#57: RV Life, Food, and Meal Planning with Dan and Sam Mathews

Samantha and Dan Mathews are podcast hosts, content creators, and parents of two! They travel full-time in their RV while homeschooling and working from the road. We got to chat with these two about how they meal plan and shop for living on the road. We cover what makes meals easier for them, what challenges they face, and how they source a lot of their food. We hope you enjoy!

Connect with Dan and Sam online: https://linktr.ee/wearedanandsam

Find their Pastalaya recipe.

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Transcript

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[00:00:00] 

I'm Riley and I'm Roni. And this is the plan to eat podcast, where we have conversations about meal planning, food, and wellness. To help you answer the question what's for dinner.

Roni: Hello and thank you for listening to another episode of the Plan to Eat podcast.

Today we have a really fun interview with Sam and Dan Matthews. They're podcast host, content creators and parents of two. They also have traveled full-time and lived in their rv.

Riley: Today we get to talk to Dan and Sam a lot about, uh, the nomadic life and what it looks like to meal plan and meal prep, uh, what they have room for, how they store stuff. So if this is something you've ever been interested in, this podcast is going to. Hopefully be really helpful for you, as you figure out how to downsize your kitchen space and your cooking space.

Um, we talked about so much more, but we're excited to share it with you and we hope you love the episode.

Roni: Dan and Sam, thanks So much for joining us today on the podcast. We're excited to talk to you.

Dan & Sam: [00:01:00] Thanks for having us here. Yeah, we're pumped.

Riley: So why don't you. guys tell us a little bit about yourselves? 

Dan & Sam: Yeah. So I'm Sam, 

I'm Dan. And we have been RV living now full-time for just over five months, I think. Um, back in 2019 was when we started our quote unquote rV life. Um, 

we lived stationary for a few months. We loved it. Transition happened and we lived with some family friends in a guest house and then through, um, Just some more changes. We were brought back to RV Life. We wanted to travel. We were in between renting and buying land, and we figured why not just hit the road in the rv? Um, I also finished up a surrogacy journey, and so to kind of focus on the kids and family time, we thought traveling would be so fun. Um, so let's see, August 18th, I think. Of 2022, we hit the road full-time In How many states have we been to now? 20. No, it's probably pushing 30 now. Dan's driven all of the miles, but maybe two. Yep. [00:02:00] So it, um, he may have a different take on it, but it has been so fun just being on the road with the kids, making those memories. Um, some days are exhausting cuz it's like 14 hour. If we choose to travel that much in one day, it's like 14 hours. Um, but it's been a blast. We've, we've loved it. I, I really like the spontaneous aspect of it. Uh, I felt like I don't know, like a wandering gypsy or somebody that jumps on a train and travels from state, to state, not for real, knowing where they're gonna stop. And there were nights where we'd be driving, it's like 1:00 AM mm-hmm. And I'm like, Hey, look. A rest area. And we'd just pull up next to all the 18 wheelers and we're like, I felt pretty cool set up. Yeah. We're setting up like our starlink on top of it as we're chilling in this rest area. And. So that side of it we definitely enjoy, but we also want to establish a home base here in Springfield. 

Riley: yeah. I could imagine, uh, that some people listening are like, that sounds so. Okay, look, I'm a planner and like [00:03:00] the, like the, like I've got no plan thing. So I guess by listeners, I mean me, I'm like, what? Like there's no plan. You just go, there is something very romantic about the gypsy life, but it feels so scary 

Dan & Sam: Yeah, I'm a planner too. And so that was hard for me cuz we had, we had certain like, states or locations on our bucket list. Like I always wanted to see Haystack Rock on in Cannon Beach in Oregon. Um, Dan wanted to go to Glacier and Yellowstone, and then we love places like Florida and the bad land. So we're like, okay, how can we hit all these? What route can we go? So instead of planning everything ahead, it was kind of like the morning or the, night of when we'd hit the road where like 

Our goal is Oregon, we're in Utah. How are we gonna get there and what do we wanna see on the way? And so it was just planning in a different way. Um, and sometimes it wasn't in our favor cuz it would be like 10 at night and we're like, oh dang, where are we gonna sleep for the night? Um, but for the most part I was able to just calm my anxiety of lack of planning and just live in the moment [00:04:00] and, you know, stay wherever we ended up. I feel like we'll go back to that at some point we'll be

like, you know what, let's just take a month and go, yeah, travel wherever we just, oh, maybe without kids a minute, but doing that for five months definitely takes its toll. And we wanted to see so much that even with that amount of time, it's difficult. So there were times we'd go to like Yellowstone and we'd spend one day in Yellowstone, which if anybody's been there, you know, you could spend three weeks there And not see it all. And so we got little glimpses of things here and there, but, As a whole, I think we're gonna slow it down on that stuff.

If we, if we give anyone a piece of advice, it would spend at least a week in one area. Um, at one time, not a day, because yeah, we were in a different state every day sometimes, but it was fun. 

Roni: That's crazy. 

Oh, what was the thing that made you guys decide to uproot your life and just live in an rv? 

Dan & Sam: Um, like I said, it was a perfect transition from we were renting and our owners needed to sell their property. Um, and we were [00:05:00] also finishing finishing up a surrogacy journey and, um, we're like what a great way to just switch from in a surrogacy journey. I don't bring the baby home, and our kids are four and six years old and they've never remembered or like my. Oldest, my son, he doesn't remember bringing home a baby and you know, having a sibling. But we wanted something to kind of get their mind off of the thought of, oh, mom had a baby in her belly. 

The baby's not coming home with us. so instead to focus on traveling, like we get to go to the beach, we get to go to the mountains. Um, and then it just so happened with the way things worked out with us needing to find a new place to live that RV life just made sense. Um, with that transition, and I think it also went back to about a year and a half ago, we competed in

a TV show where we renovated, uh, a van, another team renovated an rv, another team Ren renovated a school bus all in five days and meeting all of those people that live the nomadic lifestyle. They're like traveling the country in their van and they're like, oh, I don't know. I'm [00:06:00] probably gonna go down to the desert for the next three months and hang out there and probably meet up at this music festival. And we remember talking about that one night during the competition, we, we got like five hours of sleep all week, 

but yeah, uh, we'd go and lay in bed and we're like, man, these people, they just go wherever they want. They're just so happy to, they're not tied down. And they love life and the adventures and the stories that they came away with are awesome. And so I think that's been in the back of our mind ever since we got to that point. Yeah. Uh, or ever since we competed. And so we just wanted to experience it and we, we loved, um, like I said, living stationary at the time in 2019. It worked perfect for us, but I always wanted to see, and maybe that's the stubborn part of me, of just like, I need to experience it. I always wanted to experience full-time RV life cuz you see people doing it, you know? And. Anything you see online, you're like, oh, this looks great. This looks so fun. Like they seem like they have the best life.

So we're like, why not experience it and try it out for ourselves? So it was one of those things that we always wanted to do, so we're like, this is the perfect time to [00:07:00] just make it happen. Finally, might as well, we could do it when we're 70, but might as well do it in our thirties. Yeah. Sometimes we feel like 30 year old snowbird that live in the north all summer and then go down to Florida. 

Riley: So I know something about you guys. Um, but it's like a distance. It's like this, like, I don't know if you lived in a school bus or you did, or you were gonna, what's that connects to this too, cuz this is not just 

Dan & Sam: So

Riley: Yeah, go ahead. 

Dan & Sam: we bought a

school bus and it wasn't, it was in 2017, Dan was at work and he called me up. He's like, can we buy a school bus? I'm like wait, what? I should have been working. I was on Craigslist though, and or Facebook marketplace or something. And the school bus popped up and it said that it ran. And I was like, I could turn this into a thousand cool things. like I don't know which direction I want to go, but I called her, I said, Hey, do we have enough money to buy this school bus? And she's like, uh, I mean, yeah, that's time. We did not, I think we took out like a small personal loan. It was 1800, so It was wasn't a ton, but we didn't have just random money sitting around my bus.

No. So we [00:08:00] started, we started gutting the whole thing. And then, uh, we had every intention of turning it into an rv, traveling around in this old school. Yeah. We was just like going camping with friends and family in it. Yeah. But then at that point, I got a job offer out in Colorado. Yeah. So instead of living on 230 acres and having plenty of room to renovate and my tools all over, we moved into a 900 square apartment with. Fairly park a small car. I mean, everybody was like

oh yeah. Near to mirror in that parking lot. And so we had to get rid of the school bus. Um, but that was always something we wanted to do. Yeah. And that's kind of, I guess where our tiny living started was the school bus. Um, and then obviously I had to get rid of him and move to Colorado. And then I, the next time I was looking on Facebook Marketplace, and again, watching everyone on Instagram live their RV life renovate, and I'm like we never finished renovating the bus. Like, why don't we renovate the rv? So you made it happen? 

Riley: So ultimately this is just kind of who you.

Guys are like, this is just, it's just built into you guys. I started [00:09:00] with a school bus.

Dan & Sam: Yeah. If you had asked me though, I don't think I would've ever said like, yeah, I'm down for that. I'm gonna live in a small space traveling the country. For me, I always wanted to, you know, have a big chunk of land where we could adventure on our own property. And then once I realized, That we could basically have access to millions of acres.

Mm-hmm. All over the country. you have public land that we could go and hike and bike and see waterfalls and uh, paddleboard or whatever you want to do. You can do it. Yeah. All you have to do is be more mobile. And so once we realized that, I mean, that was the big draw. I don't think our friends and family are too shocked at our life now. I feel like ever since we've gotten married, we have these random. Kind of spur of the moment decisions. Like who just buys a school bus? You know, who moves their two kids into a smaller rv? When we first lived in it, everyone's like, oh, I'm so sorry. Like you'll find a place like, surely someone has a room you can rent.

Oh, they felt bad. They were picking us hard. Like, no, like we [00:10:00] chose RV Life. RV life didn't choose us. We chose it. And now, and then whenever we decided to hit the road full-time, they're like, All right. Sounds good. See you. See you when you get back in town. So it's definitely a part of our life to be very spontaneous and no nomadic and adventurous and just like we think through things.

But also adventure is like, the number one decision. We just decision don't take as much time to think through things. That's the difference. We think through it, but it's like, five minutes. Yes, we're doing it right. You're good? I'm good. Sweet. Let's do it. If I called your mom today and said that we were buying a giraffe in a rhino and starting a zoo, she'd be like, oh, okay, cool.

Like that's not that far off from your guys. lifestyle. Hopefully not. 

Riley: awesome. 

Roni: Oh. Where's your favorite place in the US you guys have traveled to. 

Dan & Sam: I think we have two different places you go. No, you go first. Florida. I love the beach and this last time especially, we went, um, before RV Life we would go and stay in. We started out staying in a motel cuz it was cheaper. Then we like worked our way up to a nice [00:11:00] fancy hotel. I mean Margaritaville hotel right off of Annamaria Island. And then this last time we stayed at a RV resort that was, A block away, like right across the bridge from Annamaria Island and that's where we love to travel. And we hopped on our e-bikes every day and rode across the beach and it was so fun. There was one day when it just, down poured and we're cruising on our E-bikes.

Look, Dan's looking back at me. Soaking wet. Soaking wet. But we're like grinning ear to ear like this. this. is the best moment. I am this living dripping wet. My new leather shoes I just got are destroyed from the rain, but I'm like living my best life. So, and the kids love the sand, they love the beach. And so for me, I would for sure say the beach. I thought you were gonna say the badlands. Oh, that is, you really can't do that. You, oh my God. Waking up to the north room right there is gorgeous. Yeah. For me it would be the Redwoods. I've always wanted to see it and I thought it would be cool. Um, but if You had asked me before I had been to any of these places, I would've been like, glacier's gonna be my number one.

Like, it's gonna be the coolest place I've ever been. And then we got [00:12:00] to the Redwoods in Northern California and it blew my mind. I mean, we're parked in an rv, this giant vehicle that everywhere I drive I feel huge. Yeah. Compared to everyone else. And you get there and you just feel so small and there's a hundred foot or several hundred foot tall trees that are wider, uh, than the rv.

I mean it. It really felt like we entered Jurassic Park for a second. Yeah, I mean it was a different world. Not to mention the huge herd of elk that we encountered upon entering, uh, the National Park did not like me. very much. It came after me. I had to hide behind someone parkway. So 

Riley: Well, that sounds amazing. I haven't, I love Florida. I love the beach. I haven't been, sorry I haven't been to the redwoods, but I would really love to. It's on my list. 

Dan & Sam: The kids, it's definitely spend, spend like a week there because there's so much to see and you're right on the coast. Mm-hmm. And so not only could you be standing next to. a tree the size of a house, but you could be looking out and apparently certain times of year [00:13:00] orcas will visit the coast and I really, that's like, we're gonna have to go back on again list. I wanna see a killer whale just like cruising right along the coast. We saw in Alaska. No, we never sucked. What was the big whale we saw? That was a gray whale. Oh my bad. 

Riley: At this point in the conversation, I'm, I know people are wondering how does this relate to plan to eat? so we get a ton of people who contact us and, and by a ton, I mean, it feels like a ton, but it's not a lot. I know that the the, RV life, the small living life is not, um, The nomadic living life is not like a huge percentage of the population, but, um, we have a ton of people who contact us and ask us like, okay, I live in my boat for the summer, or they're a snowboard and they live in a small place for the winter. Or, um, we've got RVers, we've got just people who camp long term things like that off grid. And they wanna know, how do I plan for this? Um, and so we thought we'd, uh, pull in some [00:14:00] experts because we are not experts on the nomad life. Um, so let's get started with what's the food storage situation like in your rv? Um, and kind of how do you plan for that? 

Dan & Sam: Yeah. Um, the lack thereof, I'd like to say. Um, Dan and I have actually gotten to a few, um, conversations like, why are you buying 10 boxes of cereal and why are you like we don't have room, but then again, you do have somewhat of storage. And so, Um, I think we have a total of one, two, we have like two cabinets. One's for like dishes And stuff, one's for food. And then we have a skinny mini pantry, but it goes pretty deep, like the depth of our fridge. Um, and then obviously an RV fridge, which is half the size, if not less than a residential fridge. And so you do have to kind of get creative with your storage, but. In the way you shop in meal plan, you can make it work. And so whether you're buying [00:15:00] things in bulk because it's cheaper or you don't wanna run out, like that's, that's what happened with me. We were going up north for, um, Thanksgiving and it always snows up there and I'm like, I'm not gonna run to the store every week to get a new box of cereal. Like it's all, I have it right now. 

We can fit 10 boxes in here and the kids eat it every morning and I eat. My protein cereal every morning. And so why not just buy it now? So there's certain, there's certain things you can bulk, um, buy, but yeah, the storage is definitely something to work around. I feel like staying organized with it is the key.

Yeah. I mean, like you put, you put all your chips in one spot, your granola bar, your spices, and you just have to do it on a smaller scale. Yeah. But there's times like once we actually go through all of our groceries, we bring 'em home and we put them in their spot. I almost feel like I'm on cribs. You know, when you used to like walk in their house and they open their fridge and everything's perfectly Oh, yeah. Divided up. And so, I mean, the kids know, uh, what pantry drawer has all of their granola bars for the morning. [00:16:00] Yeah. Their snacks or their apple sauce pouches. Um, you know, we know right where all of our food is, and so it's not like you're having to look for anything everything's with, I mean, you could stand in one spot in the kitchen and grab every piece of food that we have because we have such a small space.

That's true. But if you stay organized, Even with a, a small amount of space, you can make it work. Yeah. and I'm sure we'll get into this? but um, with that, with the smaller space, you have to kind of be creative so you can't. When you're shopping on your own, and especially the days where I, you know, don't have my list with me or whatever, I will just pick up random things like, Ooh, this looks good, this looks good. You know, the kids are with you, they want Oreos, they want these cookies or whatever. You're buying all these random things. Well, in an rv you don't have the space for it. You have to buy like real strategically what's on your menu. Like, what are you planning for for the week? Otherwise, We just throw stuff in our shower, which becomes a storage space whenever we're parked, um, oddly enough.

And so, yeah, you don't have a ton of extra space to just buy random things. You have to stay a little focused and organized. [00:17:00] 

Roni: how often do you guys go to the grocery store? to like replenish everything that you have? 

Dan & Sam: Dan, how often do you go to the grocery store? Wow. Wow. That seemed like a very hidden question, didn't it? Um, no, but probably about once a week. Yeah, about once a week. There's certain things like the staple items, you know, um, non-perishable stuff. We can last several weeks, but because our fridge is so small, um, you know, storing those fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, um, different things we have to go every week. And so, yeah. And we don't we don't really find ourselves being out and being like, oh man, I really want to go and get a burger from this place. Mm-hmm. But it's weird because if you're in the city, like we've parked at RV parks in the city. Mm-hmm. And we had easy access to it, but we'd still eat the food that we had Yeah.

In the rv. But then like when we were in Utah for two weeks. Mm-hmm. For some reason being out in the middle of nowhere. I mean, we're running off of our generator power the entire time, and we're sitting there like, Man, the burger. [00:18:00] I could go for a giant burger with bacon and for some reason, yeah. Uh, when you're away from civilization, you want to go back and eat some of that stuff. Yeah. But it's nice. And maybe that's just part of the nomadic. like person in us that we like to be away, but there's certain aspects like, you know, when we're parked in Portland, Oregon and we're craving a burger, we're like, yeah, we're not about to go get out in all this traffic just to get a burger.

Like we'll just cook here. Um, but yeah, being out in the desert and then you're like, man, burger sounds good. Which tip? The local, like small restaurants in small towns are so good. They usually have? the best food we've found, so yeah. 

Roni: So what was the process like of figuring out how much you could buy and store in your RV as far as food goes? Like, did you like go to the grocery store the first time and like buy what you would normally buy when you were stationary and then you're like, oopsy. 

Dan & Sam: Yeah. you kind of, it's for sure trial and error. So the first few times, you know, I got a Sam's membership and there's certain things that Sam's I really like, but it comes in like [00:19:00] twos or fours or eights and you're like oh dang, where am I gonna put all this? like recently I got. and I still guilty of doing it. Um, like, Annie's mac and cheese was on sale at Costco. It's an eight pack, it's an eight box. And so I'm like, dang, where am I gonna put this? But we've designated, above our fridge, there's this cabinet that lifts, lifts up that goes really deep. That's all my, Like, bulk extra. So if in my pantry space I run out of a box of pasta or. You know, our protein drinks. Then I look up there and that's where everything's stashed cuz it doesn't have to be accessible in there. Sometimes you forget to look up there and then you buy twice as much. and then we realize we've got four months worth of Mac cheese. Yep. That would be peanut butter. And right now pasta and um, I don't know. I think oatmeal or something. So many, I think it was after one trip though, to the grocery store. You figured it out pretty quick because we were shoving like bags of chips and wheat thins for the kids underneath the couch. We're like, we don't have any room for this, so we're just putting it everywhere in our closet.

And then after that it was like, okay, when we go, we know that. You know, this box or this ingredient is gonna last us for [00:20:00] two weeks, so we don't need to buy it next time. We'll buy it the time after that. Mm-hmm. Taking inventory of what you already have, making sure it's not on your list again, is so important because we just don't have the space. and then when we do need a shower, we're like taking everything out of the shower, like putting it on our bed. 

Riley: Do you find, do you find that, uh, cooking this way makes you cook? Like, Do you get in a rut more often because you kind of like, this is the space we have, this is how, this is an easy meal we can make, or do you feel like you guys can eat whatever and do 

Dan & Sam: It's for sure, it's for sure a rut. And also it depends on what type of RV lifer you are. So when you are stationary, you're usually hooked up with full hookups. So you have water, you have, power, um, You know, you can wash dishes like normal, but when we are out in the desert, we're conserving water. And so, um, all we have is the fresh water in our tank and the generator running.

So when you're, you know, washing your hands, it's like, hurry, turn the water on. Okay, turn it off. Okay, turn it on. Turn off. And so you can't. You know, you can't dirty 10 dishes for one meal [00:21:00] It's more like, okay, let's eat some cereal with paper bowls and spoons. Let's do sandwiches for lunch on paper plates. Um, and so depending on what our, our life or like our week of travel looks like, we'll kind of adjust our menu accordingly. Um, I, and it's kind of been hard for me because I do love cooking and love making, um, like homemade meals from scratch, whether it's, um, Alfredo with garlic and butter and. Fresh Parmesan cheese, like I enjoy doing that, but if I'm in the middle of utah, I can't make, I can't do that. And so having to adjust our grocery, um, Grocery plan or like our meal plan for that week is really important. Um, so yeah, it just depends. And I feel like snacking while you're out, I mean, that became a pretty big deal because we did, like you said, we didn't want to prepare. Yeah. Big meals. We didn't want a ton of dishes.

And so then we would, we would plan our snacks almost like they were meals. Yeah. And so, you know, we do tortillas, pepperoni, and uh, string cheese. String cheese and roll it up and you make a quick snack [00:22:00] or Yeah. Peanut butter roll up. Yep. Peanut butter, rollups, jerky, uh, almonds, cashews, you know, a lot of little things like that.

So then when it did come time to eat, it wasn't like, oh my gosh, I need a whole plate of food. Yeah. You could just eat the sandwich and be totally fine. Yeah. And it would, it would change depending on where we were, um, or how far we had to travel But even on travel days, mm-hmm. I mean, there were days we'd put 16 hours on the road. I should say, I would put 16 hours off the road, put one the kids would sleep, would be on your computer. I'm like can I just sit and watch a movie while you drive? Um, but yeah, we'd plan our snacks accordingly. and so she'd be like, Hey, I've got these three things made. do you want one of them? She'd grab it quick while I'm driving. In, we wouldn't have to stop. Yeah. There were times which we actually found that we loved this, uh, where we were park stationary and even we didn't have full hookups, but we have a Blackstone girl and we would cook meals outside. So when we were at, um, Dan talked about gutted earlier. There was an event in Kansas City or season two they were filming and we had everyone over one morning.

And I, my [00:23:00] heart warmed up so much cuz we were able to host and in a small space you can't, I mean, We do have actually good seating in our rv. We can see like 1, 2, 3, 4, like comfortably six adults, actually eight adults with the two front seats. Um, but we don't host a lot and I love hosting. And so one morning we invited everyone over for breakfast.

We pulled out the Blackstone, Dan made bacon, potatoes, pancakes, and it was so fun. And it was actually minimal dishes cuz it was like, The bowl to mix the pancake mix and then the Blackstone and a few utensils. And then other than that was like paper plates and bowls and stuff. Um, and so yeah, that was fun to do that, but we just can't do it inside.

It has to be an outside activity. It, it really is a good tool though, to have a big, flat cooktop. Mm-hmm. Because you don't have to sit there and wash it after each one, you know? Yeah. Like if you get a little bacon grease on your pancakes, everyone's probably gonna thank you. They're not gonna be mad about it.

So. We would, you know, it, it's just a bigger pan. Yeah. Basically that you can cook everything on all at once. Mm-hmm. And like you said, you'd have two spatulas, maybe a pair of tongs. Yeah. And that's all [00:24:00] we had to clean up after, so.

Riley: That's funny that you bring that up cuz that was my next question was like, do you guys have a grill? Because it seems like in the situation you are in, that would be like a key element to like having some more variety in meals. Um, I imagine for the people who like live on a boat for the summer or whatever, like I. Obviously they don't have that, but they have a different situation, which is maybe like fishing all the time or

Dan & Sam: Yeah. Yeah, we've Um, recently bought, we just bought a George foreman cuz it's cold in missouri right now. And so, you know, pulling out the blackstone, I mean dan would do it. I would not cook the Blackstone outside, but we got a George Foreman just for like paninis. He eats a Turkey melt sandwich for lunch and it's easy just to throw it on the George Foreman, you know, wipe it down when it's done. Um, and we've. have a instant pot. I think I got that a couple months ago cuz at first starting out we just had, you know, pots and pans. But I was dirtying multiple pans for one meal. When you do an instant pot, you can kind of do it all in one in different stages. And so getting the Instant Pot was nice. [00:25:00] The george Foreman, um, I got a toaster oven. Because I didn't, whenever it was hot in the summer is, that's still in the trunk? It's still in the trunk? of my, it's been in the trunk. Cause I have nowhere to put it. We don't have a storage space in the camper, but I got it because in the summer I didn't wanna heat up like do the oven for like chicken nuggets or something for the kids. Cuz it heats up the entire rv when you have a little toaster oven, it's, you know, just small. But I found that we weren't hooked up to, we do like disperse camping, which is no hookups. And so we didn't have you know, power a lot of times, But I just kept in the trunk cuz there's no space for it. but I do want a air fryer that's still on my list.

But having those nice, um, appliances is really helpful. Less dishes. Yeah. And honestly, I mean, you can get away from the traditional cooking. Mm-hmm. If you do have power or a backup source, uh, you can run electric. Yeah. And so, uh, even if you are on a boat, Get one of the small like pancake irons, you know? Yeah. It's like, Two feet wide and a foot deep, and you could [00:26:00] still cook a big meal on that. I had the little griddles. You could lift it up a lot. I mean, you could do hibachi on that. We've used stuff like that while I'm out hunting and everybody will bring leftovers from, you know, the week before they'll make a big enough meal and we'll make spaghetti on that. You know, you pre-make it and then all you do is put it on there, flip it a couple times, heat it up, and you're ready to go. And when we're not hooked up to power, we have like a power bank that will charge and then you can just hook up into that instead of. the rV or the generator on, 

Roni: Yes. So Dan, you're a pretty avid hunt. Hunter, you even run your own hunting podcast, right? 

Uh, what do you do during hunting season when you potentially like get a large game animal or something, but you only have a little tiny fridge? 

Dan & Sam: that was all year. Basically, Dan, all year, we've been making trips. I mean, we, because we're in the center of the us like where we're. Our home base wanting to, yeah. We kind of call it home base. You know, her family's here, so we'll stop in and say hi to everybody. Mm-hmm. We've got a lot of friends here and so I've got a [00:27:00] big chest freezer at one of my friend's house.

Uh, and so we'll come through, I'll drop off a deer mm-hmm. Or an elk or whatever I have, and I'll just drop it off in the freezer and then we'll kind of replenish our frozen meat supply when we come back through. Yeah. And so, we'll, I mean, about half the freezer, I would say almost is taken up with, yeah.

With wild game meat. And then once we run low, we know we've gotta make a stop back here. Or very rarely do we stop and like buy beef at the store. Mm-hmm. Um, but if we were out, we would just have to do that. I guess we do have a portable freezer that goes down to like zero degrees and so that's nice. If we're ever transporting meat from one state to another, we can just put it in there cuz it does not fit in our small rv um, freezer. But we have that if we ever need. Yep. 

Riley: Let's see, uh, uh, what else? Like what's your like, favorite thing about RV life? Like what, um, and this doesn't have to be food related, like it could be, um, 

Dan & Sam: I mean, I [00:28:00] love food 

Riley: yeah, then tell me your favorite food related thing, 

Dan & Sam: and as a mom, it's like I feel like my whole life revolves around food because every. Every few minutes. The kids, I'm hungry. I want a snack. Oh, yeah. Um, but what's your, what's our favorite meal that we've cooked in the rv? I would probably say the day we had everyone over for pancakes, bacon and breakfast potatoes. I could eat breakfast, food, breakfast, lunch and dinner. Yeah, it's, it's the best meal of the dinner. I don't know if it was part of it hosting and just having everyone there, or if it was the food itself. Probably a combination of both. We are. We've liked recently doing, um, elk steaks. So Dan got an elk in Colorado. Um, And at night we'll have elk steaks and broccoli and super easy to make salt, pepper, and then steak seasoning. And we use the George Foreman, boil some broccoli either on the stove or put the bag in the microwave, and that's a really good meal. Yeah, I think my favorite meal to make, uh, when, when I'm hosting [00:29:00] people is. Philly cheese steaks. Oh yeah. I love making Philly cheese steaks on the Blackstone and there's something about it, like I don't, it doesn't rarely cook, cook. If I'm outside I will cook every meal. Maybe I just need to plan more. Grill Blackstone Grill meals, and then that's probably why you like being in Florida. Cuz it's warm enough for me to cook outside all the time. For real. We just need to go back to florida. We'd all be happier. 

Riley: I mean, I, there is something really special about, like I love to go camping and just camping, food tastes better, uh, like cooking it outside, being together, like all of that. I think it, I think it's, I. like 50% situational and 50% the food like, and who you're with. So maybe not 50 50. Um, but I think all plays into it. Food tastes better when you're with people that you love.

Dan & Sam: I feel like I can get more creative too in these season of, and maybe this is my, um, seasonal depression coming out, but in when it's cold and you have like, I have no motivation to cook and. you [00:30:00] know, washed clean dishes into the freezing water. Like I would much rather be in Florida making some like fresh pineapple salsa or like um, teriyaki chicken on the grill, you know,

sandwiches or something like that for me is, sounds so fun. See, this is where we're a divided home or a divided rv, I guess, because. I love when it's cold. Mm-hmm. And we do like when you do zpa, Toscan. Oh yeah. Oh my gosh. Soup. It's like cold and it's just a hot soup. I need to add that to the menu. And then, uh, the other thing is chili and grilled cheese. Oh my gosh.

Or chili and peanut butter sandwiches. Oh, on a cold day. I know it sounds weird. I It's so good though. I would've called everyone's bluff on that and then I tried it and it's great. Um, but I love. Being in the cold and then yeah, coming home to. We don't drink coffee. No. So like hot chocolate, I mean I did.

Or like a really hot soup is awesome. What we've found too, Dan's talking about all these soups and now I feel like I have to put 'em on the [00:31:00] menu. But what we've found too, because we have a lack of space and storage for all these ingredients, I kind of have to have like multiple uses for things. So if we do, you know, elk steaks and we thaw a bunch of elk steaks out, okay, we're gonna have elk steak for dinner, but maybe in the morning we can do like steak and eggs or for lunch we could do, um, like. Steak burritos, you know, throw some peppers on the grill, Um, because you're using the same ingredient for multiple things instead of a recipe. And that's why I'm like, I have to plan So carefully because if I do this, if I plan a week worth of meals and every meal has a different type of meat and every meal has a different ingredient, well I don't have space for all of that. And so when I when I'm able to plan and be like, okay, we're doing. I'm gonna go to like ground, you know, venison or elk because that's what we use most of the time. you know, if I have elk steak, then I can plan it for multiple meals instead of having to have, you know, ground sausage and ground Turkey and chicken breast and [00:32:00] ground, you know, beef. And so, but it's good cuz you're like, The MacGyver of the culinary world. Oh, I feel like, I feel like if I was on Chopped, I would totally win. And maybe it comes from my mom was a single mom and so growing up, she's an amazing cook, but she would create an amazing meal with like four ingredients. And so whenever I watch CHOP and they're like, here's some PI pineapple slices, also some Dr. Pepper and a whole jar of garlic cloves. I'm like, what are you gonna make with that? But then I just get in this like, it makes me excited. Like it's a challenge of, hmm, what can I make? Or if I'm. We have brown rice and peppers. I'm like, what am I gonna make with brown rice and peppers? So then I just go to Pinterest and I like look up a recipe.

I'm like, Ooh, this one looks good. And you end up trying something you've never tried before and either really liking it or you just kind of put a spin on it and make it your own and then you end up liking it. And so, yeah, you have to kind of be creative, um, but also plan well to use the same ingredient for multiple things where you don't get bored of it.

Cause I mean, we do meal prep a lot and we have. [00:33:00] We'll eat, you know, Elks Steak and Broccoli multiple times a night just cuz it's easy. You don't have to think about it. Um, you know, we know how to make it, we know how to clean and, um, but whenever I have to put thought into it, it makes it a little bit less enjoyable.

I get kind of frustrated because I'll go and I'll look in the pantry and I'm like, we have nothing. We have no food at all. And then 15 minutes later she's got like a five course meal and I'm like, Where did all the, did you go to this store? And she's like, no, we had it all. And I'm like, how did you turn that into this?

Yep. She made like gourmet ramen noodles one time. Oh, that's really, she really good. Like this is really good. And I was like, it's ramen noodles, babe. Quit trying to like church it up. It's ramen noodles. 

And she's like, just try it. Just try it. And I tried it and I was like, can you make that again? It's delicious. Yeah. It doesn't take a lot of ingredients. 

Riley: Meal prep's gotta be the best way. Well, one really good tip for people who are in this situation, um, Because like what you just said, like taking the elk steaks and then trying to get into breakfast in another dinner and a different kind of lunch. Like it's like cook [00:34:00] once, eat all week, kind of li life. Which is super helpful because then you're not dirtying as much, you're not using as much water, you're not in all of the situations. Uh, it really eases the burden of cooking in a small space and small storage and things like that. Yeah, 

Dan & Sam: you cook it all. It's like you have to bulk shop, or not bulk shop, but um, plan out your shopping, but then you kind of bulk cook. So if I know I'm gonna have multiple days of pasta, then I cook a big pot of it, then I have it, we'll usually do Ziploc bags because then it's less to wash when we are stationary. Um, Or when we don't have full hookups. and so I'll have, you know, the noodles already prepped. That way I don't have to go back and do it again. Or we'll cook up a bunch of ground meat all at once and then just portion it out for different meals. Um, so yeah, we gotta get real creative with that.

Well, and we, we've got some books in the rv, but I feel like the majority of the books that. aren't kids books are, are like recipe books.

Yeah. Whether it's wild game stuff or like the Magnolia Yeah. Table. Mm-hmm. Something. Is that what it [00:35:00] is? Ooh, I see it every morning at the stove as if I'm cooking, just cause I walk past it. Um, but yeah, having, having those recipe books, because then you can read through and you're like oh, hey, you know what? We've got most of those ingredients we can supplement with. The other stuff that. we do have, or if we ever get in a rut of cooking the same thing over and over and you get a little bored, we just look up a recipe. Yeah. There's a couple that we picked up on the road, like Pastalaya. Oh, that was good. Not in Texas.

It's, yeah, it, it's fun when you go and meet other people also. Mm-hmm. Because then they're like oh, hey, come over. We're gonna make this special meal for you. And then you find new recipes that way too. And yeah, most of them, I feel like a lot of meals are the same ingredients, just mm-hmm. different ways cooked and prepared a different way, and so, oh yeah.

There's a million things that. you can make with the stuff we have in the camper right now. 

Riley: We need to do a, We need to do a second episode where you guys talked to us about cooking wild game and like tips and tricks and, because I know a lot of people's aversion to wild game is like [00:36:00] flavor and it's like, but if you know how to cook it, it's not. 

Dan & Sam: For sure. 

Riley: really not as much of an issue. I mean, sometimes an animal doesn't taste as good as another, but um, cooking it does really help a lot. 

Dan & Sam: I definitely married into hunting. It was not something I grew up doing or grew up really knowing about. Um, And at first I was definitely weirded out, like, I'm about to eat a duck. I'm about to eat deer. And Dan's like, don't even. She looked in the freezer one time and there were rabbit squirrel, pheasant deer, and duck.

she's like, we got a. dozen animals. What is going on? We have a. Farm inside of our freezer, or I'd take something out. I'm like, Dan, I don't know what meat this is. Then you would tell me, what, oh my god, that's a squirrel. Like, or he'll be like, that's a goose. breast or something, I don't know. And yeah, figuring out how I was gonna cook, it was so hard. It was like daunting to me at first. But he has a few, um, wild game recipe books and I always told myself, or at the beginning, I told myself, I'm gonna make this meat like four different [00:37:00] ways cuz I could make it one way Riley like you said. And you taste it and you're like, this is awful. It tastes so bad because of the ingredients you use. it. took out that gamey taste. But if I cooked it this way, it actually. um, Masked. it a masked it a little bit. I can't even say that word. Masked. Masked. I like masked it. Ma hides it a little bit. and so, um, I think duck was the first thing that I tried and I made like duck nuggets. I made like barbecue pulled duck and then I did like a garlic seared panier duck before. And, you know, I found which way I liked the best. and so being creative and trying different, different things was really fun.

But Um, so that I didn't just take taste one, bite it, and I was like, I'm done. You know? Yeah. And you can either experiment with that stuff or you can get a good recipe book because Yeah, most, most wild game people have an aversion to it because it hasn't been cooked, right?

Mm-hmm. you know, like if you if you cook a venison [00:38:00] steak well done, and you dip it in teriyaki sauce, it will be the, it's most disgusting thing you've ever had, but you do medium rare. you do medium rare, or you, or you put it in the ina pot and. You shred it and put it in breakfast quesadillas. Yeah, like there's so many different things.

Things that you can do. And even for duck, like for a long time as we were figuring out exactly how to cook it, it was like, Hey, I hunted this so I'm gonna eat it. Mm-hmm. One way or another. But you want to be able to enjoy it. And so that Pastalaya down in Texas so good it, they cooked it with one of the toughest, most gamey ducks out there. And you couldn't taste it at all. Yeah. And the flavor of everything else masked it. The way that they cooked the meat. Mm-hmm. Masked it. So, sorry, we got off on a little tangent there. Yeah. You can tell 

we're we're foodies. For sure. We're foodies and that's just a part of our life. Like hunting is a part of our life and a food source for us, and so it just comes naturally to talk. Yeah. If you ask how often we go grocery shopping, it's like once a week. How often I go [00:39:00] grocery shopping? There you go. It's probably like four times every day a day. 

Roni: Well, you guys probably have really good venison in Missouri because like We we like to go deer hunting in Kansas because they eat a lot more corn and stuff, or like we get. Antelope from Kansas too, cuz they eat a lot more corn and stuff there. Whereas here in colorado they eat like sage brush and it like really, um, changes the flavor of the meat.

Just like if you're eating beef and it's like a grain fed beef versus a grass-fed beef, like you taste the fla, like the flavor is totally different between those animals. 

Dan & Sam: were talking about that the other day, or even we were talking about Wagyu B the cow is massaged and it's 

Roni: Oh yeah. 

Dan & Sam: and juicy. And then you have like you know, the corn, corn, fed Farm raised cow. Well, people, I feel like a lot of people don't realize with game animals. in most meat in general, the more you age it, the better it's gonna taste. People think like, oh, it's gotta be fresh, never frozen. And that's when it tastes the best, actually. That's when it tastes the most gamey typically. [00:40:00] And so, uh, growing up, you know, there were times where we would hang a deer for a week before we did anything with it. Uh, in fact, right outside the store, store, it's so weird.

I've got two dozen ducks that are just hanging from me and my buddy. We shot them and it's been about two and a half weeks that we've left them hang. And some people are like, that's so disgusting. But when you tried to figure that stuff out, uh, you realize how good the meat can actually taste. 

Roni: Mm. 

Dan & Sam: even talking with other hunters, they won't pull any fresh meat outta their freezer.

They'll pull stuff out that's been in there for two years and then they eat it. and they're like, dude, yeah, you gotta let it age. You gotta let it age. Whether it's dry aging, putting it in the freezer, there's 10 different ways to do it. But, um, just in preparing it, and then letting it sit before you actually bring it into the kitchen, that can change the flavor a lot.

Mm-hmm.

Roni: That's great tip. Honestly.

Riley: Yeah. 

Dan & Sam: I mean, I can't, I can't, I can't hang a whole elk in the rv [00:41:00] unfortunately. Otherwise I would. But uh, yeah, that's where leaving it in the freezer works just fine. Oh yeah, 

Roni: Probably like tip the rV over a little bit. 

Dan & Sam: right. I could just put like a hanger on the back and it's just like dangling behind me. 

Riley: That's what I was envisioning too. I think I have one last question for you guys before we maybe wrap up here. But, um, do you have any rV cooking fails? Like, so the reason I ask this is because, well, I. The thing I'm picturing is like Kevin and the chili on the office where he like dumps the whole 

Dan & Sam: episode. Oh, such a good episode. 

Riley: Okay, But in the, in an rv, like if you spill something, like your comforter's got chili on it, you know, like, so do you 

Dan & Sam: Okay, I've got two and then you can add in. Okay. Can I just do one? Yeah. It's not a cooking fail, but it's a food fail yep. We were driving. Yep. And it, was actually in the redwoods and there were all these elk on the side of the road and there was this dirt lot, and I'm like, I'm pulling into this dirt lot.

I don't even know if I'm gonna be able to get out of it. But these elk are like, all of a sudden [00:42:00] we saw them and we're like dude. So I turn and I mean these things are huge. you know, it's like a really, really heavy school bus. Mm-hmm. And so it's like rocking and you can feel you. Feel like the whole thing's gonna twist and break in half.

Yeah. And all of a sudden Sam's like, no, no. Uh, a whole jar of spaghetti sauce and a whole bottle of syrup, like the two most messy things you can imagine, flew out of the cabinet, Both were like, we're out, and they just jumped out of the cabinet, exploded on the ground. And so we've got like, Pasta sauce. Yeah, you, I'm, I'm still finding like spaghetti dots of sauce everywhere. Like on a white shower curtain. It's on there. Like the baseboards. It was all over the floor. Oh, it, it exploded Bad. Yeah. That was, that was part of one of the worst. And then for me, this thanksgiving. You know, with our family, everyone, you know, is signing up for what they're bringing. And I was like, oh, maybe I'll just use my oven for the first time in bake a pumpkin pie. Like, why not? And I, what you don't [00:43:00] realize is the oven, the rv, oven doesn't cook things, um, like properly to temperature because of it being a small oven. and then the propane, like, it, just, you know, and I 

Roni: Yeah, they're really, they're really, short ovens, right? So it's like right next to the heating element. 

Dan & Sam: Yes. Well, what I didn't realize was, okay, there's the, you know, heating element on bottom with this metal. Like she over it. Well that's not where you put the, the, pie. You're supposed to put it on the rack itself. In a normal oven, there was like two racks. So I was thinking, okay, this is like the bottom rack. No, this is like right above the propane, the flames. And so I put it in there and I'm like, dang, like you know, it's all cooking maybe like 20 minutes. I'm like, what? Something smells burnt. I'm like, well it's the first time using the oven. Maybe like some plastic got down there and you know, it's just burning all that off. Cause it's the first time outside. And then after another 10 minutes I'm like, yeah, this doesn't smell right. Also, I'm like, oh, we gotta get going. So I like pull the pie out and immediately when I open like the oven, I'm just like, Yeah, my [00:44:00] pie is completely burnt. Also, it is nowhere near done. Like it's still liquid. It was burnt and soup at the same time. However you can have it. So I. Smoke is in the rv and we set the pie on the picnic table. At this point, we're late for our Thanksgiving dinner. I'm like, we'll just stop by. Stop by Walmart. Get a pre-made pie, which I looked for. You know, the ones in the bakery that are all done and boxed up and ready for you.

Um, I looked for it whenever I was grocery shopping, but I couldn't find it, so I grabbed the oven one, you know, I should not have. So fail for sure. It was, it was funny though. Yeah, 

Riley: Smoked pumpkin pie. 

Dan & Sam: Yes, smokey. It's a bummer too cuz I'm a pie. Like as much as I like food, dessert is where it's at for me. Yeah. Which I can't buy many desserts cuz we don't have a storage space for it. So Dan just loses out. It's unfortunate. 

Roni: Well do you guys, before we. You finished, you guys. I wanna hear just a little bit about how this transition happened with your kids. Um, so like, your kids are kind of like early school age, so did you start homeschooling them? What was that process like? [00:45:00] 

Dan & Sam: Yeah, because we were hitting the road, you know, and we obviously were traveling and not living stationary, homeschool made the most sense. Um, and then just with stuff in the world going on right now, and, um, we're like, why not? I was never against homeschooling. Dan and I both were public schooled and we. loved it. Um, but with us traveling, it's like, why not? And their kindergarten Ember's technically still preschool. And so at that age, you know, it's more creative. Um, you know, they're experiencing things on a daily basis. When we're going to these national parks, we're teaching them things you know, about nature and the animals and habitat. Um, And then they're doing their little junior, junior ranger. Badge booklets. And so they're learning constantly. And so it, it seemed like something that was very doable for us and very manageable. Um, homeschooling was about, you know, an hour a day, and so they learned a lot just from us traveling and experiencing.

And then we just supplemented with the curriculum of, you know, some, um, math and then literature or, um, Am I reading, reading, reading, writing? Um, there's another word for [00:46:00] it. The science. The science one. We, the science we, we connected to, like, we learned about the desert when we were in utah and the, um, redwood, evergreen trees when we were in the redwoods. And so, we kind of tied it in and they loved it, and it was very adventurous. Um, but then with the nomadic life, it was hard. And with, you know, us, with us traveling, we work from home and then schooling the children, it was hard with our schedule. And so we've sinced, um, we're settling down in one place. For a little bit. We're still traveling every couple weeks, but we're like, if we're in one place, we might as well get them just enrolled back into school And they were so excited. so this week, actually they are two days. They were probably like back days, mom and dad, you guys are terrible at teaching us you are. you suck. We need to go back. Um, but they loved it and we loved, it's their old school they were at. um, they love the teachers and um, I think it's best for them and for us just with managing. Um, life and work in this season. You know, when [00:47:00] we're driving down the road in the rv, Dan is completely, you know, focused on driving. And if it's a 12 hour day, um, there were days where I was getting cars sick, and if I'm up front, I can't be turning around every five seconds or like sit back there with him and be like, let's do our school for the day and here's your math sheet. Also, the way the rV was structured, we can't really hear them, so I would give them like different math sheets and then they'd be asking me a question. I'm like, I. I just can't hear you. And so it proved to just be too difficult for us. Um, and, but they're, our kids are, so, we always say resilient and flexible. Like no matter, you know, living in the RV multiple times or living in a friend's guest house and then traveling and then living stationary, they just are like, all right, what's next?

Where are we going? What are we doing? Um, I think they've adopted to our lifestyle, um, really well and. They, they enjoy it cuz you know, we're like, we're going on a road trip, and they're like, yeah, where are we going? We're like, we're gonna the beach. Yeah. They get so excited. So, um, it's been fun for them.

And on [00:48:00] the education side of it, uh, there's a lot of really good apps out there too. Yeah. So we, we get, I know they make tablets, uh, just for learning, but we got them iPads. Mm-hmm. And so, Like getting the Homer app. They really like that one. They can stream and watch shows, but then that we, they can also do like educational stuff for it.

Yeah. So like Netflix has a show called Number Blocks and I'm like, I'm a nervous wreck thinking that I'm responsible for educating my children. I was like, I did not care for school at all. Yeah. And then one day Canyon, before we even started homeschooling, he's like, dad, could you do some numbers to me?

And I was like, uh, okay, what's three plus five? And he is like, come on dad, that's too easy. And I'm like, Oh, I didn't know that was too easy for you. I'm like, what's 15 plus 10? He's like, dad, that's too easy. And I'm like, dude, you don't, you've, yeah. I don't even know if you've ever taken a math class. Yeah.

But he watch his, he's a preschool number block show all the time, and, and so we end up, I was like, all right, dude, you're gonna push this and you're gonna be like, I have no idea. So I was like, what's [00:49:00] 293 plus 715? And he just stops. He doesn't say like, that's too hard. He just sits there and in the air, he's just pointing.

And then he comes back with a number and I'm like, you're kidding me. There's no way. And I do it on my phone. Yeah. And then from then on, I mean, we're going into the four digit numbers, just adding up whatever we can, and I'm like, Yeah. Thankfully he's got this down because if was up to me, he would not wanna give it thanks to other Yeah.

The apps. But yeah, there's a lot of things that you can supplement. Um, and I feel like we could have done a little bit more research, but we were so excited for adventure and letting them experience life in a different way. Mm-hmm. That the education side of it we're like, they're gonna pick things up here and there.

Yeah. Um, but it wasn't like our number one priority. Yeah. And they're both pre elementary school. Yeah. 

Roni: Mm-hmm. 

Riley: Yeah, well, I mean they probably, like, this has nothing to do with education, but just like the life that you've taught them to have. Like they don't know anything different. So living in the small space and the, and the [00:50:00] traveling, like that's just normal for them. So, I mean, I'm sure the kids are certainly resilient, but 

Dan & Sam: Yeah, they've been to more states than Dan Didn't leave his state, his home state till what you said college or, no, I think I was probably about 16 before I actually left the state of Wisconsin. Yeah. so they've experienced so much. 

Riley: Yeah. That's awesome.

Roni: All right, well, why don't you tell our audience where everybody can find you, find you online, find your podcasts, all that stuff.

Dan & Sam: Yeah, so we have a combined platform We are dan and sam, we're on, um, Every platform basically. We do have a podcast ourself. We just talk about life and, um, traveling, adventure, marriage, kids. Um, and yeah. Yeah, that's all we are. Dan and Sam. Yeah. Luckily nobody took the handle on any of it. Uh, and then my podcast is the nomadic outdoorsman.

I cover everything from frog digging to moose hunting in any and every location we can find. So, No matter what type [00:51:00] of content you're looking for, we probably, we probably have it. I mean, we don't have like sports talk show or anything. That's true. But other than that, hunting outdoors, travel kids and everything. 

Riley: That's great. so we normally ask people about a recipe that they've been enjoying lately, but you guys have mentioned a Pastalaya or something like that a couple of times. Can you tell us what that is and maybe we can share the recipe with our audience?

Dan & Sam: Okay, so I, I actually just got the official recipe Oh, you did? From my buddy last night. Oh. And he did say if you don't do it in an Insta, if you don't use an Instapot, it's gonna take five to six hours to, to make. Um, just because of how you have to, so use an instant pot, so I can send that over to you, but it's basically jambalaya and you can put whatever meat you want in It Mm-hmm. Uh, the Texans, they definitely make it hot. It was like nine and so just be ready for that nine. I'm, I'm used to milk and cheese and so like any type of heat really messes me up. Uh, but I hate that whole bowl. Yeah. And I'll, I'll make it exactly how he, he made it for us. Um, but yeah, it's jambalaya with like penne noodles [00:52:00] and whatever meat you decided to put in.

Yeah. It had like slap your mama's. Um, seasoning and then Tony's seasoning. Um, there was celery in it, peppers, onions, sausage. He did, he didn't like mushrooms and so he actually substituted mushrooms with a can of rotel. Oh. So that was probably another slice. He like, yeah, he just gave me a bunch of different stuff and it all came out of the meat eater cookbook, 

Roni: Oh, 

Dan & Sam: um, and then he just made a twist on it. Sweet. We do have that cookbook, so now I'm about to look it up. Yep.

Riley: Awesome. Well, thank you guys so much for joining us today. 

Dan & Sam: Yeah. Thanks for having us. That was fun. Yeah, it was awesome. 

Roni: We hope you enjoyed this episode. And if you did, please share it with someone and subscribe to our podcast. Wherever you listen to your podcasts.