Choosing Camp Meals

[SctDad]

Has anyone out there let the Cub Scouts choose what they want for camp meals. So far we have chosen meals that most of the boys have liked. But we still have parents that like to go and get food elsewhere.

 

So have you let the boys decide, and what was your results?

[SSScout]

SctDad: Merry Christmas...

Sounds like you are already letting the parents choose THEIR camp meals...

Just like at home... a balance of what the Cubs WILL eat (let'em choose?) and what's nutritious and worth eating (parents choose).

Reference Bill Cosby's breakfast routine ("read the ingredients on the box! Chocolate Cake! Eggs! That's good! Flour! Milk! Flour's good! Breakfast food!") but not all cake...

Convince the parents that THEY need to show cooperation, and eat with the Cubs. Can't go out to Tom and Ray's and order crabcakes to go.

Our hard choices have involved religious requirements (vegetarian vs omnivorous) rather than picky eaters. But parents can be picky too, I guess?

 

Boy Scouts, on the other hand, need guidance too. General camp food Troop rules: no soda pop, no donuts or pastry for breakfast, vegetables and or fruit at lunch and dinner, but still can't forcibly make'm eat it.

 

Bon Apetit!

 

 

[shortridge]

Don't forget to mix in (maybe by executive fiat?) some fun stuff the Cubs can mostly do themselves - hobo dinners, pita pizzas, egg-in-an-orange peel.

[SctDad]

we only really had a few complaints last time. One boy was a vegitarian, so we expected that. SOme of the others did not like what we had. It was a new soup, but the soup was gone by the end of the meal. For those who did not like it, their parents had a back up. The only other one that we had a problem with was a sibling, that is becoming a problem for other reasons too. She thinks that she can do and say everything/anything she wants. I talked with her father and she was not really expected to be there. But that is a whole other issue, for a future post.

 

I guess that if we hav ethe boys make their own menu then there is little room for complaints. Not to mention, the next campout is at a council camp and there is not a whole lot around for food. SO they will be kind sttuck.

[Twocubdad]

Are the parents getting food for themselves or for their Scouts? Not that it really makes much difference. We used to have over-indulgent parents who would bring special food for their kid, but the menu was what the menu was. Food was included in the cost of the campout, so if you didn't want to eat that was your decision.

 

I don't recall that we let the Cubs select the menu. The pack always provided the food and cooked as a group. It was not uncommon for us to have 100-150 people on a campout, so the menu was generally built around our ability to feed that number of people cooking in the woods.

 

Even with those numbers, we still had a fairly sophisticated menu. One dad had a 3x4-foot piece of steel cut we used as a griddle and could cook pancakes for 100 people in 20 minutes. We mixed batter in a 5-gallon bucket with a cordless drill and paint paddle. One year all the boys made hobo dinners and we used the same ingredients to make a really nice beef stew for the adults. We always included 4-5 Dutch oven cobblers for dessert later around the campfire. For breakfast once we had an "oatmeal bar" with maybe 12 different toppings -- chocolate chips, fruit, different jams, syrup, brown sugar, etc. That was fun because most of the boys initially turned up their noses at the oatmeal until they tasted it. None of them had ever had real, cooked oatmeal. They thought we were giving them the instant, microwave gruel they were used to. They went nuts when they tried the real deal.

 

The point is that even though we had a bunch of people to feed, we tried to set the bar pretty high and set a good example for the Scouts. Now, 6-8 years later, the Boy Scouts still talk about some of the meals we had as Cubs. I wish I could say the Boy Scouts have taken the lead and now cook great campout meals, but every now and again we see a flash of effort. You never know when a seed will sprout.

[ScoutNut]

We have never asked the Cubs to choose the meals at our Pack campouts.

 

We ask parents to list allergies on the health form we require. We also ask them to list on the permission slip any foods that their kids absolutely can not, or will not, eat. Then the adults planning the campouts decide on the menus.

 

Families are not allowed to bring extra snacks and keep them in their tents. Parents are not allowed to make a Mickey D run. Everyone eats what is there. If there is something they don't particularly like, they simply eat more of the stuff they do like. We usually have lots of food and no one has ever gone hungry.

 

Once the kids get out hiking and playing outside all day, they are hungry, and would eat just about anything, and think it was wonderful!

[Stosh]

As far as eating things they don't like, many times we have prepared multiple dutch oven dishes, one with onions and one without, only to toss out 75% of the one without. We quit that practice and now the boys eat what they request. Only adjustments that are made are for allergies.

 

As my mamma used to say, "there's peanut butter and jelly in the cupboard and you can check with the neighbors to see what they're serving, otherwise, sit down and eat your supper."

 

Stosh

[perdidochas]

For the most part, our meal planning for Cub Scouts is either each family brings food for themselves, or we plan a kid-friendly den or pack meal--i.e. usually hot dogs/chili/and the fixings.

[HobcawChaos]

For our Webelos-aged GS troop, they design their menu for a camp-out with leader input where needed. I.e. wanting pancakes for breakfast will need a couple of camp stoves going and may take a few turns through the line but if you're okay with that then no problem. On the other hand, a request to make fried chicken (over a fire!!!) and macaroni and cheese was leader-modified to a souped-up boxed macaroni and cheese and pre-cooked chicken one-pot over the fire. Still not my personal first choice but after a long hike, they devoured it! Very good dutch oven cobbler for desert, too.

[AnneinMpls]

Hi Hobcaw!

Our Junior GS very successfully made fried chicken in a dutch oven - the only problem was to make sure they fried all of the chicken - they made enough to start eating, and then thought they could sit down and eat Nope - made them get up and get the rest of it cooked up!

 

When we're camping by patrols (which is most of the time) I have each patrol use a different cooking method, based on that patrol's experience with outdoor cooking and what they want to do. That way I'm not stretched thin supervising dutch ovens all over camp - the varied cooking methods means that two patrols won't be needing me at the same time. For example, while I'm working with girls at the dutch oven, the other patrol was making camp lasagna using the campstoves that they are very familiar with so needing very little supervision. If we had had a third patrol at that camp, they would likely be a group of fairly new girls so would keep their meal prep very simple.

 

(I was quite wary of doing fried chicken in the dutch oven, but then realized most of the girls in that patrol regularly made fried chicken for their families on the stove top at home, so were already familiar with being safe around hot oil, so it was only the specifics of working with the dutch oven that were totally new.)

 

Have fun!

Anne in Mpls

[HobcawChaos]

Hey Annie! I've never considered fried chicken in a dutch oven....just got scared about the oil. Guess we'll have to give it a go now! We usually cook in patrols, too, but with each patrol responsible for cooking a given meal - another on clean-up, another on fire-tending. Your chefs sound more advanced than mine. At the fall campout, one fifth grader cracked an egg for the first time?!?!?! But watching her patrol mates teach her and seeing the smile on her face....PRICELESS!

[AnneinMpls]

LOL!

Most of the girls in our troop do a lot of cooking for their families (inner city, mostly single moms, lots of younger siblings).

BUT, this year I have a girl in the troop whose mom has never let her do anything in the kitchen - she's also the type to jump in with both feet. This resulted in her attempting to layer a lasagna on a papertowel laid on the picnic table, instead of in the dutch oven Where was I? Helping the younger patrol at the campstove )

When we're cooking indoors, we tend to have each patrol responsible for cooking a meal for the whole troop because the cooking space is limited. But outdoors, if you can separate patrols in their own areas, you can effectively triple the amount of cooking experience each girl will get on an overnight.

 

(Really sorry - just realized I totally hijacked this thread!)

 

Ok, back on topic...

I think an easy way to get some Cub input into the menu would be to list "doable meals" (meals the pack leadership will be happy enough with), then have cubs vote for their top 2 or 3 or whatever you need for the overnight. Pancakes tend to always win for breakfast - maybe offer choice of juices or milk, and bacon or sausages.

 

Anne, cold and snowy in Mpls

[Vicki]

Speaking of the looks on their faces - when the new guys notice that I just took a pancake, a little bit of syrup, a sausage link, rolled it all up, and had breakfast with no dishes!

 

Priceless.

Vicki

[Bob White]

Scouting is a teaching/learning experience. I have always let the scouts decide their meals on a campouts in Cub Scouts and in Boy Scouts. But we also taught them to make good decisions.

 

First we teach them that anything that you can prepare at home in a kitchen you can prepare on a campout.

 

Then we ask them about their favorite foods and favorite meals.

 

Then we teach them about balaned diets .

 

Finally we have them make a menu of some favorite meals that include a balanced diet using the food groups.

 

They eat properly, they eat meals they like, and they learn good health habits.

 

It's a youth program, teaching them to make good decisions and then letting them practice is what we do.

 

What do they learn fron having adults make more decisions for them?

 

 

 

 

[AnneinMpls]

Bobwhite, I don't think I've ever said this to you before,

You'd make the perfect Girl Scout leader! (Hope you know that's high praise!)

 

In my not-vast experience, I've seen Cub Packs tend to be very adult-led, making the transition to Boy Scouts a little trickier than if they utilized a transitioning of what we in GS call the Girl/Adult Partnership, with girls taking increasing responsibility as they age in the program.

 

Because Cub Packs tend ot be very large, I think from a practical standpoint it's tricky to get Cub input - do you do the brainstorming at a pack meeting, or do dens tend to cook for themselves - if this is the case, then it all works out about the same as patrol cooking. But in my not-vast experience, meals tend to be done up for the pack as a whole - not sure how to do boy-designed menus if you've got a pack of 40 or 50 - do you have some tips to share on how to do that practically?

Anne in Mpls