Ultimate Recipe Guide For RVing Holiday Dinners
Some holiday traditions should be abandoned, like slaving away in the kitchen. What fun is it if everyone else is having a good time but you’re stuck with the cooking? If you don’t enjoy the hassle of making a big holiday dinner in your sticks and bricks home, it’s time to start the holiday season on the road with RVing holiday dinners.
RVing holiday dinners are easy
Do you live in an area with mild weather this time of year? Then pack up the RV and move your holiday season celebrations to a great RV campground. When you move the party to your favorite state or national park it`s like gaining an extra summer weekend at year’s end.
As a result, the best part is that RVing holiday dinners are less labor-intensive than a traditional sticks-and-bricks feast, but they are just as much fun to enjoy. Here’s how to prepare for your all-new custom.
It`s easy to cook old favorites such as green beans, brussels sprouts or even asparagus – seen here – over an open grill at a campsite for a side of any holiday dinner. Photo courtesy of Bruce B www.airforums.com member.
Meal prep tips
Many traditional holiday meal components like dips, salads and pies can be prepped and even made ahead of your departure. What`s more, once you arrive, a barbecue grill, pressure cooker and cast iron skillet can replicate your favorite holiday meals at the campsite, without any fuss. Use them in the following ways:
- Toss the turkey and try Cornish game hens or turkey sausages. Most RV ovens are too small to cook turkeys, so consider grilling your main meat dish instead.
- Pre-cook time-intensive side dishes like squash and potatoes in the pressure cooker. Make them in shifts then pop them in the oven together.
- Cast iron skillets for sides can be placed on a stovetop or campfire. Cook old favorites like green beans or seared Brussels sprouts with garlic in this multipurpose pan that’s a must-have for RVers.
Fruit compotes are easy to make in RV kitchens.
Great RVing holiday meals don’t have to be restricted to the Fourth of July and Labor Day. Make the most of your year-round camping climate by adding Thanksgiving and the winter holidays to your annual RV celebrations.
For more holiday cooking tips, check out this post on How To Cook Thanksgiving Dinner In An RV and this one on Christmas Dinner in an RV.
Rene Agredano and her husband, Jim Nelson, became full-time RVers in 2007 and have been touring the country ever since. In her blog, Rene chronicles the ins and outs of the full-timing life and brings readers along to meet the fascinating people and amazing places they visit on the road. Her road trip adventures are chronicled in her blog at LiveWorkDream.com.
We travel every Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday week. Sometimes I cook a Turkey Breast instead of the full huge turkey but do the rest of the dinner just the same as home. Often we eat out for Thanksgiving and when we get home we celebrate a huge Thanksgiving dinner with the adult kids just before we leave for Florida for Christmas. Then we take all the leftovers with us and have a huge Turkey dinner for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. We usually find a local Methodist church in the area we plan to camp so we can attend their Christmas candle light service on Christmas Eve. Sometimes we even cook a party size Stouffer’s Lasagna for Christmas dinner and just have a salad. My boyfriend still works so we take advantage of all his holidays to be able to travel more until he retires. We even have a little travel Christmas tree we take with us and it has hand made non breakable decorations from all the places we have been on during our travels. Then we add festive red and green lights to our awning for Christmas and Pumpkin Lights for Thanksgiving. Makes the holidays lots of fun.