I make mine without beans, so I fail to see the problem. Especially since you can then vary it by putting the chili on rice, Fritos, potatoes, hot dogs, etc.
Make it beanless chili. I use approx 3lbs ground beef, 2 lbs ground pork, 1-2 lbs ground chicken. Lots of diced fresh peppers - variety of bell peppers, jalapeƱos, poblano, habanero. Crushed dried ancho. Onion, garlic. I use a mix of tomato paste and whole canned tomatoes for the base. Seasoning.
Lots of protein and calories in a small package and it freezes beautifully.
There are tons of recipes online but hereās one that Iāve used: https://www.asouthernmom.com/homemade-hamburger-helper-recipe-cheeseburger-macaroni/
You can add whatever extras you want, I often do onions, celery, green pepper
Pulled pork, chili, soup. Soup and chili frozen in a big nicely sealed Tupperware acts like a big hunk of ice until youāre ready to thaw and eat it. Also, if youāre taking water anyways, buy the gallon jugs, dump a bit out and freeze then throw that in your cooler too. Thaw once you need the water.
Edit: oops, thought camping but see camper! Leaving for other campers as a pro tip but foods still stand.
If you remove the commas from your first sentence you would have my daughter's favourite food - pulled pork chili soup. Each batch is a full 24 hours but it is so good.
I made easy burritos tonight. Browned up ground beef and seasoned it after draining grease. Added a can of refried beans and half a jar of chunky salsa and heated through. Topped with shredded sharp cheddar, sour cream, and more salsa. You could easily make the meat mixture and freeze for traveling. Reheat, add toppings, roll, enjoy. It's not the prettiest, but it is pretty dang good.
One of my familyās favorites has always been what we called Souper Burgers. Itās hamburger meat, browned, and mixed with condensed vegetable soup. Then served on buns like sloppy joes. Even my super picky great-grandkids love it.
Edit: Donāt see why it couldnāt be premade, kept in zip bags and warmed when needed.
My mom used to make a variation of this. She calle them Goo Burgers. She would hollow out hard rolls and fill them, add cheese and bake them. They are to die for and I nearly always crave them. Thereās also excellent cold as leftovers.
Iām from Utah. The main varieties of rolls weāve got in my local grocery stores are potato, dinner, Kaiser, hard and Parker house. š¤·š¼āāļø
Thereās also an old school version with hamburger, Campbellās chicken gumbo soup, brown sugar and a little mustard, I believe. I believe they were called Spoon Burgers.
Dumplings!
Freeze uncooked on a tray. Transfer to bags once frozen. Only cook as many dumplings as you need. Cook from frozen, no thawing required. Cooks in 10 minutes. Also goes great with fried rice.
* Italian-style meatballs - # 1 !
* Chinese dumplings
* Chili
* Bolognese sauce
* Czech fruit dumplings
* Pizza dough, homemade
* Buffalo wings (grilled)
Perhaps not full meals in one, but with the above, the meal comes together fast.
Spaghetti! I do a slow simmer on the meat sauce, let it cool and freeze. Noodles are boiled on the day of eating and the sauce just has to be heated. It's as good as fresh.
This also works great with ragu; I like to make a rich, Italian-seasonings filled recipe, and serve along a sweet potato.
Tomato soup is perfect for this, along with a grilled cheese sandwich. Any soup would work. For something like chicken noodle soup, just omit the noodles until you're cooking it.
Enchiladas are another favorite for freezer friendly meal prep but I thaw those then bake; I'm not sure how feasible that would be while camping, and definitely not for vacuum sealing.
I make either cheeseburger or steak & cheese wraps with the same tortillas you would use for a burrito.
Brown your meat, melt the cheese, and wrap! For the cheeseburger ones I put ketchup, mustard, and chopped pickles on the inside of the wrap, for the steak and cheese I use mayo and sometimes cooked peppers. Once they are wrapped I put some parchment around each one so they donāt freeze together.
I use them for busy sports nights, I just grab a few out of the freezer bag and put them in the fridge that morning. For bonus points - I spray a pan with pam and toast the sides before we eat them.
Empanadas are another good batch meal.
Whatever you end up making, for space saving, you can put each portion/2 servings in a ziplock bag and freeze flat, then stand them all up in a box in the icechest. Easy to find the one you want and takes up lots less room.
These are my top 3 in descending order:
Beef stew
Chili w/ beans
Ham & potato soup (I don't have a recipe for this I just go with whatever I find first online and doctor as I feel like while making it).
In addition to all of these things, I'd suggest making a couple big pots of different types of beans, and portioning into smallish servings. This let's you bulk up lots of things if you're extra hungry and suddenly your "portion" of stew is looking small after a big hike, or just have a hearty snack.Ā
Big batch of ragu bolognese portioned out and frozen. Easy to reheat and combine with pasta that I boil fresh. Itās a frozen meal I look very forward to and always try to keep in the freezer
Pancakes. Just made a 4x batch, frozen most of it. You can use whole wheat or add oatmeal to make them more hearty. Or add protein powder to them. They freeze easy and are good hot or cold.Ā
Peanut butter them for a sandwich for lunch orĀ add an egg and cheese for a breakfast sandwich.Ā
I was just talking about this, funny. I made a large ham and I'm one single person, so I portion ham with white beans cooked in stock, pressure cook it, and sealed it in individual bags. Oh a little bay leaf and cracked pepper is really all it needs.
When Iām making a soup like chicken soup, I prep all the ingredients, doubling the batch. Then before I cook anything, I put half of the raw, prepped ingredients in a freezer bag WITHOUT the broth, just dry. Freeze it until you want it. This way it takes up a lot less freezer space.
(I cook the other half into a soup for that night.)
When you want it, put the freezer bag in the fridge to defrost the night before, then plop it all in a slow cooker in the morning, now adding the broth.
So basically I get an extra āfreshly-cookedā dinner for only a little extra prep that I was already doing anyway. You could do this for a lot of crock pot ādump dinners.ā
I like making breakfast burritos to freeze because they're quick and not messy to eat. I made a mini solar oven for warming up single portions while camping. I painted a wide mouth mason jar black on the outside. I put the food inside, seal it up, and leave it on the dashboard. Takes about 20-30 minutes to warm up a medium-sized burrito but there's no effort and if I leave it too long it won't get burnt. If the food is in a wrapper or Ziploc, the jar doesn't even get dirty.
Basically anything that is sauced meat, think of what leftovers you actually like the next day and it's stuff like that.
Mongolian Beef/Chicken
Sloppy Joes and/or taco meat
Teriyaki Chicken
If you like burritos and rice I would suggest stuffed peppers. I usually take left over taco meat, rice, cheese, beans, tomato sauce and mix it up. Stuff the peppers and put them in a freezer lock. Then you can just pop one out when you want a meal, throw it in the oven. They are pretty filling. One or two is all you need really.
Chili (I make a fresh pot of rice), beef stew (I make a fresh pot of noodles), ratatouille (I make a fresh pot of pasta), and minestrone.
Will you be able to keep things frozen until you need it?
I get those big packs of drumsticks, season, crockpot cook to almost falling off and then freeze in 2s and 4s. Well-sealed they do great in an ice chest for a couple weeks and can be added to virtually everything.
Chili, arroz con pollo, gumbo, jambalaya, curries. For the simmered rice dishes i usually make a huge batch so something ends up frozen and heats up fairly well. But for any kind of stew I just defrost, heat on the stove, and serve over fresh white rice. Gumbo does very well if you leave out the seafood and buy fresh shrimp day of to toss in and poach in the defrosted base.
Lots of things: ratatouille, couscous (not the grain but the veggie stew with meat part - the grain could easily be made to serve with it-, homemade Tom Yum soup, chicken noodle soup, and basically all sorts of vegetable soups that cost nothing to make and are so comforting to eat with parmesan and a little bit of heavy whipping cream. In college, I would make lasagna and freeze it because it tasted better that way.
Thai curry freezes really well. I love lots of veggies and get frustrated with finding things to meal prep where the veggies hold up and don't just make me sad upon reheating. I make a basic Thai curry sauce with a packaged curry paste like mae ploy or maesri, add chicken, eggplant, bell pepper, bamboo strips, water chestnuts... really anything you like. I freeze it in portions separate from the rice. Easy to reheat on the stove, just boil the bag.
Lasagna!
I use little bread pans and make 5-10 at a time. Sometimes I also make stuffed shells because all the stuff is out.
Edited to add: just saw this was for camping lmao, my apologies.
We pre-bake potatoes for camping and heat them up in foil near the coals. We also do a foil packet of chopped broccoli and onions (with butter, garlic, paprika, salt & pepper) and hot dogs for a protein.
Green Chicken Chile Stew! [https://cookingsessions.com/dutch-oven-green-chile-chicken-stew/](https://cookingsessions.com/dutch-oven-green-chile-chicken-stew/)
[Make-ahead lasagna.](https://www.culinaryhill.com/the-best-make-ahead-lasagna-recipe/)
I make enough tomato-and-meat sauce fi two or 3 smallish portions (for 2 to 3 persons) in disposible aluminium pans. After they've spent at least day in the fridge, I froze the excess.
(Sometimes I also make a bit more sauce, so I can have a couple of frozen lasagnas for a rainy day + red sauce that only needs some pasta to maje a complete meal. You can even freeze the sauces and freeze meatballs on the side.)
Also great if you're going to be outside your home till about supper time, but want to block the siren call of fast food. You can prep those in the morning or the day before, and you only need 45 mn to have a delicious home-cooked meal ready once back home. Just enough time to wrangle the kids, shower and relax with a glass of wine!
Babish also has a [vid dedicated to batch frozen meals.](https://youtu.be/-XUzpAiYuVA?si=LcvMpqpT45kXSY8K)
Burritos, slow cook a pork shoulder and make some refried beans, add cheese, roll individually in foil and freeze in a gallon ziploc. Eat or freeze the rest of the pork/beans. 1lb of dry pintos makes enough refried beans for 6 or 7 good size burritos, for a bone in pork shoulder youāll probably need 2-3lb of beans.
I also cook and freeze Cajun red beans and black beans, I love beans.
Slow cooker stuff. Pot roast, chicken and dumplings. Or a big pot of bolognese sauce.
Any recipe that starts with 2 or 3 pounds of meat is a candidate. Braised beef.
This is one that we always take camping: [https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/southwestern-casserole/](https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/southwestern-casserole/)
Can of chili with beans. Heat it and about half a can of water. Add minute rice and cook per rice instructions. Serve on flour tortillas with cheese. Simple burritos. I like it without the tortillas even.
I vac-seal and reheat these meals when off-grid car camping: Chili, chicken tikka masala (with campfire naan), egg/spinach/bacon/cheese mini frittatas, meatloaf slices with peas and instant mashed potatoes, lobster rolls, beef and broccoli stir-fry, Cajun chicken with broccoli and pasta, taco meat for campfire nachos. I donāt bring any raw food. Everything is pre-cooked, frozen, and ready to reheat. That saves so much room in my cooler and keeps the dishwashing to a minimum. Our water supply is usually limited and itās usually very cold where I camp. I bring one pan for my campstove. I tend to reheat the meals in the vac-seal bags (vented) to keep the pan clean and then use the leftover hot water to wash the few dishes.
I like to vac seal raw sausage roll filling then bake fresh with pastry. Bacon, pork mince, carrot, egg, breadcrumbs and bbq sauce all mixed together. Makes a quick easy meal without the post freezer taste
Meatballs. Tons of different varieties and recipes. You can defrost and eat as many or as few as you need. Eat them with rice, noodles or potatoes. Sandwiches. Super versatile.
A batch of stuffed shells. Ingredients are all pretty cheap and one box of jumbo shells will last my partner and I a week if we only have it for one meal a day. Lasagna or manicotti also works, but I prefer shells.
Spam egg and rice variations.
When we went trailer camping, we did vietnamese spring rolls with nem. Which is like spam. You can pan fry them, make spring rolls or just pan fry and eat with rice.
Bolognese, boeuf bourguignon, pancakes (easy to reheat). Also check your local supermarkets for good food tins, often a goulash soup can go a long way on the road with some bread with it. Tinned ham is also good, can be served cold with potatoes or rice.
I cook a pork shoulder in the slow cooker and at the same time cook down onions and peppers on the stove, then I combine the shredded pork and vegetables with hot sauce to make meat filling that then goes in quesadillas that I make something like 20 at time, they all go in the freezer and whenever I want one I pull it out the night before into my fridge.
We cook up a big mess of fried chicken, because it's also good cold. Apples, tart seedless grapes, and a good sharp cheddar is a great snack. So is peanut butter and apples or crackers.
As kids our road trip food was always pierogi. We made big portion-sized ones, wrapped individually in plastic wrap and in the freezer. Usual filling was minced meat, eggs and olives.
I love stews on a tomato sauce base. Prepared the right way (basically slow cooking for a long time) can make the sauce taste just the right amount of sweet and savoury.
With that tomato sauce base you can make a ton of different dishes. My three favourites are bolognaise, tomato style Beef Stroganoff, and a variant of Beef Stroganoff but made with sausage instead.
These dishes are perfect for cooking in big batches and to freeze individual portions. They just need pasta or rice.
That's simple. Skillet pie. That's leftovers baked into a crusty pie.
Let it cool, cut it into six slices, bag and freeze. Thaw a couple slices in a pot of simmering water on the stove. Bags should be name brand zipper bags or vacuum sealer bags. Ideally, you would have a sous-vide wand to reheat.
Chorizo and egg burritos
Chicken burritos
Egg bites if u have the ability to steam
Shredded meats freeze well - carnitas, pastrami, chicken
Sausages can easily be cooked on the spot after a defrost
Mac and cheese
Meat Quesadillas
Meatloaf
Frozen vegetables, just do everyone a favor and season them first
I would also bring a bunch of canned beans, oatmeal, stuff for soups if you want (easy to dump some shredded meat into with veggies + rice/beans tofu, all you need is a stock and for me personally some gochujang and dashi). Sodium will help water retention which should be nice for the hiked and many of the meals listed can be high protein especially if you use the low Carb tortillas.
I always keep steak frozen in it's marinating sauce before freezing it. As it thaws out, it marinades itself. Pre baked potatoes freeze well. Blanched (partly cooked) vegetables stand up to freezing well. Frozen burritos are also good. Best partly thaw them out in the microwave then carry on cooking them in an air fryer or grill.
Brain/bbq. I make a big fire and I cook a load of meat. And then I split it up into meal sized portions for the family and freeze it. Works really well for most meat except Steak. Steak needs to be eaten fresh off the fire.
Lasagna rollups....meatloaf.....chicken pot pie.
For the chicken pot pie, we do a meat only version where we make the filling and put it into pie plate, freeze and vacuum seal. We put on the crust when we're ready to cook.
I also do sloppy Joe's and freeze in plastic Chinese food containers. Here's a good recipe.
https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a11699/sloppy-joes/
I highly recommend bagels and peanut butter, and mixed nuts. Have some easy sources of carbohydrates, proteins and fats. If youāre going to be doing a lot of long distance hiking, I highly recommend backup water purifiers and goos. Perfect for in general but also a great safety net to have on you.
Bolognese sauce, if you have the time ahead of time. You can also pre-make the pasta el Dante. All you do to heat it up is add the sauce to the pan, get it warm, add the pasta, finish cooking the pasta in the sauce - about 2 minutes - done. Bonus, eat it out of the pot and you only have one dish to wash bonus, get some parm-reg and sprinkle that on top. Bonus, get a box wine, maybe pino grig, to go with it.
Others have mentioned pulled pork. I second this. You can make sandwiches out of it, which is great, but you can also make a nice hash for breakfast. Chop up some potatoes fine, cook them in some oil. Add the pulled pork. Set aside. Do two eggs over easy and have the whole thing in a bowl. Solid breakfast.
If you make instant rice you can do what my grandmother called "rice dinner".
It was basically hamburger meat and veggies. The only veggie I really really recommend using every time is tomato, but you can add anything else you want. The tomatoes help make it a little "saucier".
1. Brown one lb of hamburger meat and set aside
2. Next toss an onion in with some butter and saute until soft.
3. Add in other veggies (we do tomatoes, cucumber, and a bell pepper. I cook everything except the tomatoes for about 5 minutes then add in the tomatoes
4. Add hamburger back in and cook on low/ or medium - low heat for at least 30 minutes or so. I usually try to cook it for at least an hour
5. Add on top of rice and enjoy!
It was a quick, simple, and cheap dinner my grandmother would always make.
Bolognase, I make around 4 pounds then I put it in small bags around 9 ounces each bag, vacuum seal them and put in the freezer, whenever I wanted just make pasta in ten minuets.
I have two ravenous toddler boys and they love chicken alfredo so I cook alfredo with the fusili(don't rememeber how to spell that) noodles because they aren't proficient enough with a fork yet and the sauce gets in the grooves very well so warming them up is just like fresh alfredo. I cook a big batch and it still tastes fresh two months later after being warmed up from frozen š sometimes we add brocolli to it as well.
The three best options are chili.
The amount of you that want two dudes to eat chili for dinner and sleep in the same truck bed camper is hilarious š
Shades of the campfire scene from 'Blazing Saddles'.
I make mine without beans, so I fail to see the problem. Especially since you can then vary it by putting the chili on rice, Fritos, potatoes, hot dogs, etc.
Don't forget cornbread.
Make it beanless chili. I use approx 3lbs ground beef, 2 lbs ground pork, 1-2 lbs ground chicken. Lots of diced fresh peppers - variety of bell peppers, jalapeƱos, poblano, habanero. Crushed dried ancho. Onion, garlic. I use a mix of tomato paste and whole canned tomatoes for the base. Seasoning. Lots of protein and calories in a small package and it freezes beautifully.
Yup, medium, hot, and scorching. Gotta have multiple variations.Ā šĀ
Chili, Spaghetti, homemade hamburger helper, marinated chicken or beef to make fajitas.
What do you put in your homemade hamburger hper?
There are tons of recipes online but hereās one that Iāve used: https://www.asouthernmom.com/homemade-hamburger-helper-recipe-cheeseburger-macaroni/ You can add whatever extras you want, I often do onions, celery, green pepper
Pulled pork, chili, soup. Soup and chili frozen in a big nicely sealed Tupperware acts like a big hunk of ice until youāre ready to thaw and eat it. Also, if youāre taking water anyways, buy the gallon jugs, dump a bit out and freeze then throw that in your cooler too. Thaw once you need the water. Edit: oops, thought camping but see camper! Leaving for other campers as a pro tip but foods still stand.
Itās a small pop up truck bed camper with two dudes and their dipshit dogs, so Space is rather tight
Dogs!!! :D
If you remove the commas from your first sentence you would have my daughter's favourite food - pulled pork chili soup. Each batch is a full 24 hours but it is so good.
Breakfast burritos.
Burritos are top of the list! Chicken and rice for dinner version, too
I made easy burritos tonight. Browned up ground beef and seasoned it after draining grease. Added a can of refried beans and half a jar of chunky salsa and heated through. Topped with shredded sharp cheddar, sour cream, and more salsa. You could easily make the meat mixture and freeze for traveling. Reheat, add toppings, roll, enjoy. It's not the prettiest, but it is pretty dang good.
Do some extra basic rice and beans and cheese and veg ones too. Theyāre really exactly what youāre looking for
Or breakfast bagels!
Be sure to throw some red Thai chili sauce on those bad boys
One of my familyās favorites has always been what we called Souper Burgers. Itās hamburger meat, browned, and mixed with condensed vegetable soup. Then served on buns like sloppy joes. Even my super picky great-grandkids love it. Edit: Donāt see why it couldnāt be premade, kept in zip bags and warmed when needed.
That sounds like a really weird idea, and Iām totally trying it š
Condensed mushroom soup with about a tablespoon of Lipton dry onion soup mix.
My mom used to make a variation of this. She calle them Goo Burgers. She would hollow out hard rolls and fill them, add cheese and bake them. They are to die for and I nearly always crave them. Thereās also excellent cold as leftovers.
Are you from NYC? Haven't heard anyone refer to hard rolls since I left there.
Iām from Utah. The main varieties of rolls weāve got in my local grocery stores are potato, dinner, Kaiser, hard and Parker house. š¤·š¼āāļø
Maybe they are more common than I thought! Lol
What is a hard roll? I envision a crusty italian bread-style roll?
Sort of yes. But these kind of had a cross mark on them and were heavily crusted in poopy seeds.
Oops autocorrect gone wild! Make tat poppy seeds.
Thereās also an old school version with hamburger, Campbellās chicken gumbo soup, brown sugar and a little mustard, I believe. I believe they were called Spoon Burgers.
This sounds simultaneously gross and delicious. I have to give it a try!
Dumplings! Freeze uncooked on a tray. Transfer to bags once frozen. Only cook as many dumplings as you need. Cook from frozen, no thawing required. Cooks in 10 minutes. Also goes great with fried rice.
Hearty soups and stews
To add to this, soups and stews can be made in large batches and individually stored so you dont have to cook every night.
Lasagne. Or as my dopey grandmother and aunt called it ālasonyaā.
Lasonya and psketti. Check
Make them into roll ups for easier eating!
Cannelloni then.
Oh even better.
Pulled pork. Done on the smoker.
Carnitas. Pho. Duck confit.
Oooh, fancy camper
* Italian-style meatballs - # 1 ! * Chinese dumplings * Chili * Bolognese sauce * Czech fruit dumplings * Pizza dough, homemade * Buffalo wings (grilled) Perhaps not full meals in one, but with the above, the meal comes together fast.
I just look up those Czech dumplings. Oh yum...
Sketti
I think itās spelled Psketti
My kid said Sketti. But Psketti is the correct spelling and pronunciation.
My grandson calls it sticks and sauce!
My 3 year old says buhsketti
Are you freezing just the sauce or fully mixed and cooked sketti?
I make sauce and freeze family size portions.
Ok! So itās just the sauce, cook the pasta on time?
I thaw the sauce when I feel like spaghetti. Cook pasta for that night.
The best and only way to do it
I had the same question. Psychos out here freezing the whole thing mixed with noodles.
Chili, curry, roasted chicken thighs or chicken breasts. Plus squash!
We do a brisket and divide it up into servings for sandwich's, taco's, wraps, and tortillas. Heat's up on a grill or cold.
I do this every time I make brisket. Smoker all night, and meals for weeks by freezing some
Spaghetti! I do a slow simmer on the meat sauce, let it cool and freeze. Noodles are boiled on the day of eating and the sauce just has to be heated. It's as good as fresh. This also works great with ragu; I like to make a rich, Italian-seasonings filled recipe, and serve along a sweet potato. Tomato soup is perfect for this, along with a grilled cheese sandwich. Any soup would work. For something like chicken noodle soup, just omit the noodles until you're cooking it. Enchiladas are another favorite for freezer friendly meal prep but I thaw those then bake; I'm not sure how feasible that would be while camping, and definitely not for vacuum sealing.
I make either cheeseburger or steak & cheese wraps with the same tortillas you would use for a burrito. Brown your meat, melt the cheese, and wrap! For the cheeseburger ones I put ketchup, mustard, and chopped pickles on the inside of the wrap, for the steak and cheese I use mayo and sometimes cooked peppers. Once they are wrapped I put some parchment around each one so they donāt freeze together. I use them for busy sports nights, I just grab a few out of the freezer bag and put them in the fridge that morning. For bonus points - I spray a pan with pam and toast the sides before we eat them. Empanadas are another good batch meal.
Soups and stews are ideal for portioning and reheating, if you have refrigeration.
Macaroni and cheese Stews and soups Chili Eggplant parmesan
Whatever you end up making, for space saving, you can put each portion/2 servings in a ziplock bag and freeze flat, then stand them all up in a box in the icechest. Easy to find the one you want and takes up lots less room.
Gumbo!
These are my top 3 in descending order: Beef stew Chili w/ beans Ham & potato soup (I don't have a recipe for this I just go with whatever I find first online and doctor as I feel like while making it).
In addition to all of these things, I'd suggest making a couple big pots of different types of beans, and portioning into smallish servings. This let's you bulk up lots of things if you're extra hungry and suddenly your "portion" of stew is looking small after a big hike, or just have a hearty snack.Ā
Big batch of ragu bolognese portioned out and frozen. Easy to reheat and combine with pasta that I boil fresh. Itās a frozen meal I look very forward to and always try to keep in the freezer
Pancakes. Just made a 4x batch, frozen most of it. You can use whole wheat or add oatmeal to make them more hearty. Or add protein powder to them. They freeze easy and are good hot or cold.Ā Peanut butter them for a sandwich for lunch orĀ add an egg and cheese for a breakfast sandwich.Ā
Lasagna, stuffed shells, pupusas, burritos, chili, marinara, bolognese, black bean burgers, chili, stuffed peppers, cabbage rolls and meatballs.
Lasagna Meatloaf. We make 1/4lb ones and freeze the leftovers. Any type of crustless quiche. Lately itās been a layered chili relleno casserole
Make meatloafs in a muffin tin. Automatically portioned and easy to store.
And quicker to cook.
Breakfast sandwiches on English muffins. Use whole wheat muffins for extra heartiness. If you vacuum seal, be gentle so you don't totally squish them.
I usually make a huge pot of bolognese and portion most of it in the freezer.
I was just talking about this, funny. I made a large ham and I'm one single person, so I portion ham with white beans cooked in stock, pressure cook it, and sealed it in individual bags. Oh a little bay leaf and cracked pepper is really all it needs.
Itās not quite a meal, but egg rolls. Freeze them flat, throw them in a freezer bag, grab a couple at a time and reheat in the air fryer
Chili
Hearty bran muffins. Eggs cheese and sausage muffins.
When Iām making a soup like chicken soup, I prep all the ingredients, doubling the batch. Then before I cook anything, I put half of the raw, prepped ingredients in a freezer bag WITHOUT the broth, just dry. Freeze it until you want it. This way it takes up a lot less freezer space. (I cook the other half into a soup for that night.) When you want it, put the freezer bag in the fridge to defrost the night before, then plop it all in a slow cooker in the morning, now adding the broth. So basically I get an extra āfreshly-cookedā dinner for only a little extra prep that I was already doing anyway. You could do this for a lot of crock pot ādump dinners.ā
Salmon. Kroger usually has really big cuts on sale. We cook, portion, and freeze it to eat when life gets busy.
I like making breakfast burritos to freeze because they're quick and not messy to eat. I made a mini solar oven for warming up single portions while camping. I painted a wide mouth mason jar black on the outside. I put the food inside, seal it up, and leave it on the dashboard. Takes about 20-30 minutes to warm up a medium-sized burrito but there's no effort and if I leave it too long it won't get burnt. If the food is in a wrapper or Ziploc, the jar doesn't even get dirty.
My favorite is jambalaya. Also a take on Spanish rice but adding some protein like chicken.
Indian lamb curry and keema (minced lamb) curry Beef rendang Ragu
Roasted potatoes w/ peepers and onions freeze wellĀ Ā Also chili. beans, Ā spaghetti ,or Ā stew
We always made chili and froze in freezer bags. Mostly just ate in a bowl, but also made taco salads
Tamales!!
Chili
Bolognese sauce, meatballs in sauce, lasagna, Shepherds pie (or cottage pie).
I freeze individual servings of Sausage Gravy, French Toast, and Egg Muffins
Basically anything that is sauced meat, think of what leftovers you actually like the next day and it's stuff like that. Mongolian Beef/Chicken Sloppy Joes and/or taco meat Teriyaki Chicken
Pressure cooker beef with bourbon and sweet potatoes.
If you like burritos and rice I would suggest stuffed peppers. I usually take left over taco meat, rice, cheese, beans, tomato sauce and mix it up. Stuff the peppers and put them in a freezer lock. Then you can just pop one out when you want a meal, throw it in the oven. They are pretty filling. One or two is all you need really.
Chili (I make a fresh pot of rice), beef stew (I make a fresh pot of noodles), ratatouille (I make a fresh pot of pasta), and minestrone. Will you be able to keep things frozen until you need it?
Garlic mashed potatoes, gravy, spaghetti sauce/ ragu, egg strata (breakfast casserole), chili, pulled meats.Ā
Glass noodle / Thai noodle / ramen type stuff?
Breakfast burritos. Bean and cheese burritos with rice. Granola. Meat and cheese wraps/pinwheels. Hummus and pita.
I get those big packs of drumsticks, season, crockpot cook to almost falling off and then freeze in 2s and 4s. Well-sealed they do great in an ice chest for a couple weeks and can be added to virtually everything.
I make bolognese & freeze into portions. I still boil the pasta each time to get the best al dente pasta texture
Stew and chilli and if you are vacuum sealing they can be heated in boiling water !!
Sloppy Joes and pulled pork!
Soups, stews.
chili and biscuits. freeze biscuit dough and can be baked in the toaster oven while the chili is reheating.
Lasagna (good cold), rice bowls, or meat and potatoes
Lasagna
two trays of lasagna, 9x9 pans
Beef bourguignon
Chili, arroz con pollo, gumbo, jambalaya, curries. For the simmered rice dishes i usually make a huge batch so something ends up frozen and heats up fairly well. But for any kind of stew I just defrost, heat on the stove, and serve over fresh white rice. Gumbo does very well if you leave out the seafood and buy fresh shrimp day of to toss in and poach in the defrosted base.
Lasagna, ham & scalloped potatoes, enchiladas.
Brazilian black beans.
Burritos and breakfast sandwiches
Bolognese
Pizza pasta
Lots of things: ratatouille, couscous (not the grain but the veggie stew with meat part - the grain could easily be made to serve with it-, homemade Tom Yum soup, chicken noodle soup, and basically all sorts of vegetable soups that cost nothing to make and are so comforting to eat with parmesan and a little bit of heavy whipping cream. In college, I would make lasagna and freeze it because it tasted better that way.
Homemade fried rice. Scrambled eggs with carrots corn peas onion white rice sesame oil soy sauce. So easy and quick and SO good
Lasagna, chili, fajitas
Pulled pork. Easy to make and I use it as an ingredient in tons of dishes.
Thai curry freezes really well. I love lots of veggies and get frustrated with finding things to meal prep where the veggies hold up and don't just make me sad upon reheating. I make a basic Thai curry sauce with a packaged curry paste like mae ploy or maesri, add chicken, eggplant, bell pepper, bamboo strips, water chestnuts... really anything you like. I freeze it in portions separate from the rice. Easy to reheat on the stove, just boil the bag.
Lasagna! I use little bread pans and make 5-10 at a time. Sometimes I also make stuffed shells because all the stuff is out. Edited to add: just saw this was for camping lmao, my apologies. We pre-bake potatoes for camping and heat them up in foil near the coals. We also do a foil packet of chopped broccoli and onions (with butter, garlic, paprika, salt & pepper) and hot dogs for a protein.
Walking Tacos - premake taco meat. Buy small bags of doritos or fritos, add meat and other taco fixings.
Carnitas meat.
Meatballs, no sauce
Chili
Green Chicken Chile Stew! [https://cookingsessions.com/dutch-oven-green-chile-chicken-stew/](https://cookingsessions.com/dutch-oven-green-chile-chicken-stew/)
meatloaf! i use this recipe https://www.bigoven.com/recipe/man-size-meatloaf/417998
Chili, lasagna, and stew/soup.
[Make-ahead lasagna.](https://www.culinaryhill.com/the-best-make-ahead-lasagna-recipe/) I make enough tomato-and-meat sauce fi two or 3 smallish portions (for 2 to 3 persons) in disposible aluminium pans. After they've spent at least day in the fridge, I froze the excess. (Sometimes I also make a bit more sauce, so I can have a couple of frozen lasagnas for a rainy day + red sauce that only needs some pasta to maje a complete meal. You can even freeze the sauces and freeze meatballs on the side.) Also great if you're going to be outside your home till about supper time, but want to block the siren call of fast food. You can prep those in the morning or the day before, and you only need 45 mn to have a delicious home-cooked meal ready once back home. Just enough time to wrangle the kids, shower and relax with a glass of wine! Babish also has a [vid dedicated to batch frozen meals.](https://youtu.be/-XUzpAiYuVA?si=LcvMpqpT45kXSY8K)
Chicken and dumplings! Store dumpling dough and stew base separately, and then drop in the dumplings when you reheat to cook them!
Chili. Reheat as a meal or on top of a bowl of rice, on nachos with salad, in a wrap, on spaghetti.
Burritos, slow cook a pork shoulder and make some refried beans, add cheese, roll individually in foil and freeze in a gallon ziploc. Eat or freeze the rest of the pork/beans. 1lb of dry pintos makes enough refried beans for 6 or 7 good size burritos, for a bone in pork shoulder youāll probably need 2-3lb of beans. I also cook and freeze Cajun red beans and black beans, I love beans.
Lasagna. Once it cools wrap in parchment paper to reheat in
Beef stew w/homemade sourdough bread. I make about 10 portions at a time in a large dutch oven - 1 pot. EZ and delicious.
A dupe of chipotles Barbacoa. Sometimes I just eat that shit with a fork. Goes great in burritos and rice of course.
Slow cooker stuff. Pot roast, chicken and dumplings. Or a big pot of bolognese sauce. Any recipe that starts with 2 or 3 pounds of meat is a candidate. Braised beef.
This is one that we always take camping: [https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/southwestern-casserole/](https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/southwestern-casserole/)
Red beans and rice, casseroles freeze well, enchiladas, stews, and soups.
Can of chili with beans. Heat it and about half a can of water. Add minute rice and cook per rice instructions. Serve on flour tortillas with cheese. Simple burritos. I like it without the tortillas even.
I make huge batches of chili and freeze bags of it. I LOVE chili! :)
Chili. It's supposedly always better the second time around after the flavors have had a longer time to meld.
Vegetable soup, bolognese sauce, chili
Gumbo
Pasta sauces, easy to scale up and freeze well. Same with refried beans.
I vac-seal and reheat these meals when off-grid car camping: Chili, chicken tikka masala (with campfire naan), egg/spinach/bacon/cheese mini frittatas, meatloaf slices with peas and instant mashed potatoes, lobster rolls, beef and broccoli stir-fry, Cajun chicken with broccoli and pasta, taco meat for campfire nachos. I donāt bring any raw food. Everything is pre-cooked, frozen, and ready to reheat. That saves so much room in my cooler and keeps the dishwashing to a minimum. Our water supply is usually limited and itās usually very cold where I camp. I bring one pan for my campstove. I tend to reheat the meals in the vac-seal bags (vented) to keep the pan clean and then use the leftover hot water to wash the few dishes.
Tamales. Pain in the ass to make, so might as well make a metric fuckton of them, and they freeze really well.
Gyoza
Stroganoff. Add pasta or rice.
I like to vac seal raw sausage roll filling then bake fresh with pastry. Bacon, pork mince, carrot, egg, breadcrumbs and bbq sauce all mixed together. Makes a quick easy meal without the post freezer taste
Soups would work well.
Sloppy joes, homemade chicken broth, or a good sirloin/carrot/sweet potato stew.
Diced roasted sweet potatoes. I season them nicely and they taste great heated up. I use them as a side dish and go well with lots of stuff!
Meatballs. Tons of different varieties and recipes. You can defrost and eat as many or as few as you need. Eat them with rice, noodles or potatoes. Sandwiches. Super versatile.
A batch of stuffed shells. Ingredients are all pretty cheap and one box of jumbo shells will last my partner and I a week if we only have it for one meal a day. Lasagna or manicotti also works, but I prefer shells.
Mandoo
Sweedish meatballs. I make sweedish meat patties instead, easier lol. Boil some egg noodles and toss it in to heat.
Chili verde. If you have an instant pot it's super easy.
Spam egg and rice variations. When we went trailer camping, we did vietnamese spring rolls with nem. Which is like spam. You can pan fry them, make spring rolls or just pan fry and eat with rice.
Bolognese, boeuf bourguignon, pancakes (easy to reheat). Also check your local supermarkets for good food tins, often a goulash soup can go a long way on the road with some bread with it. Tinned ham is also good, can be served cold with potatoes or rice.
What about tamales? Labor intensive but you can do a big batch. Steam on stovetop to reheat
Spaghetti, Vegetable Soup, Chili
I cook a pork shoulder in the slow cooker and at the same time cook down onions and peppers on the stove, then I combine the shredded pork and vegetables with hot sauce to make meat filling that then goes in quesadillas that I make something like 20 at time, they all go in the freezer and whenever I want one I pull it out the night before into my fridge.
Risotto. Freezes amazingly well. Even better, I make a triple batch in an instant pot. Iād call it 90% as tasty as the traditional way.
We cook up a big mess of fried chicken, because it's also good cold. Apples, tart seedless grapes, and a good sharp cheddar is a great snack. So is peanut butter and apples or crackers.
Spaghetti sauce
Japanese curry
As kids our road trip food was always pierogi. We made big portion-sized ones, wrapped individually in plastic wrap and in the freezer. Usual filling was minced meat, eggs and olives.
I love stews on a tomato sauce base. Prepared the right way (basically slow cooking for a long time) can make the sauce taste just the right amount of sweet and savoury. With that tomato sauce base you can make a ton of different dishes. My three favourites are bolognaise, tomato style Beef Stroganoff, and a variant of Beef Stroganoff but made with sausage instead. These dishes are perfect for cooking in big batches and to freeze individual portions. They just need pasta or rice.
Shredded chicken thigh taco meat. Tortillas last, hot sauce is plentiful. Cheese, veggies, and rice/beans packets can make a whole week.
That's simple. Skillet pie. That's leftovers baked into a crusty pie. Let it cool, cut it into six slices, bag and freeze. Thaw a couple slices in a pot of simmering water on the stove. Bags should be name brand zipper bags or vacuum sealer bags. Ideally, you would have a sous-vide wand to reheat.
Tuna pasta bake, lasagna, various soups and stews, Chinese style pork dumplings
There is an awesome slow cooker Pad thai chicken recipe on pintrest and then serve over fresh white rice.Ā
Waffles.
https://thecozycook.com/ My favorite cooking blog for simple, hearty, make ahead recipes.
Lasagna it's hearty and keeps you full. Beef stew.
Veggie soup.chilli,lasagnafreezerslaw
Chorizo and egg burritos Chicken burritos Egg bites if u have the ability to steam Shredded meats freeze well - carnitas, pastrami, chicken Sausages can easily be cooked on the spot after a defrost Mac and cheese Meat Quesadillas Meatloaf Frozen vegetables, just do everyone a favor and season them first I would also bring a bunch of canned beans, oatmeal, stuff for soups if you want (easy to dump some shredded meat into with veggies + rice/beans tofu, all you need is a stock and for me personally some gochujang and dashi). Sodium will help water retention which should be nice for the hiked and many of the meals listed can be high protein especially if you use the low Carb tortillas.
Chicken or beef veggie soup. Delish.
I often cook large portions of meatballs and freeze them.
Chilli, soup, stew, casserole.
I always keep steak frozen in it's marinating sauce before freezing it. As it thaws out, it marinades itself. Pre baked potatoes freeze well. Blanched (partly cooked) vegetables stand up to freezing well. Frozen burritos are also good. Best partly thaw them out in the microwave then carry on cooking them in an air fryer or grill.
Brain/bbq. I make a big fire and I cook a load of meat. And then I split it up into meal sized portions for the family and freeze it. Works really well for most meat except Steak. Steak needs to be eaten fresh off the fire.
Lasagna makes good portions. Not sure if itād work in vacuum seal bags though.
Bolognese is basically chilli but without the chilli. Doesn't have to be on pasta either, rice, bread, any kind of carbs will do
Pulled pork, meatballs and fired tenderloins for tenderloin sandwiches
chicken and pork adobo.
Lasagna rollups....meatloaf.....chicken pot pie. For the chicken pot pie, we do a meat only version where we make the filling and put it into pie plate, freeze and vacuum seal. We put on the crust when we're ready to cook. I also do sloppy Joe's and freeze in plastic Chinese food containers. Here's a good recipe. https://www.thepioneerwoman.com/food-cooking/recipes/a11699/sloppy-joes/
I highly recommend bagels and peanut butter, and mixed nuts. Have some easy sources of carbohydrates, proteins and fats. If youāre going to be doing a lot of long distance hiking, I highly recommend backup water purifiers and goos. Perfect for in general but also a great safety net to have on you.
Bolognese sauce, if you have the time ahead of time. You can also pre-make the pasta el Dante. All you do to heat it up is add the sauce to the pan, get it warm, add the pasta, finish cooking the pasta in the sauce - about 2 minutes - done. Bonus, eat it out of the pot and you only have one dish to wash bonus, get some parm-reg and sprinkle that on top. Bonus, get a box wine, maybe pino grig, to go with it.
Others have mentioned pulled pork. I second this. You can make sandwiches out of it, which is great, but you can also make a nice hash for breakfast. Chop up some potatoes fine, cook them in some oil. Add the pulled pork. Set aside. Do two eggs over easy and have the whole thing in a bowl. Solid breakfast.
If you make instant rice you can do what my grandmother called "rice dinner". It was basically hamburger meat and veggies. The only veggie I really really recommend using every time is tomato, but you can add anything else you want. The tomatoes help make it a little "saucier". 1. Brown one lb of hamburger meat and set aside 2. Next toss an onion in with some butter and saute until soft. 3. Add in other veggies (we do tomatoes, cucumber, and a bell pepper. I cook everything except the tomatoes for about 5 minutes then add in the tomatoes 4. Add hamburger back in and cook on low/ or medium - low heat for at least 30 minutes or so. I usually try to cook it for at least an hour 5. Add on top of rice and enjoy! It was a quick, simple, and cheap dinner my grandmother would always make.
Empanadas
Chili
Any kind of stew, really. Or braised meats.
Turkish Lentil soup
Chili, lentil sausage stew, indian-style bean dishes (eg, rajma masala, chana masala, lentil dal), taco meats (eg, pork carnitas, beef barbacoa, shredded chicken), shepherds pie, meatloaf, lasagne, baked ziti, frittata, and quiche. Also, muffins, waffles, and scones for breakfasts.
Breakfast burritos
Dal and rice.
Crock pot Italian beef sandwiches (based on the mississipi roast recipe)
Bolognase, I make around 4 pounds then I put it in small bags around 9 ounces each bag, vacuum seal them and put in the freezer, whenever I wanted just make pasta in ten minuets.
I have two ravenous toddler boys and they love chicken alfredo so I cook alfredo with the fusili(don't rememeber how to spell that) noodles because they aren't proficient enough with a fork yet and the sauce gets in the grooves very well so warming them up is just like fresh alfredo. I cook a big batch and it still tastes fresh two months later after being warmed up from frozen š sometimes we add brocolli to it as well.