I chose Ledges State Park for this maiden camping expedition for several reasons. It is a beautiful and unique place in Iowa with tons of hiking trails, clear streams for creek walking that circle the park (and actually run over the road) and it was far enough away that the notion of crawling into our warm comfy beds would not even be an option.
I am a planner by nature and I couldn't wait to get our meals planned. With a borrowed camp out book, my daughters and I scoured it trying to decide what to make. We knew we wanted to include all the food groups in our meals and had already vetoed hot dogs and burgers which we grill all the time at home. We were somewhat limitless as we were trying to do this trip very low budget and I did not want to purchase a bunch of camping cooking supplies so I knew that everything would be made with hot coals.
Here is what we came up with:
Dinner:
Foil Packets:
2 1/2 lbs ground beef (we used a cheap minute steak from our deep freeze)
Any Vegetable of your choice sliced thin (carrots, onions, potatoes)
Make sure your vegetables are sliced thin. I had cut up our summer squash, red and green peppers and onions before we left. Place meat on square of foil (I put Pam on the foil before) and spread vegetables over the meat. Wrap in foil making a secure seal and cook in coals for seven minutes to each side.
You could put all of this together, but I let Megan and Lucy make a foil packet for each of us so they could be in charge of deciding which and how many veggies they wanted in theirs.
We also took the label off a baked bean can, used the old fashioned can opener to open it and set that on the coals to cook. That can only took seven minutes before the beans were boiling. Everyone was so impressed by that can of beans!
Dessert
Cinnamon Sugar Baked Apples (similar to Apple Crisp)
4 Apples
cinnamon/sugar mixture
butter
We baked these in foil packets as well and put them on the coals as we were eating dinner. They were warm and delicious to eat by the time dinner was done.
Place sliced apples on foil. Sprinkle the cinnamon/sugar mixture over and add a dollop of butter. Wrap securely and bake for 20-25 minutes, turning often over coals.
Breakfast
Brown Bears
10 bread slices
3/4 cup melted butter
1/2 cup cinnamon sugar
Trim crust from bread. Cut into 2" squares. Place bread on cooking stick; dip into melted butter and them cinnamon sugar mixture. Toast over hot coals until crisp
Fruit Kebab
Alternate on skewer;
sliced bananas
chunk pineapple
marshmallows
strawberries
Heat over coals until marshmallows are golden brown.
Other fruits to try: peaches, plums, maraschino cherries
click here for part 3
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