Feeding yourself using a campfire

[Good_Steward]

As easy as this sounds to me, actually creating good food using coals and other natural elements are becoming a lost art. I have recently been teaching my kids to use fire to cook. To them it's pretty cool and new. To me, it was lessons learned growing up in the woods. We have recently been using coals to cook corn and potatoes. This was an example of how to cook meat: We found a rock behind our house, cleaned it up, built a fire over top of it using a pyramid style fire, and then loaded the wood underneath of it and to the sides to maintain even heat. Aluminum foil optional:

 

 

 

While cooking the burgers, we used the coals to make potatoes and corn. While we are using a fire pit for this (such is life in suburbia..^sigh^), the principles remain the same and we made a darn fine meal. Ain't as quick as the microwave, but the smokey flavor is well worth it. Next up, I plan on using another method from the poor man's deer camp that I grew up in (tents and open fires). I plan on building an open fire, splitting logs, and sharpening a side of the logs enough to drive it in to the ground next to the fire with a large rock, and nailing steaks to the logs (preferably hickory or oak) and letting them cook. It will sear the steaks and singe the wood around them giving them an awesome nutty / smokey flavor. Also plan on digging a hole, filling partially with rocks, loading in coals, then throwing in a dutch oven filled with either biscuits or stew, then filling the rest of the way with coals and rocks, Ignore for hours on end and serve on a metal plate. :)

 

Anyone else in to survival gourmet??

Edited December 15, 2013 by Good_Steward

[Peace]

In my somewhat experienced/somewhat ingornant opinion, a dutch oven with coals underneath and on top will outcook any oven anywhere.

 

also, it's not PC, but we always cooked "hobo stew"  ... ground beef chunks, cut potatoes, peppers, onions, and whatnot... wrap it up in aluminum foil and bury it in the fire - somewhere in the coals.  Wait a few minutes, pull it out and chow down right out of the foil  ... probably ensured we would all get parkinsons,... but it was so good.

 

In a survival situation, searing is great.  You need to kill bacteria, but you can maximize the nutrition value of your food by not overcooking it (because you will surely be rationing... eating less calories than normal).  On the other hand, if you come down with a food-born illness when mobility is requred to survive,... that could be the fatal factor.

Edited December 15, 2013 by Peace

[LI0NSFAN]

In my somewhat experienced/somewhat ingornant opinion, a dutch oven with coals underneath and on top will outcook any oven anywhere.

 

also, it's not PC, but we always cooked "hobo stew"  ... ground beef chunks, cut potatoes, peppers, onions, and whatnot... wrap it up in aluminum foil and bury it in the fire - somewhere in the coals.  Wait a few minutes, pull it out and chow down right out of the foil  ... probably ensured we would all get parkinsons,... but it was so good.

 

In a survival situation, searing is great.  You need to kill bacteria, but you can maximize the nutrition value of your food by not overcooking it (because you will surely be rationing... eating less calories than normal).  On the other hand, if you come down with a food-born illness when mobility is requred to survive,... that could be the fatal factor.

We always cook "hobo Stew" when we make a camp fire. I love it!

[peejman]

Heh, my wife calls them hobo packs. Building a fire pit in the back yard is on my Christmas break "to do" list.

[UncleJak]

We do foil pack cooking a lot. We have also done stew in a enamelware over the fire. Bacon hanging from a stick is also pretty good. And lets not forget my favorite: campfire coffee! Sent barefoot from the hills of Tennessee

[Peace]

hmmm... I may be feeling a TGO campout coming on...   it would be for the food, of course... 

[McGarrett]

It's good that you are teaching that to your kids, good life skills to know for sure. I still remember learning a lot of these things in Boy Scouts 30 years ago. 

 

I built a fire pit out of an old truck brake drum and use it outside sometimes for cooking. I also have a wood stove inside that I can cook on in a pinch.

[JWC]

I think it's ok to say "hobo stew". I believe it would'nt be PC if it was "homo stew." But then who the hell would want to eat that?

[glowdotGlock]

I cook on the fire 3-4 times every month..

[gunwhatgun]

I think it's ok to say "hobo stew". I believe it would'nt be PC if it was "homo stew." But then who the hell would want to eat that?

O    M     G, I laughed so hard my eyes hurt :bowrofl:

[whiskey]

Check out recipes for "caveman style" steaks. Awesome goodness and about as easy as falling down. We camp several times a year, so I do a little campfire cooking. I like to slice up squash and onions and wrap them up with some butter in a foil pack. Fruit is good grilled over a fire too. Halved peaches, apples, pineapple and mango. Sent from my iPhone using [URL=http://tapatalk.com/m?id=1]Tapatalk[/URL]

[DAdams]

While in Scouts back in the fifties when Detroit iron was iron, we cooked tin foil dinners on the engine block while on the way to camp. Stop half way, give them a turn. Fifty miles and letting them continue to cook while setting up camp was about right if the chunks weren't too big.

[Guest RebelCowboySnB]

I have not cooked on a fire in years. I cook on an engine block all the time though in the summer.

Edited December 30, 2013 by RebelCowboySnB

[East_TN_Patriot]

I have a reprint of an old wilderness living/woodsman guide from the late 1800s - early 1900s.  In it there is a section about cooking over a fire and it emphasizes that those who depend on a large roaring fire to cook every meal are going to have a tough row to hoe, especially if you are on the move.  The author's point was that it is a waste of time, energy, and resources to build a huge fire for each meal.  Instead, you tailor the fire to the meal.  Many meals only require a small, quick-burning, and hot fire to cook or heat water.  I thought it made a lot of sense.

[Moped]

I have a reprint of an old wilderness living/woodsman guide from the late 1800s - early 1900s.  In it there is a section about cooking over a fire and it emphasizes that those who depend on a large roaring fire to cook every meal are going to have a tough row to hoe, especially if you are on the move.  The author's point was that it is a waste of time, energy, and resources to build a huge fire for each meal.  Instead, you tailor the fire to the meal.  Many meals only require a small, qat uick-burning, and hot fire to cook or heat water.  I thought it made a lot of sense.

That was George Washington Sears in his Woodcraft and Camping.  He's nickname was Nessmuck and he is credited with coming up with the Nessmuck style of knife and a double bit hatchet.  It's a great book and still very much in demand.  Here is a link to a free edition.

 

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/34607/34607-h/34607-h.htm

 

If you like that sorta thing, check out Horace Kephart.  He was a writer and outdoors man that ran in the smokes back around 1900.

[JPS]

While in Scouts back in the fifties when Detroit iron was iron, we cooked tin foil dinners on the engine block while on the way to camp. Stop half way, give them a turn. Fifty miles and letting them continue to cook while setting up camp was about right if the chunks weren't too big.

 

I used to own a copy of this - looks like it's still available at Amazon..