June was filled with car camping trips for us. We kicked June off by bouncing around Bend, then camping at Timothy Lake on Mt. Hood, Orcas Island in the San Juan’s and finished out the month camping along the McKenzie River Highway. This weekend we’re headed to Big Sur, Pinnacles National Park and Santa Cruz, CA. Each trip is a little different but here is how I break up my main approach to figuring out GF Camping Life and adjust as needed by the trip. Figuring out how to bring all of your GF food can be stressful so I break it down into smaller steps for myself so I am less overwhelmed. First, I start with the basics, coffee. Then go from there.
1.The Coffee/Tea/Additional Drink of Choice Operation
Decide what additional drink you would like to make and then what is needed to make it. Sounds simple but when adding on how to make it safe so you don’t accidentally get glutened it can be a little more stressful. I’m a coffee drinker. So I have two approaches to making coffee while camping.
First approach, this Small Stainless Steel French Press. this is what I will take when going on longer trips and even when staying in houses. I grind up the coffee while at home and then just pour it in. I boil the water using my Jetboil.
Second approach, the JetBoil french press attachment. This is a game changer when backpacking. You just boil water, pour the grounds right into your JetBoil and use the little attachment to press down.
2. Dinner Ideas
There are a wide range of safe GF camping meals to make. Since I cook everyday I like to have everything made ahead of time prior to camping so that I can just pull something out and heat it up and will be good to go.
Lately, I have been using these BFree Wraps and making breakfast burritos for the first night days breakfast and a veggie bean burrito for the first night. I make them the day before the trip, wrap in foil and freeze them and then stick them in my own cooler and I just heat them up in the fire pit when I’m ready to eat. I am weary of using the grill cover on fire pits to cook because I know people put buns directly on those so, I just make sure I’m the first one cooking and actually stick the wraps on the hot coals inside the fire pit and use tongs to rotate it. The wraps hold up very nicely.
For the second night, I have been eating these Grand Teton hot dogs with UDI’s buns. I will also make a quinoa salad or salad of some sort ahead of time to go along with it.
3. Snacks & Drinks
Car Camping is all about those little luxuries you can bring with you outside. I make sure to bring my favorite snacks along with me. I will bring some sort of bag of chips to eat. Along with some fruit that I end up eating for breakfast. Sometimes I make a fruit salad ahead of time so that I can bust it out when needed.
For drinks I always bring some sort of GF Beer or Cider. Lately I have been loving Ghostfish’s Blonde Ale. Its very easy to drink while camping.
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