Backwoods Gourmet

[David]

Outdoor cooking seems to be in a bad state these days, probably due to a number of things (everyone I know seems to only like expeditions for the activities, not the "simply camping" value, and people coming out of scouts seem to have done less cooking these days).

What I want to know is what has happned to all of the classic camp style cooking? Nowerdays everyone (sorry for the massive exaggeration) seems to just want to rip open a packet of dried soup or something, stick it on a burner and eat in 3 minuits.

Last weekend I had spit roasted pheasents, jacket potatoes and veg with some friends using just a knife and some foil over an open fire. As a rule whenever I am cooking for a group outside I like to make food better than what everyone would ususally eat - several times adults have asked for some of the recipies -does anyone else share this view? Or is cooking something no one is intersted in any more?

[Marmot]

backwoods or backwards? back to the woods or backwards in time?

persoanlly i prefect the activities to the cooking, fine the odd phasant over the fire routine once in a while when you're a phone call away from the nearest kebab van cause you've discovered the pheasant youve got is racked with some bird ailment and its started to rain,

however when i get up pre dawn to hit a peak i dont usually have that much time to go to the nearest stream and start tickling some trout!

i think the old traditions should be kept alive, they are fun if nxot anything else
the old boiling water from a sheet of paper is quite remarkable, but just like welsh i think they're dying out, replaced by titanium and butane

[Digby]

I like to make food better than what everyone would ususally eat - several times adults have asked for some of the recipies -does anyone else share this view? Or is cooking something no one is intersted in any more?

I agree David. As far as I am concerned, a BBQ in the back garden is a very pale shadow of an outdoor banquet. My favourite way to spend an August evening would be cooking a proper meal on the embers of a hardwood fire, in the company of good friends. (Beer would help, too). :)

[Jake D]

Food always tastes better outdoors which is why some of the stuff you get in pouches tastes bearable. But you still can't beat good food cooked over a (proper) campfire.

[MtCleric]

If you are not concerne with the weight of equipment that you are going to bring to your outdoor feast, I would recommend looking into some dutch-oven cooking. There are a plethora of dutch-oven cookbooks out there and it is truly a form of cooking especially suited for camping. Throw a roast, potatoes, carrots and other fixings in the pot at the beginning of the day, pile on the coals from last night, and by evening, you have a full meal.

The ovens do weigh quite a bit. I have heard about aluminum versions of them. They are supposed to be significantly lighter than their cast-iron cousins, but I have had no experience with them.

[Marmot]

works just as well with and old biscuit tin.
for quickness you can cover one of those pots with clay and light a fire beneath. For these things it is important to make a chimney for the fire, ususally is quicker than a day, but still quite slow.

[Jake D]

Marmot

I think the dutch oven referred to here is one of the old cast iron ones. You boil up a stew in the morning, pile ember around (and on top of) the stove and when you get back to the camp you have a lovely thick casserole. There's nothing quite like a venison stew cooked that way. A biscuit tin is equally useful but in a different way. Remind me next time we meet and I will lend you my proper dutch oven!

[MtCleric]

Ah yes, here's where the gap across the sea rears its ugly head. I did mean the "old cast iron ones." Beasts about 12 inches (30cm?) across and 6 inches (15/16cm?) deep.

However, since I haven't seen a biscuit tin (that I know of), that might be a near cousin. ;) From what little I know, I believe we don't even call the same things "biscuits." An Irish exchange girl once told me that what I was calling "biscuits" were (her words) "bloody scones."

[Marmot]

oh ok sages of the outdoors i bow to your knowledge.
The only dutch ovens i knew off involved a a douvet and body gas

[Ollie]

... lovely....

Just generally FYI, these are biscuits:
http://www.csdm.qc.ca/stejarc/dictionnaire/imagesdicob/biscuit.jpg

And these are 'those ruddy scones':
http://www.ozbird.com/oz/OzCulture/oz_culture/dishes/scones.jpg

Lovely with cream, jam (jelly?), or even peanut butter.

Not really that similar. Funny how things translate!

[Digby]

USA Cookie = English biscuit
USA Biscuit = Irish Bloody Scone
Irish Bloody Scone = (Standard) English Scone

When I lived in Ireland Scones didn't have the 'bloody' prefix. This must have changed in the last 25 years.

[Marmot]

as we're talking about biscuits and the like, what makes jaffa cakes cakes instead of biscuits

[MtCleric]

When I lived in Ireland Scones didn't have the 'bloody' prefix. This must have changed in the last 25 years.I'm fairly certain she added the "bloody" to emphasize how flustered she was with our language use.

Kind of back on topic, I had a scoutmaster who would put scones/biscuits on top of a beef stew inside the dutch oven. That was a feast. It was kind of like a main-course cobbler.

[Digby]

Ah! Now you're talking cobblers (pun)! We have a dish over this side of the atlantic called beef cobbler but we would refer to the biscuits on top as dumplings, even though they look like scones /bloody scones.

I think the Irish refer to them as Cookies (or bloody cookies in the south west...) ;)

[David]

Dumplings and stew outdoors; that sounds like my kind of meal - on the topic of ovens outdoors, is it possible insead of using a metal oven / pot etc. to make one out of the right kind of earth(clay based I believe) and rocks? I have heared several suggestions, but they have not seemed very practical and involved statements like 'then lay the meat on the embers' (mmmm yum yum). They mostly describe a smal kiln/pizza oven type thing, but is this just a myth?

[Marmot]

i can imagine them working, but would only be energy efficient on a short term basis

[Digby]

The program by Ray Mears on UK television a couple of days ago was a real treat. In it, he butchered a freshly killed deer (culled by a marksman) and cooked a haunch of it in a pit fire. While the meat cooked, he walked along a nearby seashore collecting the 'first course' of shellfish - razor clams, mussels etc.

The cooking was done in a pit lined with flat stones, with further flat stones from the fire piled on top. The whole thing was covered with a mat of sphagnum moss, the covered by sand. Two and a half hours later he was eating freshly roast venison. So what about your pouches of curry flavoured polifilla now lads?

[Flutterby]

I saw that. It was a wonderful program, but a little too gory for me.

I just couldn't stop thinking about that scene in Bambi......

[David]

Yep, back to my home thread!
Sorry about this, but I have to relate a tale of a recent meal I had. The event was entitled 'Feast' so you can guess it was kind of lavish...

well yes - we had: Rabbit, Pheasant, Partridge, Fish, Chicken, Kebabs (also inc. peppers tomatoes wild garlic etc.), Nettle Soup, and finished off with chocolate fondue and fruit.

Not just one of each either. There were loads of us though, so it wasn't as if we were stuffing ourselves: i'm not trying to give an impression of our supreme gluttony! It was all cooked on open fires and all the food (apart from the chocolate) was "as is" - everything was skinned etc. there and as natural as possible. Is this just too much bother for everyone else? To prepare as such a delicios meal with the most basic tools and in fading light is the most challenging and enjoyable thing I can think of, with so many different skills. What are your thoughts? Great time or waste of effort?

[timmygowalkies]

I must say, there is nothing i like less than a meal cooked over an open fire. That is as long as it is adventurous, different and done well. There is such a variety of things you can do over a fire it is a wonder people don't use them as much any more, i guess it's the fact that things can be done much quicker in an oven or on a gas/fuel stove.

[Ollie]

Very true, everything seems so rushed nowadays - whatever happened to proper cooking! All this boil in the bag nonsense!! :)

[Flutterby]

I must say, there is nothing i like less than a meal cooked over an open fire.

Especially if it's done properly, over a campfire, while singing songs which seem to contain an unusually high amount of innuendo! :p