Camping Food Continued-Roasted Chicken

Our last camping trip of the season found me using my brand new "baby" 10 inch Dutch oven 4 out of six nights!

Dutch-oven Roasted Chicken Legs with Spinach Fettucini and Sauteed Zucchini

Why is it everything tastes better when eaten outdoors? This meal or chicken legs roasted in the Dutch oven, with sides of spinach fettucini and sauteed zucchini was extremely simple, yet felt very decadent while camping. Our Costco has begun selling packs of chicken legs packaged in sealed bags of 5 chicken legs each. These little packs were extremely easy to pack in the cooler. The fettucini was a quick cooking kind which took only three minutes once the water started boiling. The zucchini was also easy. I pre-sliced it at home, packaged it in a ziplock baggie and packed it in the cooler.

Once I was ready to cook, I pre-heated my Dutch oven, melted some butter in it and added the chicken legs along with a generous sprinkling of a new seasoning blend I recently bought at a Tastefully simple party. I kept my Dutch oven around 350 degrees by placing about 7-8 coals underneath and 10-12 coals on the lid and left it alone, aside from turning it every once in awhile to ensure even heat, for about 50 minutes. While you're waiting for your chicken to cook, make your side dishes, start a campfire, and enjoy a glass of wine in the great outdoors!

Raw, seasoned chicken just added to the Dutch oven

Chicken cooking in the oven (yes, it is just sitting on the ground!)

Greek Beef Casserole while camping!

Towards the end of summer, I was fortunate enough to attend a demonstration on Dutch oven cooking at a campground where we were staying. I was already familiar with Dutch oven cooking having inherited one from my father-in-law last summer. I bravely made my son's birthday cake in it last summer while camping!

However, attending the demonstration was an eye-opener for me at how easy Dutch oven cooking could be! I had always thought of my Dutch oven as sort of a fun thing to occasionally wow people with while camping and to show off a little. I had seen it as this bulky pot that I could barely lift and that had to sit under my feet in the car for lack of space. When I told the demonstrator that I had inherited a 14 inch deep Dutch oven, his response was, "Whoa, that's 10 quarts of food!" It was his disbelief that I was actually using a pot that big that inspired me to go buy a "baby" 10 inch Dutch oven. This pot completely changed the way I feel about Dutch oven cooking. The techniques I learned made the Dutch oven a joy to use, and with the smaller pot it is completely manageable! For our last camping trip of the season, a six-day trip to Fort Stevens, OR, I used the pot 4 times!

Here is one of the dishes I made, a greek beef dish called Stifado inspired by Beatrice Ojakangas' book, The Best Casserole Cookbook Ever, that I adapted to work in my Dutch oven. Hands down, it was the best dish I've ever made while camping.

Greek Beef Casserole in the Dutch oven by Joie de vivre

Ingredients:

1/4 c. canola oil

2 1/2 lbs. top round beefsteak, cut into 1 1/2 inch cubes

3 Tbls. red wine vinegar

1 c. water

1 tsp. rosemary

2 Tbls. tomato puree

2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. pepper

1 cinnamon stick

5 whole allspice berries

2 small onions, chopped roughly

4 potatoes (I used white ones) cut into large bite sized pieces

Directions:

1. To make cooking while camping easier, chop your meat at home before placing it in a doubled Ziplock baggie in your ice chest. Also, pre-measure and place the rosemary, salt, pepper, cinnamon, and allspice in a little ziplock baggie prior to your trip.

2. Preheat your Dutch oven by placing it over your chimney starter while your coals are lighting. Make sure to leave space for oxygen to get to your coals and be careful of your arms! Make sure Dutch oven is steady. When the Dutch oven is pre-heated, add the canola oil and the beef. Stir the beef until it is browned.

3. Drain the beef and add all of the remaining ingredients. Place the lid on the Dutch oven and cook at 350 degrees for about an hour and 15 minutes. (*A Note about Dutch Ovens* You can get 350 degrees in a 10 or 12 inch Dutch oven, by placing about 7 coals underneath, and about 10-12 coals on top. Use long handled tongs to move the coals from your chimney starter to the bottom and the top of your Dutch oven. Every 15 minutes or so, turn the pot a quarter of a turn clockwise, and turn your lid a quarter of a turn counterclockwise to ensure even heat distribution. After 45 minutes, you will need to add fresh, hot charcoal briquettes to the bottom and top of the oven to ensure even heat as well.)

4. When dinner is getting close, saute some sliced green, yellow and red peppers.
5. Expect some hungry and nosy neighbors to come calling when you pull the lid off this masterpiece! Enjoy, and if you try this, let me know how it goes for you!

Chocolate, chocolate chip cake in the Dutch oven!

 This past weekend was our last camping hurrah of the season.  It was also my son's 5th birthday party.  Since we were camping only 20 minutes outside of town, he decided to have his party at our campsite and swim, play games, eat, run around, roast marshmallows, and of course, eat birthday cake.  Despising stale cake, I opted instead to try out my father-in-law's dutch oven, and bake the birthday cake at the campsite.  It was a completely risky move that risked disappointing a party boy and guests, but with cooking bravado (and marshmallows in case of failure) I forged ahead.  I am so glad I tried this because it wasn't at all difficult and now it opens up for me a whole new avenue for camp cooking!  I hope this inspires you to try it out yourself.  If anyone else has some good dutch oven recipes, or has a good link to one, please share it, I'm excited to try it again!

Needed:

14 inch dutch oven

Long tongs

Oven mitts

Charcoal

Lighter fluid

Lighter

Chocolate cake mix

1 Package of chocolate chips

Vegetable oil

Eggs

Flour

Baking powder

Sugar

Cocoa powder

Water

Frosting

Sprinkles, etc.

1.  Light your coals on fire.  It will take them 30 minutes to get good and hot. (Pictured above)

2.  Line your dutch oven with heavy duty foil.  This will help the cake slip out and make it very easy to clean your dutch oven.  Do not go over the lip as the lid needs to have good connection to keep the heat in.  Spray the foil with cooking spray.

3.  I have a 14 inch Dutch oven.  Most standard cake mixes will make a cake in a 12 inch dutch oven.  If you have a 14 incher, add to your dry mix, 1 cup flour, 1/2 cup sugar, 1 tsp baking powder, and 2 Tbs. cocoa powder.  Follow the directions on the back of the package adding eggs or oil (or both) as necessary and add an extra 1/2 cup water to the wet ingredients.  This will extend the cake mix to fit into a 14 inch dutch oven.  I brought the extra dry ingredients along in a ziplock baggie.

4.  Mix the wet and dry ingredients and then mix in 1 package of chocolate chips.

5.  Pour the cake batter into the dutch oven and cover.

6.  When the coals are white, use long tongs to arrange 9 of them under the dutch oven.  Place the covered dutch oven on top and arrange 16 coals on top of the dutch oven.  This will keep the temperature around 325 degrees.

7.  Every 10 minutes, using your oven mitt, turn the dutch oven 90 degrees.  Then pick up the lid and rotate that 90 degrees in the other direction.  This will prevent hot spots and promote more even cooking.  Cake will be done somewhere between 30 and 50 minutes.  When you are turning, take a peek at the cake, when it starts looking done, do a toothpick test.  Remove dutch oven from coals when toothpick comes out clean.

8.  When the dutch oven is somewhat cool to handle, place a large plate (or in my case a cutting board) over the top and flip.  The cake should slide right out.  Remove the foil and let cool.  Frost when cool.  Voila!

The flat section of my cake was a little side piece that was not quite done and therefore fell off the cake while it was cooling, but it added to the whole baseball theme.  My son thought it was the greatest to have a baseball cake while camping, it tasted great, I tried something new, and it was easy to boot!