Easy camp cooking? I love to cook. I love my family looooves to eat. We try to eat healthy when we can, and road trips and camping are no exception. We recently visited Fredericksburg, TX, a quaint town in the Hill Country of Texas known for its wineries, antique shops, and the colossal granite dome called “Enchanted Rock.” After hiking and exploring on our recent trip to the KOA in Fredericksburg, TX, the kids helped to prepare a delicious and easy dinner- with dessert!- over a charcoal grill.
The Texas Hill Country is an area in central and southern Texas with a dramatic landscape of rugged hills dotted with limestone and granite boulders and cliffs. In the town of Fredericksburg, we experienced life on the frontier firsthand at the Pioneer Museum. The kids got to make ropes, sing with cowboys, grind coffee on the back of a covered wagon, and learn German in the one room schoolhouse. Down the street, we explored some homemade candy shops and walked along the main street and market square.
When I was looking for a nice hike, a friend told me “You’re not a Texan until you climb Enchanted Rock.” Challenge accepted! We drove the 20 minutes from Fredericksburg to this massive pink rock, looking like a half-buried Eastern egg. Even with our 20 month old in the backpack, it was not a difficult climb up the granite. My kids kept saying “we climbed a mountain!” as they scrambled up and around, admiring the little islands of vegetation that managed to sprout on the smooth surface. We only stayed a couple of hours, but were famished when we got back to our KOA cabin.
When we got back to the campgrounds, the kids had fun visiting and feeding grass to the longhorns on site. Another truly Texan experience! The KOA cabins are surrounded by grassy areas and shade trees, where the kids built fairy houses while the charcoal heated up. Each cabin is equipped with a picnic table and grill, and has a covered porch with a swing for relaxing evenings. We were starving- and it was time for some easy camp cooking.
Tips for Easy Camp Cooking
Most of the food we packed didn’t need to be refrigerated, so we brought just one small cooler with ice. Here was out dinner menu:
1). Sweet Potatoes: kids wrap them with foil and place on the grill. These take the longest!
2) Black Beans: kids helped to fill the foil bags with canned beans, onions, cumin, oregano, salt (we brought the spices in a little baggie to pour in)
Once they are finished cooking, scoop the beans over the sweet potatoes and top with sliced avocados.
3) Volcanoes!: We eat these while waiting for the other food to cook. Heat up corn tortillas on the grill, and then the kids can sprinkle melting cheese (like monterey jack) on top and heat up until melted. My kids love volcanoes!
4) Dessert: Grease a cast iron pan. Have the kids unroll a packaged, raw pie crust to line the bottom of the pan. Then they can pour in a can of blueberry pie filling, and a pint of fresh blueberries. Carefully mix while in the pie crust. They should fold over the edges onto the fruit filling to make a galette. We put the dessert on the coals while we were eating dinner. It should bake covered until the crust looks finished (it took us about 35 minutes over hot coals).
It was such a memorable weekend, and a time to connect with our kids in nature. Even though we’re not quite brave enough to tent camp with our 20 month, KOA cabins let us camp and cook outdoors, hike, and have fun together in the beautiful Texas Hill Country.
THIS IS A SPONSORED POST. I RECEIVED A COMPLIMENTARY 2 NIGHT STAY IN EXCHANGE FOR MY EXPERIENCE AND THOUGHTS ON THE CAMPGROUND. ALL OPINIONS ARE MY OWN.
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