Camping- how do you cook when it's raining?

[AintNobodyHereButUsChickens]

We're setting off for our holiday on Friday night, first day of holiday is Saturday and the weather has forecast rain for the first week at least

This is our first time going camping, we assumed it wouldn't really be safe cooking inside the tent but what else are we meant to do if it's going to be raining so much?!

What sort of place are you camping in? Could you buy or borrow a gazebo?

So not cook in the tent, also don't leave disposal bbqs in the tent or porch of tent when you have finished with it. A couple died from carbon monoxide poisoning a couple of years a go from bringing their used disposal into their tent porch.

What sort of tent do you have? Does it have a porch? I’d buy a big Brolley if not and cook under that.

Pop up garden gazebo or giant golf umbrella.
DO NOT cook in the tent as it could be a carbon monoxide risk.

What others have said - what sort of tent do you have? We are camping right now and we have a big camp kitchen, so we do cook in the tent when it's raining!

(Excuse the mess!)

They start with a p and end with a b, middle letter u! For breakfast you can't beat a McDonald's though shopping centre food courts are also excellent as they tend to have nice toilets to dry off in.

Over the years, we've variously- rigged a tarp, used a porch with sides open and one of us has stood in the rain with waterproofs on and cooked. Event shelters are quite popular too....
Tarp and poles are cheapest but if your not experienced campers/understood tensioning guys and or have some handy trees could be a bit of a challenge. It's possible someone on gumtree or eBay local to you is selling an event shelters or gazeebo- would you have room in your car?

We're panicking about space in the car as it is, I keep looking at this huge mountain of stuff to take and feel sure it's not all going to fit! It's doubtful we could even squeeze in a piece of paper if we needed to! We have a roofbox but DH thought he was buying a 420l one and it turned out to be 240l (Never buy a roofbox when you're sleep deprived...)

We do have a porch but we don't actually know if we can take it yet, just depends if it'll fit in the boot.

I've actually been wondering if we can afford to go out and buy a bigger car tomorrow 😂😫

Find a local restaurant or pizza take out!

Try and take the porch if you can, they are so useful. even in the rain we cook under ours and have the table there to eat. Eating outside is lovely when you can stay dry, plus you can keep shoes etc there.

We cook in an open sided beach shelter or rig up a tarp. When we had an estate car we cooked in the boot with the hatchback up as a shelter. The car did smell of fried onions for a bit though.

We have the Outwell day tent (currently around £170 on eBay whereas we paid £300 for ours a few years ago, and offering next day delivery) which is great for keeping cooking smells away from the main tent (I’m a bit oc) and it gives us extra space for playing cards/games in bad weather. Definitely worth the £ if you could squeeze one in!

Standing over a BBQ or camping stove with a brolly is what camping is all about.

Tarpaulin tied up between trees / bushes.

Or head to the nearest pub 💁

Definitely don't cook in the tent, my neighbour's brother died after bringing the used BBQ in the tent to keep them warm.

Get a takeaway We cook under the tarp with waterproofs on.

We weren't really considering cooking inside as even with us being complete novices, the thought of cooking inside a tent seems insane. Just checking that it was as we thought and a total no-no.

There really is no way we can squeeze in anything like a gazebo. As well as all our camping stuff, we have an 8yr old and a 1yr old to pack mountains of shite for too considering leaving these at grandmas for a fortnight

Tarpaulin for a fiver and some bungee ropes.
We had a little Robin join our camp for a few days one rainy summer in Scotland! Actually sat on the cooker with his wings out getting a warm! Dc were thrilled!
Don't let the weather spoil it.
Remember Billy Connolly says never the wrong weather just the wrong clothes!

We take the slow cooker can use that inside aslong as you have ehu
Or just have things that don't need cooking
Salad
Sandwiches
Tapas
Etc or like others have said gazebos can be cheap and don't take up an awful lot of space
And of course there's always the option for liquid lunch (breakfast and diner)

Go to the nearest pub!

I bet Billy would be in the pub.

You will get more in the car than you think if smart when packing it up, DCs sit on pillows, use clothing to pack inbetween boxes in the boot rather than take a suitcase or bag, stuff under front seats etc.

supermarket cafés for breakfast & dare I say this - Wetherspoons. Greggs pasties!

Bring foods that don't need cooking, or need very little. I like Maggi noodles or cup a soups for that - they're quick to make and just need a little hot water. If you want something fancier then you could pick up some meats and cheeses and do a kind of deli platter, or make up some wraps, or bring tinned/pre-cooked meat to make a salad, or cook up some pasta before you go.

Also, re the car space issue... are there perhaps a lot of 'nice-to-haves' in there on top of the essentials? If you go quite basic then you should only need one backpack per person.

How big is your tent? Does it have a door you can prop open and cook?
Saying that we do cook in ours with a gas cooker and just enough heat to cook basics. Don't bbq but should be fine with a normal gas cooker

Pub!