. So you're forever moving it around to not try to burn a spot and then have the rest of it be raw. Uh it doesn't, it just doesn't play out as well, and you're burning through fuel. Um the more weight, it it adds up. Uh front country, you can do all kinds of things. And I mean, pouring rain is a bit of an issue. Go check out Martin Pine's um YouTube channel because he had I'm sure he it was his he's got a video that where he rigs a I think he does, rigs a tarp over top of um the wood, the fire, so that he can cook when it's pouring rain. That's an awesome thing. Like anything over an open flame, man. Come on.

SPEAKER_00 9:32

Meal suggestions, there's I mean, there's lots of resources online. You can also ask ChatGPT what to make. Breakfast suggestions might be some breakfast burritos, pancakes. Um, and if there's different things you have to add, like unless it's all in one, if it's a complete pancake mix and you just need to add water grate. If you need to add some other separate ingredients like baking powder or something to your mix, then do that at home. Uh oatmeal with dried fruit, eggs in a bag, uh lunches, tuna salad wraps. So you've got your wraps already from your burritos from the morning, and then you can just reapply that for a tuna salad for lunch, pasta salad, peanut butter and jelly salad, or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, deli made sandwiches, peanut butter and jelly salad.

SPEAKER_01 10:14

Maybe it's it's salad. There's no bread doesn't count. Come on.

SPEAKER_00 10:21

Uh dinners could be any anything you can wrap and foil it. You can throw it in the fire pit. Um, sausages, veggies, fish. We've done fish that way. Tacos, uh chili made ahead, which is just needs reheating. Uh a lot of people would do just hot dogs and hamburgers.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

Like that's that's pretty easy. Go easy. Don't, don't, don't spend all day. I there are days where you do spend some time laboring over the over the fire or or over the you know, your Coleman uh cook stove. Don't do it all the time. Just get out there and and do some of that hiking and biking with the kids.

SPEAKER_00 10:54

Uh snacks, app hummus and veggies, trail mix, fruit, uh, cheese string. The uh trail mix is something that yeah, like stuff like that that the kids can grab and take with them. Uh, and then desserts if you want to be really special. Um, banana boats, uh, which is like bananas. You can put chocolate chips and marshmallows, and you melt it in the fire, and and that's pretty yummy. Uh Campfire Apple Crisp and s'mores. S'mores were like our evening snack often over the fire.

Food Safety Pre-Chill And Cooler Habits

SPEAKER_01 11:26

S'mores and uh spider weenies. Spider weenies. Spider weenies. Uh, if you want to know about spider weenies, send us an email. We'll get back to you on that. Tell you how that all works. Yeah, uh, I suppose that you know, like some some tips and tricks. If you so if you're front country camping, take a cooler. Uh uh, take two coolers, I highly recommend because there's one that's gonna be opened all the time and you're gonna you're going to run out of ice in like two days. Um but pre-chill. So I have I have a bunch of the old gel packs, the you know, the blue ones that that we used to use for freezer packs for your coolers. Uh plus I have a bunch of water ones. Use the blue ones to pre-chill, because you're gonna throw them back in the freezer after you've loaded a bunch of food into the cooler and you'll be gone for a week because they'll refreeze, it's all good. Uh pre-chill it so it's already it's there. Once you load your food and then put a bunch of water freezer packs on top, Bob's your uncle. Uh it'll it'll actually buy you probably the better part of a day of cold food in your cooler.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

So you have to be careful about keeping food that needs to be kept cold, cold. So you don't end up with salmonella or something because it's generally a bad thing.

SPEAKER_01 12:43

So so again, if you're car cooling or car camping, uh uh car cooling, think about as you're pulling your meals out, try to pull all your ingredients out in one shot. It's not it's not as easy it sounds. Prep them and stuff, and and then if stuff has to go back in or whatever, but check the next layer, see how it's feeling. The stuff on the bottom, if the next layer is feeling good, like feeling it's like, oh, it's just starting to thaw or something like that, the feet stuff on the bottom will be fabulous because cold uh heat rises, cold drops, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:17

So and if you're car camping and you're at a provincial park, they'll have ice. So you can if you're like, oh my goodness, that that freezer pack didn't stay frozen as long as I thought it was going to, and my ice is all melted and it's a big wet mess inside my cooler now.

SPEAKER_01 13:30

Yeah, and you're cool.

SPEAKER_00 13:31

You can always buy some more ice.

Foil Cooking Staples And Packing Hacks

SPEAKER_01 13:32

Your cooler will will likely have a drain in it. Uh, certainly the the newer ones. I I have some that are quite old, so I'm not gonna age myself. Uh, they don't have drains in them, but draining that water out actually is beneficial because that water is warming up your food that's on the bottom that it's sitting in. So it's also making for you know sloppy ground beef and stuff like that. So drain drain that out for sure. Yeah, and it and as far as like ice for coolers, if you can if you've got space and you can buy a block of ice, that'll last you twice as long as ice cubes, potentially more. Uh and I suppose a final note tinfoil is your friend. So if you have you get to it like it's a rusty uh campfire grate that you can cook on, put tinfoil over it. Uh you want to make, you want to do some not 14 pans going at the same time and blah blah, and you want to throw something, lobster tails. We we literally slice them open, pull out the meat, base them in in um butter and garlic, wrap them up in tinfoil, throw them in the fire for I don't know, five, eight minutes, something like that, and Bob's your uncle. Um make envelopes of doing doing potatoes, and again, put them on the campfire, or mushrooms, or asparagus, or whatever. It's all good and yummy.

SPEAKER_00 14:58

Some essential camping food staples you might want to take with you. So proteins, uh, eggs, and if you're backcountry, you can get the freeze-dried eggs.

SPEAKER_01 15:08

You can get freeze-dried eggs, or if again, the first few days you can you so here's a hack uh take an algene bottle, break the eggs, and dump the the uh yolk and and whites into an algae bottle, and then you've got you don't have to deal with the shells, and you've got a bunch of cooled business to do for the first two, maybe three mornings.

SPEAKER_00 15:32

Uh pre-marinated chicken, summer sausage, canned tuna or chicken or salmon, and hard-boiled eggs because they're hardy. Uh, carbs, tortillas, they won't smush like breadwill. Um, instant rice, just so you're not spending all your cooking fuel trying to cook regular rice, uh, pasta and pancake mix, and then some hardy produce like root vegetables, like potatoes, uh, carrots, onions, bell peppers, apples, and oranges. And then, yeah, so your snacky stuff, trail mix, jerky, string cheese, energy bars or granola bars, and fruit leather.

Keep It Simple And Where To Reach Us

SPEAKER_01 16:08

Yeah. Um other than that, keep it trying to don't overcomplicate things. I I do it all the time. It's it's nice for treaty stuff, like like doing ribs is you know, I I pre-cook them at home. I will throw them on the fire, warm them up, uh, and warm up sauce in a pan somewhere, something, uh, and bap, bap, bap, and and bob's your uncle. But that's once over the course of a car camp weekend. Where I'm actually we're gonna try to do it on a backcountry trip coming up, but same, same idea. That's once. Uh, there will be plenty of meals that you know are whatever sausages, hamburgers, hot dogs, and a side of you know, some dehydrated pastas that are already cooked, so that you just you literally have to boil some water, throw it in there, and there's there's your side, you're done. Uh also weightless dishes, which is nice when you're camping because nobody likes doing dishes, man. Yeah, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 17:10

That's it for us for today. Thank you so much for listening andor watching. And please do check us out on all the social media. We are on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram. Uh, we're on Blue Sky, but I don't think we're very active there. And if you want to uh please do email us at hi at supergoodcamping.com. That's H I at Supergoodcamping.com. And we'll talk to you again soon.

unknown 17:33

Bye.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

Bye.