What dried food do you take camping with you?

[sherby]

We will be cooking on a gas stove (small) and have a big fire pit with a grill (weather dependent)

so far have

dried noodles
tinned soup
eggs
UHT milk
sugar
tea bags
marshmallows
whiskey [double wink]

we are only going for 3 nights and the campsite has a farm shop selling bread, eggs, fruit and meat

but my list looks woefully short lol

rice
pasta
coffee
salt
baked beans

biscuits
tom sauce
(adding more as i remember them) !

yes forgot we had b beans in

also remember the campsite shop will be expensive so maybe buy bacon, sausages etc before you go.

I have also bought those tins of ready made chilli etc, which if eaten at home are vile but at camp anything hot tastes fab

washing up liquid and cloths and teatowels

As above but I also take couscous and the dried pasta n sauce rather than plain pasta.

Brioche rolls with choc chips are always good for breakfast for the kids. Plus the quaker oats porridge sachets and a variety pack of cereal boxes. A jar of peanut butter or nutella.

I find that dinners are easy as pasta or bbq does the trick. I've forgotten in the past to pack for breakfast or much for lunch. Now I have a rough plan for lunch and dinner each day - it saves taking too much and lugging it home or too little and losing a morning in Tesco.

If well wrapped in foil you can do corn on the cob and part bake rolls on the edge of the campfire.

If taking a cool box freeze a couple of 1 pint bottles of milk. They don't defrost until day 2 or 3 and act as cool blocks in the meantime.

I take the packets of pre-cooked rice- either the tilda or mr ben, they seem to take turns in being on offer.... are better value than supermarket own as have more rice than water in and only take 2 mins.

Also hot chocolate, box of wine, pesto/pasta sauce, stir fry sauce as kids can eat plain then can spice up for adults.

how do you cook the pre-cooked rice? Do you mean the microwave for 2 mins packs? How do you heat them, out of interest?

We take;
dried pasta and sauces (packet stuff)
Frankfurters
sausages
variety pack cereal
eggs
buns
biscuits
wine
juice

ketchup, mayo, pickle, burger relish, soy sauce, pesto - ie stuff that you will want abit of to make food more interesting, but won't get through a whole jar in the week.

don't tend to have room for any more than the odds and ends out of the fridge and the jars as above put in the camping fridge - tend to pack some cooking gear in
the fridge too as short on space

Man of the pre-cooked rices you can stir fry I imagine all would be fine to cook this way, but the Tilda ones certainly say you can on the packet.

Tinned sweetcorn
Individual pots of creamed rice, jelly or custard. There's usually one of them on offer.

Best results I have had with the rice was on the mr bens egg fried but has worked with all - boil 30ml ( i think...not too much anyway cm or so )per pack stick in rice and warm thru- stir a couple of times whilst in esp if doing a few packs...I often chuck in rice before the waters boiled if in a rush...Although if doing stir fry have also just put the rice in the mix for a bit longer if only using single burner..

We take

Breakfast cereal
Couscous
Pasta
Rice
Ketchup
Lea & Perrins (can add flavour to anything in absence of proper food)
Stock cubes
Marmite
Choc spread

Mathasons smoked sausgage, doesn't need refridgerated and can be eaten cold or stirred in to hot pasta or boiled int he bag, or stir fried.

pasta and stir in sauces.

Super noodles yummy .

Nan bread and pitta bread as it seems to last better than normal bread if it is warm.

Instant Hot choc (areo one is lovely and bubbly stirs in very quickly.

try to take stuff that doesn't take too long to boil or you'll run out of gas and regret it when you want a cup of tea first thing.

Couscous is great.
dried pasta mix with sauces are good
if you are taking anything like sausages or even milk, freeze em first.
I like to cook up some shortgrain brown rice before we go, and then use it cold for salads, or stir fry it.
and I take some hard-boiled eggs for the journey.. they last a couple of days.

And, best of all take some whole lentils, or sproutingmix and grow your own beansprouts.
and some foil for doing baked potatoes/ fish/chops etc in the fire pit.

have a great time!

those spinach & ricotta pasta ravioli things (like that bad nanny gave to a Mnetter's DCs) with sauce.

Good idea about the rice and eggs Lauree

Incidentally, Morrison's is doing a BOGOF on Matteson's family-sized smoked sausages.

I find tortilla wraps handy as they take up almost no room and can be used for cold wraps, fajitas, or even just rolled round a barbecued sausage in lieu of a hotdog bun.

God this is depressing. The thought of a mattesons sausage for tea...

I've been thinking about dried foods and tins, cos we won't have a fridge and I hate going in supermarkets everyday.

But the problem with eating crap, is that it's, well, crap, isn't it?

I even looked at tins of curry in M&S but at £3 a tin, it had better be good!

MaryMotherOfCheeses - presumably you'll have some kind of coolbox? You don't have to live solely on dried/tinned stuff.

Take something you've pre-cooked eg.bolognese/chilli/casserole for the first night, take same or similiar frozen for second/third night - it will keep coolbox cold while slowly defrosting, and I reckon other fresh food will keep for a few days in a coolbox if you can refreeze the cool blocks regularly.

I think I will make an evening meal from mainly dried/tinned/jars maybe one night in every four. We will do a supermarket shop occasionally, and top up from a local corner shop.

I have horrible memories of my mother trying to make us eat tinned steak and kidney pie on our one infamous family camping holiday .

Now I'm a grown up camper in my own right I realize that you don't have to eat horrible food just cos you're camping .

It's the one time in the year when I buy a few yummy treats and don't worry so much about economizing.

Ah, well, the OP was asking about dry foods. I'm getting together stuff for our camping trip on Sunday and I've got some pasta and rice etc but also fresh veg and salad, some frozen chicken that will be used on the first night, frozen bacon, box of eggs and so on. You're not just stuck with dried food. I do always take a couple of tins of emergency Heinz ravioli, just in case.

The fresh veg etc will go into a big plastic box with a lid to keep the creepy-crawlies out and the frozen stuff will stay in the coolbox. What I usually do is a quick bit of food shopping every other day for milk, any nice sausages or other meats in the local butcher for the BBQ, cheese etc, and then a mid-week stock up on veg and anything else we're running low on. I usually aim to cook no more than once a day when camping except when I have a real craving for bacon sandwiches or scrambled eggs for breakfast My kids are very happy with salad and sandwiches for lunch so it cuts down the amount of faffing I need to do. The way I see it it's my holiday too so I'm not going to spend all my time cooking.

we find dried soya mince useful as a standby for chillis etc, rather than meat mince.

I also found some quite ok tinned tagine in Asda, in the Free from range, I think it's called, which will be useful next trip. I think it will just need a 8 -9 mile hike to taste lovely!

and for puddings, I take those Alpro soya puddings, in chocolate or vanilla, because they're a bit like a yoghurt, but you don't need to keep them cool.

I know Snorbs, but when I read MMofC's post I felt I had to say that camping food doesn't HAVE to be depressing. Scarred by childhood trauma, you see. My parents' attitude was 'camping = suffering' and that extended to mealtimes. It took me years to even consider camping as an adult...

I cook wonderful camping food, I'll have you know.

I'd just like to make it a bit easier....

And PR, I think you're right, a 9 mile hike makes most things taste better