I Love Wood Smoke

We went camping for the sake of the children.  They loved it.  The adults were charmed by their love, but rather overwhelmed by the amount of stuff camping requires as well as the relentless rain.  Lest you pity us, we were in a rough little cabin in a campground, not a tent in the wilderness.  There was running water nearby - lots of it in the stream, from the sky, and yes, importantly, in the bath house.

I am writing this blog post while sniffing my camping sweatshirt - I am loathe to wash the scent of wood smoke out of it.

My notes from last time were really useful.

More notes and menus for next time:

1. Tea lights in pint jars are lovely for atmosphere, especially on rainy days, but don't give out much light.
2. An extra bowl and an extra serving spoon are helpful.
3. Mug for every person, not just adults, because hot drinks are nice in chilly weather.  Must have hot drinks like hot chocolate and hot tea in addition to coffee.
4. Whatever vessel is used over the fire will be covered in black soot - good to borrow from camping friends or else get a dedicated pot from a thrift store.  Used my own cast iron frying pan, of course, and took along an old grate from a grill.
5.  Cold cereal and granola are a great camping breakfast because it's easy to be crabby in the morning when you're hungry in an unfamiliar space and trying to start a fire and then cook over the fire.  Much better to move those delicious cooked breakfasts to another meal (see frittata below) and just get everyone fed.
6. An extra bag is helpful - this time it was used for the abundant dirty, wet clothes.
7.  Chop and slice the onions at home so there's no need to take the big chef knife.  I only took a paring knife and a cutting board, which also doubled as a trivet.

Menus:

kielbasa on sticks over fire
buns/ketchup/mustard
popcorn (made at home)

mushroom/Swiss/onion fritatta (ended up scrambling that because the fire was too hot and the eggs were getting too dark on the bottom)
baked beans (home canned)
grilled asparagus over the fire
s'mores

fried fish (filets dipped in cornmeal and Old Bay) - squeeze of lemon
foil packets in the coals with potatoes, onions, olive oil, s&p (note:  triple-wrap the foil!!)
grilled asparagus over the fire
s'mores

hummus
daily bread
carrots
popcorn
s'mores

both breakfasts:
junky cereal that the kids chose rapturously in the discount grocery store
granola
yogurt/milk
strawberries
coffee in the percolator (this was the only appliance we brought along; well, we brought our in-laws' camp stove, too, out of fear of the rain, but managed to cook almost entirely over the fire)

extra snacks:  spicy peanuts, chocolate chip oatmeal peanut butter cookies (made at home), apples

Also interesting to observe:  we gave the children each $3 at the beginning of the vacation and told them not to ask us for treats, that they could control that money and buy their own treats at the camp store.  My, how they obsessed over the money!  Sometimes they appeared to make plans, and other times it was sheer impulse.  They spent it down to the last penny (Tootsie Rolls cost $.01) with lots of drama and junk along the way.  Ben finally got his wish to stick a dollar bill in a soda machine.  I truly hope that is not the highlight of his camping experience.