Easy Campfire Food Your Family Will Love

We love campfire food and camping out during the summer! Check out our Camping Prep List if you are new to camping. Camping is great for bonding with family.  More than that, there’s really nothing like sleeping under the stars and making memories around the campfire. Fellow campers know that one of the more enjoyable parts of camping (once you’ve set up your tent, of course) is cooking over the campfire. It’s lots of fun, but so often winds up with burnt food or hot dogs lost to the flames. Ugh! Instead of that huge bummer, give these easy campfire food ideas a try! 

Campfire Food: Breakfast 

For some reason, sleeping outside really builds up an appetite. We think it has something to do with fresh air. We do know everyone wakes up crazy-hungry and wanting a big breakfast. Day-old granola bars are not going to cut it. We’ve got some fabulous campfire breakfasts your whole family will love. 

Pancakes 

This campfire pancake recipe calls for beer, but it’s definitely not required. So if you’ve got young ones along or simply don’t want a brew first thing in the morning, just skip that part.  (When alcohol is cooked/heated, it does dissipate, fyi.)  We had no idea making pancakes over a campfire was even possible! Just make sure you bring your cast-iron skillet.  This is our favorite cast iron because of its durability and ease when seasoning.  And in our opinion, it’s the way to go when making campfire food!  If you’re not sure how to season a skillet, Delish explains it in simple terms here.

And if you aren’t about all the fuss of packing flour and other ingredients, just bring a box of pancake mix OR mix your batter up at home and bring it in a container or baggie. Easy peasy!

Breakfast Burritos 

Who doesn’t love a good breakfast burrito? Through the magic of tinfoil and a cast iron skillet, it’s super easy to make campfire breakfast burritos. And it doesn’t take long either! That’s a huge plus when your family wakes up “starving!” 

One of the biggest lifesavers when camping is heavy duty tinfoil. It’s the one area you don’t want to skimp!

One-Skillet Breakfast 

At home, we love eggs, ham, and potatoes for a hearty start to a weekend morning. Until we found this recipe for the One-Skillet Breakfast to make it all together, we figured our favorite morning meal was a no-go for camping. We can’t believe how great it tastes and nothing ends up overcooked! 

Tip: If you don’t want to deal with egg cartons and cracking eggs in the great outdoors, crack them into Ziploc bags before you go!  The jostling while travelling will even help to stir them up!

Campfire Food: Lunch 

In between ghost stories and snoozing in our sleeping bags, we like to hike, play games, and have family sing-alongs. At some point, though, everyone’s hungry again and wants lunch. We used to pull out a package of hot dogs and some metal skewers made for camping and caution everyone not to get burned or drop their dogs in the fire. We’re sure you can guess how that went! Thankfully, we’ve discovered these awesome campfire food lunch recipes instead. 

Nachos 

Who doesn’t LOVE nachos?  These are some of the best you will ever have! You don’t need an oven to make these most delicious nachos. We honestly were skeptical about how this would work, but they came out great! Cheesy and gooey just the way nachos should be. Everyone was impressed and they liked this lunch a lot better than those hot dogs AGAIN! 

Chicken and Veggies Foil Packet

If you’re looking for something a little healthier that will still leave everyone satisfied, these chicken and veggie foil packs are perfect. They’re a nutritious meal all in one easy foil pack. And no cast iron skillet needed. Just use tinfoil and the heat of the campfire to cook up a tasty lunch. And we can’t repeat this enough: Make sure to spring for the heavy-duty tinfoil when camping. 

Tip: Cut your vegetables and chicken up at home if you are going camping for just a few days. Otherwise you will probably want to cut everything up while camping to keep it fresher.  And Another Tip:  On really long camping trips, it’s best to start with frozen food and cook it as it thaws.

Dutch Oven Lasagna 

That’s right, we said lasagna! You will need a Dutch oven, but other than that, there’s nothing to it. It’s almost easier than making lasagna in the oven at home! And it just might taste even better being eaten in the great outdoors.  Everything else does!

But, if you don’t want to deal with or don’t have a Dutch oven, you could always make the lasagna at home in a throw away tin pan and heat it slowly in the coals. REMEMBER THAT TINFOIL!

And if you are desperate for lasagna (some kids are crazy like that – been there, done that), you can buy these freeze dried backpacking lasagnas and give that a go. All you need is hot water and the portions are pretty good. Pair it with some garlic bread (mmm! toast it on the fire!) and yummy surprise!

Skewers

We can’t leave out skewers!  Some people just need to cook with sticks, after all.  Use our step-by-step directions using veggies or add some protein for the carnivores in your group.  For a complete meal, we suggest packing Mason jar salads.  Remember to keep the dressing on the side or your salad ingredients will be soft when it’s time to eat.

Campfire Food: Dinner 

After a full day of hiking, biking, boating, etc., everyone makes their way back to the campsite and they show up ravenous! A big dinner is in order and these tasty campfire food dinner recipes are just the way to satisfy those big appetites. 

Sausage, Peppers, and Onions 

These are great on a bun or as a stand-alone. However you choose to serve them, sausage, peppers, and onions make a filling end to a day spent enjoying all nature has to offer. There are so many ways to make these! The handy dandy skillet again, a tinfoil packet, kabobs, or whole on a grate are a few ways we’ve tried it. 

Tip: Sausage tend to take forever to cook when you start from raw. By the time they are cooked through, often you can burn the outside edges. Try boiling the sausage for 5 minutes and then finish them up however you like. This is another thing you could do at home. 

Red Beans and Rice 

Vegetarians and carnivores alike will love this red beans and rice recipe. It’s a lot easier to make than you think! This one needs the Dutch oven again!

Tip: Bring your spices pre-mixed in a Ziploc bag. 

Hotdogs and Potatoes 

Hotdogs are pretty traditional food for campfires. We’ve already talked about hotdogs and skewers…  Now, we have a better way to make them! And we get to add extra carbs the family needs for an active camping trip with potatoes. 

Campfire Food: Dessert 

Sure, you could make S’mores, but there’s so much more to campfire food desserts. Besides, if your S’mores come out anything like ours, they’re not the best dessert you’ve ever had. 

S’mores Dip Campfire Recipe

Instead of the mess, try this delicious recipe! Best part is you can make this at home or while you are camping and it doesn’t need to take up cooler space. Here are the basics. You will need a throw away pie tin with a cover. Make sure it’s not plastic. These pie tins with cardboard covers work great! Layer a chocolate bar and marshmallows in the tin. We like to use the small marshmallows. We also like to put Reese’s peanut butter cups in the mixture to jazz it up. When you are ready, just put this over the coals and wait patiently. It won’t take long to melt this gooey deliciousness. Make sure to bring your graham crackers for dipping.  But, honestly, you could dip anything you like into this mixture – including bananas and pretzels. All the yummy without all the work!

Campfire Cone Dessert 

A twist on S’mores, these campfire cones that are a lot less messy and, we think, a lot more fun to eat. Just make sure you have a safe way to pack your waffle cones without breaking them. 

Banana Boats 

If you were ever a Girl Scout or just had a really cool mom, you probably tried banana boats over the open fire. A childhood highlight for sure! And it will be for your family too.

Tip: Make sure your bananas aren’t overripe. They will get mushy when they cook.

 What other great campfire food meals does your family love? We’re definitely making some of these campfire recipes part of our summer tradition!  Camping is so much fun and a great bonding experience. If you are new to it and need some tips check out our quick camping tips. Also if you are shopping for your camping gear, we recommend OurWares.com as a great place to compare camping gear. 

If you’re looking for nature-inspired activities to enjoy on your camping trip, we have crafty ideas for building fairy houses here.  We’ve seen many fairy houses on woods trails there were created using found natural objects.  A word of caution:  Do not use non-biodegradable items for fairy houses.  That’s just littering.

Another outdoor idea is to collect stones for making jewelry or paperweights.  We once hiked a mountain and everyone in the family picked up a favorite stone.  We then wrote the date and location of the hike in magic marker.  I still have mine in a plant pot!  You should also check out our Get Crafty with Nature post. Something there may spark an idea.

So get outside!  Look around you.  Slow down.  Make some amazing campfire food.  Be happy!  We live on an amazing planet!