Camping breakfast ideas

What’s the best breakfast for camping? It really depends on your style. Breakfast on a camping trip can range from a no-frills experience to a full gourmet feast. Fortunately, most breakfast foods—not to mention coffee—have a magical way of tasting extra yummy after a night in a tent! Read on for camping breakfast ideas.

Easy camping breakfasts

• Pastries and muffins with fruit
• Bagels with cream cheese (bring smoked salmon for added yum factor)
• Cereal or granola with milk (cow, soy, almond, etc.) and sliced bananas (toss in nuts for extra protein)
• Fruit salad made with yogurt and a selection of canned or pre-sliced fruit
• Croissant sandwich made with hard-boiled eggs, sliced cheese, and possibly ham
• Instant oatmeal with raisins or dried blueberries or, if you want to be a tad more ambitious, diced apple with cinnamon and your favorite nuts
• For a no-cook breakfast with gourmet taste, try these overnight oats
• Or try these cook-ahead healthy oatmeal/apple bars

Cooked breakfasts

• A cast iron pan is the foundation for a number of recipes for those seeking a homey breakfast
• We like this list of simple recipes for camping breakfasts
• For pancakes, the easiest strategy is to bring pre-made pancake batter in a sealed bottle stored in the cooler
• Dutch baby pancakes are a scrumptious alternative to regular pancakes
• For a breakfast that will be a big hit with kids, try campfire bread. Using either homemade dough or biscuit dough from a can, stretch and wrap the dough around one end of a long, clean stick, sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar, grill above heat. Here’s a more refined recipe.

How to cook eggs when camping

• Eggs can break in the cooler if you’re not careful (or even if you are), but you can try an egg holder like this one (try lining with a paper towel and placing inside a bag just in case eggs do break)
• You can bring whole eggs by placing them in a wide-mouthed, sealable container filled with cold water
• According to a variety of sources, eggs don’t keep safely once scrambled for more than a few hours, even if they’re kept chilled
• For added safety, scramble eggs the night before you leave and freeze them in a sealable pouch like a Stasher bag (you can toss in some shredded cheese and other omelet-type fixings, too); at camp the next morning, heat the eggs inside the bag in a pot of boiling water for 10-15 minutes, sloshing them around from time to time for even cooking
• Another option is to cook eggs beforehand and reheat them in the pan (particularly if you’re making an egg sandwich, no one will notice that the eggs aren’t fresh-cooked)

Camping coffee

• Easy options for coffee include:
  • Bring cans of iced coffee, or bring a jug of cold-brewed coffee to which you can add your own milk or half and half
  • Bring instant coffee and simply add hot water
    • Add hot chocolate for a “mocha” if you instant coffee isn’t up to your normal standards
    • Check out this list of the best instant coffees for backpacking
    • Or give this instant latte a shot: Alpine Start Dirty Chai Latte Instant Coffee
  • Try single-serve coffee bags, such as those from Steeped Coffee
• Coffee connoisseurs may prefer bringing fresh beans in an airtight container, grinding them at camp, and brewing in one of these ways:
  • Cone with paper filter
  • Coffee dripper with nylon filter
  • Aeropress
  • Percolator – see a list of good camping options here
  • French press – a list of camping-friendly choices is here
  • Or if you want to feel like a genuine outdoorsperson, try cowboy coffee: bring water to a boil, remove from heat and add two tablespoons of ground coffee for every 8 ounces of water; stir, wait for about two minutes, stir again, wait two more minutes, and then add a splash of cold water to settle the grounds