Monday, June 16, 2008

Camp Oven Tea

First you need a camp oven. These can be bought from camping and outdoor shops and are usually made of cast iron. Ours is home made by Fisherman out of a cut down stainless steele beer keg. It's quite a bit larger than the standard ones you buy, and we are thinking of getting one of those. This one is great for feeding a crowd but a bit big for just the family.
We light a fire (didn't show you a photo of that, I'm pretty sure you have all seen a fire before!) and let it burn down to hot coals. Then dig a hole and put some hot coals in the bottom.


Then we put the bottom half of the camp oven in, add some water in the bottom of that to keep the meat moist and sit the meat on top of a rack. Here we have chicken, beef and lamb ready to be slow roasted.


Here you can see Fisherman putting the lid on and making sure it is sealed.


Then he puts some more hot coals on top. It takes about 4 hours for the meat to roast and Fisherman checks it every now and again. If its cooking too fast he takes some coals away, too slow means he adds some more.



And there you go. It's pretty simple really. I meant to take a photo of the finished product but I got side tracked with eating it! You can cook almost anything in a camp oven. I have steamed puddings, made lovely slow cooked casseroles and some lovely damper.

We all enjoyed our dinner and the lovely time of sitting outside around a camp fire on a cold winters night. The weather was calm and clear which was just perfect. We got the kids to make banana dream boats for dessert which they all enjoyed. For those of you who don't know you make a banana dream boat by slitting the banana down the middle (with the skin still on) poking alternate marshmallows and chocolate squares in the slit, then wrapping it in alfoil. Then you put in in the hot coals to let the banana go all squishy and the chocolate and marshmallows melt all through it. Served with icecream it's really really really yummy. Not to mention extremely bad for you! But sometimes its best not to think about that!

6 valued opinions!:

Kelly said...

Wow - that is really neat. Thanks for sharing. Glad you all had a fun time. I hope Pink enjoyed her friends and that she is on the road to happy days.

Anonymous said...

I am drooling just reading your post! Mmmm bet it tasted so nice too especially on a cool winters night!
Glad you forgot to take photos because you were enjoying the meal with your friends and family too!
Lynette

Lelia Chealey said...

Oh this was the wrong post for this dieting girl to read!!! :)
Sounds so yummy!!! ALL of it!

Joanie said...

Delightful! Thanks for remembering to take pictures as I always enjoy getting a 'peak' into your life there... What a blessing for all of you! I can only imagine how tasty the meal was.

I remember having banana boats as a kid. YUM! Haven't thought about them in a long time, as my family doesn't eat bananas. (Nicholas will only have one in his fruit smoothie).

I'm laughing at your description of a clear, cool winter evening. If you laid your temperatures over our spring/going into summer temperatures - there are nearly identical! Our daytime highs should be 7-10 degrees higher than yours... No wonder our local strawberry crops are so far behind this year! It's finally been in the low 70's here (guess that's about 21 celsius). Your winters are quite mild.

It's sunny here today. Nicholas and I are picking Elizabeth up from work at 3:00pm and going to Alki Beach - a popular place in Seattle. I'll take the camera along and share our little outing later.

Thanks again for sharing! It's such a gift and blessing for me. God is so good. It's really about the little things...

Leah Adams said...

We do the same sort of thing with a cast iron dutch oven when we are camping. Makes great fruit cobblers!!

Love it!!

Leah

HisPrincess said...

Kelly, yes she still has down days but overall is on the mend.

Lynette, the meal was fabulous! Just rubbing it in a little more!

Lelia, how is the diet going? No more chocolate frosting? ;)

Joanie, yes our winter is quite mild, but summer certainly isn't! Our climate is comparable to the meditteranean. Just perfect in my humble opinion! I don't like the cold much.

Leah, I haven't tried a fruit cobbler in the camp oven. Great idea!