Camping is a great family and friend’s activity to enjoy the great outdoors and nature around your campsite. You get a sense of roughing it, whether you sleep in a tent or in a camping trailer in the woods. A campground with running water and electricity is not so much roughing it, but in all scenarios, you don’t want to worry about and spend valuable vacation time cleaning pots and pans.
This is where cast iron items make the perfect camping companion for their ease of cleanup. You need only to bring some paper towels with you and give them a quick wipe down to clean cast iron.
You can actually use 100 percent of cast iron for all of your cooking needs while you are camping. It’s a small investment up front and the durable iron will outlast your lifetime so you never need to replace items.
Make Magnificent Meats with a Press
A cast iron press can cut your cooking time in half for meats while camping. If you heat the press in the cooking vessel (cast iron skillets or pots produce the best flavor) then place it on your meat as it cooks, it actually cooks on both sides at the same time. You can use a press for bacon and sausage for breakfast and for steaks and hamburgers for lunch and dinners.
Temperature Checking Cookware
Square Dutch ovens actually cook as an oven in your home. The cast iron holds heat well and evenly cooks dishes on any type of heat source such as a grill or directly over a fire. Choose one with a notch cut out for a thermometer probe to check the temperature of dishes without removing the lid and letting the heat escape. These work well for roasts, ribs, kebabs, and even casseroles and breads.
The Freshest Fish Ever
If you go fishing when you are camping, you give yourself the freshest catch of the day possible. Using a cast iron skillet to cook your fresh fish gives it the best possible culinary flavor. Even four-star restaurants don’t have fish this fresh. Since cast iron is the favorite of chefs around the world due to them not sticking, you can cook delicate pan roasted fish with butter and herb sauce or make fried fish that is browned to perfection on the outside while flaky on the inside.
Cooking for a Crowd
When you have several people to feed at once, it is a great idea to use a large cast iron griddle on a camp stove. You can cook multiple items on it at one time such as bacon, sausage and pancakes or a huge batch of hamburgers and hot dogs for pleasing everyone. The best models have a removable grease cup for less fat in your meals.
Jaffle Irons
Some campers also call a jaffle iron a pie iron, as that is what they use them for. Everyone loves dessert right? The smaller models of cast iron are great for making small individual pies and smores. They are constructed with a cast iron body that gives you even heating and extra long handles to hold over a campfire or a grill. You can also use the larger models to cook hamburgers, grilled cheese or pressed sandwiches, muffins, or any other item that fits in the enclosed space.
Camping and Cast Iron Safety
Since cast iron camping gear gets very hot and holds the heat well, you may want to invest in some items to avoid anyone being burned by them.
Cast iron lid lifters have a hook on the end that inserts in the loop on top of a lid on a Dutch oven. It has a long easy grip handle to prevent you from burning yourself and allow you to take the lid off without being burned by the steam within the oven.
Dutch oven tripods have three legs that splay out around your campfire and support your cast iron Dutch oven, kettles or camp ovens over the flames. This allows you to adjust the internal temperature of your cookware by moving the cooking vessel higher or lower over the flames.
Cast iron stands for your cookware enable you to have a stable flat surface for cooking over a campfire. If you place a pot or pan directly on the firewood, it is often not stable and can tip or tilt. This may spill your food into the fire or it can tip over on a person and cause burns. The stands support the weight of the heaviest and largest pots, pans and Dutch ovens, regardless if they have feet on the bottom or have a flat bottom.
Camping enthusiasts enjoy the durability, even heat distribution and ease of cleanup of cast iron camping cookware. After trying just one item, they usually decide to purchase an entire line to make camping trips more enjoyable.
