Beating a dead horse-whipping instant mashed potatoes

[David Tilston]

Originally Posted by Glenn Baglo

I didn't know cats were edible.

My mom taught English in China for five years. She ate at restaurants frequently. Near the start of her residence there, she was concerned when ordering her meal and asked, "There isn't any cat or dog in it, is there?" The waiter replied, "Oh no. You pay extra for that.”

[Bruce Olive]

Speaking of instant, Krusteaz pancake mix only requires addition of water, and produces light and fluffy pancakes. I drink black coffee, so no “creamer.” BTW, that Nomad suitcase grill looks remarkable. $$$ tho….

[Jon in AZ]

Krusteaz is a staple for us at home and on the road. Made some this morning for my Valentine sweetheart with homemade strawberry compote sweetened with honey.

Powdered dry milk is another good travel staple. Makes more sense than coffee creamer to make instant mashed potatoes (and besides, my wife likes hazelnut-flavored creamer, which would be just weird ). Add dry milk to pancake mix for more protein. Use it with vegetable oil to make Kraft mac & cheese instead of milk and butter.

[Jan.nentrup]

Due to arthritic hands I can no longer peel a potato. I started buying Bob Evans Mashed potatoes 3 years ago and they are the absolute best next to home made. They go on every camping trip we take and I won’t stray from my opinion!

[barrry smithe]

Originally Posted by Casita Greg

Idaho does produce the best potatoes, hands down. That said, how hard is it to peel a few potatoes? Once boiled, there's not much to mashing them up. C'mon man!

I don’t carry a peeler, rinse off spuds and cook skin on! Life’s to short not to enjoy natures best.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Glenn Baglo

I didn't know cats were edible.

All meat is edible. Just ask anyone that was in Italy during WW2. They ate monkey. My dad was there and they didn't ask what the meat was but they knew.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Jan.nentrup

Due to arthritic hands I can no longer peel a potato. I started buying Bob Evans Mashed potatoes 3 years ago and they are the absolute best next to home made. They go on every camping trip we take and I won’t stray from my opinion!

Are Bob Evans Mashed Potatoes instant or how do they come? Where do you get them? I haven't seen them so they may not be available in CO.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Jennifer Minogue

Costco has excellent instant mashed potatoes.

Are they instant or made up in a package that needs refrigeration?

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by ShelbyM

A dozen egg shells resulted in a new disposal for us. And add us to those (possibly few) who don't spend much time cooking and cleaning up when out in the trailer. We're pretty happy with whatever we can put between two slices of bread or roll in a tortilla.

That is why we put a meal in the freezer when we make stuff at home like chili, soups, cooked meats, etc. We have a vacuum sealer and stuff stays fresh. If it is a big item like soups and we are going to be gone for 3-4 weeks we take an ice chest and use the frozen containers for ice along with jugs of frozen water. As the soups thaw we use them first and keep the smaller things in the fridge freezer for later in the trip. We like Perogies. We fry them some with bell peppers and onions, add eggs and ham and that is any meal you want. We also put spaghetti sauce over Perogies. One pan meals are the best for us. We learned a lot of easy things to cook when we were gone to Alaska for 80 days.

[Iowa Dave]

Raise your hand if you’ve had pigeon noodle soup, raccoon, snapping or soft shell turtle, frog legs, pork temple meat, goat, crawdads, sheephead, and pheasant back mushrooms. Tried a lot of things some only once, others any time I could get them. Just about the season for small town Friday night fried food dinners once we are past the Lenten fish fries. There are a couple more yet after Vining.
Iowa Dave

[Radar1]

Originally Posted by Jennifer Minogue

Dehydrated ones take up less space, an important consideration for me.

That's why we only fill our fresh water tank with dehydrated water while traveling.

(Sorry, couldn't resist. )

[Dennis mn]

Before the Scamp, we camped in a three person tent, from the back of a two door Jeep Wrangler. I dehydrated all of our food, so we did not require ice, or other refrigeration. I cooked on a single burner stove, and had an Outback Oven to make bake goods. The self contained Scamp 19 Foot Deluxe is pure luxury.

[Iowa Dave]

Originally Posted by Dennis mn

Before the Scamp, we camped in a three person tent, from the back of a two door Jeep Wrangler. I dehydrated all of our food, so we did not require ice, or other refrigeration. I cooked on a single burner stove, and had an Outback Oven to make bake goods. The self contained Scamp 19 Foot Deluxe is pure luxury.

Now that’s camping. I know what you mean about enjoying a well appointed fiberglass camper. We went fishing one night when I was a kid. Usually slept in a station wagon or in a tent or on the ground on a canvas tarp. This night we got a chance to stay in a friends old cabin. About 9:00 PM, a thunderstorm came through. We retired to the cabin where the two adults I was with cracked a couple
Hamm’s beers and I had a soda. Both of the adults were Czechs. I’ll never forget as one guy reclined in an ancient recliner, his feet up and a cold beer in hand he said “They never had it like this in Prague” From then on I always appreciated a roof and the security of being out of nasty weather. Still do today,
about 60 years later. Have fun camping this summer and into the Fall
Iowa Dave

[Sharon D]

I had instant potatoes on a recent camping trip. All I had to do was heat the water, pour in the packet and then add some ham scraps and peas. Super tasty and warm and took no time at all. I am definitely keeping a pack or two in my pantry for easy camping meals.

[Meadowlark]

We seldom take potatoes camping, but when we do, we use "Simply Potatoes" brand. They're precooked potato pieces, or what they call hash browns. They have to be refrigerated but it's worth it.

As for ham, well, we usually use Canadian bacon. We both love the smell and taste of real bacon, but it can be messy. C. Bacon easily takes it's place and can be used in scrambled eggs and other meals.


We seldom if every cook inside the Casita. Unless it's pouring down rain, we'll cook and eat in the Clam.

My husband does all the camp cooking, I do KP, clean up and trash management.


As for the poster's comment about 'appreciating' being out of nasty weather...having spent 21 years in the Army, MOST of it being 'in the field" (no desk job for me!) and in all seasons, in Germany, S. Korea and Saudi Arabia. Living in a tent for months at a time got old, especially when you consider an Army GP Medium is merely a great big tent. IF you're lucky you have a pot bellied stove in the winter at one end, and if you can use a generator, you might have a light bulb overhead.




When my husband and I went on our very first camping trip, all we had was his little popup hiking tent. After climbing over him in the middle of the night three or four times, stumbling in the dark to a pit toilet on the other side of the camp ground, I was reminded all over again what a PITA a tent is, and said, look, if we're going to camp anymore, I want a roof over my head, a place I can sit and read if the weather's bad, a bathroom within a few feet, and a heater in the winter.


SO we bought the Casita and have never regretted it. Our first night in it was spent in Glen Rose TX at the Dinosaur State Park. That night featured: high winds that shook the camper, downpours like only Texas can make, tornado alerts, lightning, thunder for HOURS. THe Paluxy river jumped it's banks and flooded out several tenters and even blew right through the seams of an RV's pull out.

I remember laying in bed in our little egg, hearing the awesome roar of thunder , the almost constant lightning and the pounding rain, and thinking this is so wierd. I'm dry, got a full tummy , got to do my crossword puzzles after dark, and the AC is working. If this is camping, I'm all in.

[Jann Todd]

Originally Posted by Meadowlark

We seldom take potatoes camping, but when we do, we use "Simply Potatoes" brand. They're precooked potato pieces, or what they call hash browns. They have to be refrigerated but it's worth it.

As for ham, well, we usually use Canadian bacon. We both love the smell and taste of real bacon, but it can be messy. C. Bacon easily takes it's place and can be used in scrambled eggs and other meals.


We seldom if every cook inside the Casita. Unless it's pouring down rain, we'll cook and eat in the Clam.

My husband does all the camp cooking, I do KP, clean up and trash management.


As for the poster's comment about 'appreciating' being out of nasty weather...having spent 21 years in the Army, MOST of it being 'in the field" (no desk job for me!) and in all seasons, in Germany, S. Korea and Saudi Arabia. Living in a tent for months at a time got old, especially when you consider an Army GP Medium is merely a great big tent. IF you're lucky you have a pot bellied stove in the winter at one end, and if you can use a generator, you might have a light bulb overhead.




When my husband and I went on our very first camping trip, all we had was his little popup hiking tent. After climbing over him in the middle of the night three or four times, stumbling in the dark to a pit toilet on the other side of the camp ground, I was reminded all over again what a PITA a tent is, and said, look, if we're going to camp anymore, I want a roof over my head, a place I can sit and read if the weather's bad, a bathroom within a few feet, and a heater in the winter.


SO we bought the Casita and have never regretted it. Our first night in it was spent in Glen Rose TX at the Dinosaur State Park. That night featured: high winds that shook the camper, downpours like only Texas can make, tornado alerts, lightning, thunder for HOURS. THe Paluxy river jumped it's banks and flooded out several tenters and even blew right through the seams of an RV's pull out.

I remember laying in bed in our little egg, hearing the awesome roar of thunder , the almost constant lightning and the pounding rain, and thinking this is so wierd. I'm dry, got a full tummy , got to do my crossword puzzles after dark, and the AC is working. If this is camping, I'm all in.

We buy shredded potatoes in a carton at Costco. You add hot water and let sit for a few minutes. Then you can fry them to brown them if you want to. They are good for any recipe calling for hash browns or any shredded potato need. Each carton makes a lot of potatoes. We can't eat them all and save some for later. We also fry our bacon and freeze it. No cooking hardly. Your first night in TX sounds like our last night in Amarillo in May. No shelter nearby.

[C&G in FL]

Originally Posted by Meadowlark

I remember laying in bed in our little egg, hearing the awesome roar of thunder , the almost constant lightning and the pounding rain, and thinking this is so wierd. I'm dry, got a full tummy , got to do my crossword puzzles after dark, and the AC is working. If this is camping, I'm all in.

Please be aware that the “awesome roar of thunder and the almost constant lightning” is really not something to “celebrate” from the inside of a fiberglass trailer. Fiberglass, unlike a metal enclosure, does not create a Farraday cage and lightning can easily go right through it, killing occupants. While the odds of this happening may be low, it can happen.

[AlanKilian]

Originally Posted by Jann Todd

That is why we put a meal in the freezer when we make stuff at home like chili, soups, cooked meats, etc.

That's exactly what we do.

To prepare, we season and make hamburger patties, seasoned steak and Salmon, chili, spaghetti sauce and they all get vacuum packed and frozen to act as ice in the cooler.

Sometimes, it's five days into the camping and we still have to thaw out something before we can cook it.

Then we supplement with bagged ice for the rest of the trip.

We modified the front to add a countertop and a pull-out cooler. There's room for a second cooler to the left of the pull-out one.

[Meadowlark]

well, C&G, I guess you're correct about the fiberglass trailer not being a protection against tlightning strike, but not buying the Casita because it might possibly be hit by lightning never crossed our minds. I bought it to keep me dry in a rainstorm, to use a bathroom without having to get dressed up and walk to a pit toilet, and to be able to sleep in a bed on a real mattress while still out in the woods. My Casita provides all those things.



I've been on a jet that was hit by lightning in mid air. Other than a loud noise and a bright flash, we were fine.

[C&G in FL]

Originally Posted by Meadowlark

I've been on a jet that was hit by lightning in mid air. Other than a loud noise and a bright flash, we were fine.

Yes, understandable, having a metal shell an airliner is a Faraday cage. During a severe thunderstorm, we take refuge in the tow vehicle. Fortunately, I am not towing (LOL) with a Corvette!