Move over cereal, and step-aside toast. Breakfast time at a campsite is a great opportunity to ditch the staples, and whizz up something quick and easy.
Whether you’re in the camp kitchen, in front of a BBQ or over a trusty little camp stove, these breakfast ideas give you a basic idea of how to create your own start to the day, while giving you the creative freedom to make the most of any leftovers you may have hiding in alfoil parcels.
For these five breakfast ideas, all you need is one basic item of cookware- a pan. Ok, other utensils may be handy too, but I’ve seen people scramble eggs using a stick and I passed no judgement.
1. One pan fry-up
Eggs, bacon, sausages, tomatoes. This type of breakfast is limited only by the size of your cooking instrument.
To get the most out of your ingredients, I recommend cooking your eggs first while the pan is still nice and clean. Whether you opt for fried of scrambled, your eggs will benefit from not being caught up in any crispy bits of bacon.
Throw in your egg accompaniments afterwards and serve once everything has that delightful charred look going on.
2. Breakfast potatoes
Also knows as fried hash, this is a great way to use up leftover potatoes, as well as leftover anything else you may have lying around from your previous three nights at the campsite. Think bacon, spring onion, leftover meat, or any veggies you have that are nearing their natural use-by date.
The potatoes themselves can be pre-cooked in some way (mashed, fried, crinkle-cut chipped) or if you’re starting from scratch, dice your potatoes into small bits and give them a good pre-fry before adding in your other ingredients.
Top your very own breakfast potatoes with grated cheese to hold everything together before scooping out of the pan.
3. French Toast
This is an excellent way to use up half-loaves of bread that inevitably get scattered around the campervan kitchen. If you happen to have thick-sliced bread on hand, your results will be next-level, but any bread will do.
Soak your slices in beaten egg before pan frying to golden perfection, and top with maple syrup or honey and cream.
For a savoury option, diced tomatoes with any herbs you have on hand makes for a swanky breakfast bruschetta.
4. Breakfast Beans
A cheap, healthy start to the morning, and way tastier than that n of baked beans you have rolling around in your emergency food stash.
Start by frying up chopped veggies such as onion, capsicum and/or mushroom, before upending two tins of beans onto your softened veggies. A dollop of tomato paste or tin of tomatoes will create your basic sauce which you can jazz up to your heart’s content with herbs and spices.
Make little pockets in your bean-pan and crack open some eggs into each well. Cover for three minutes for beautifully runny yolks that will bring a richness to the humble bean which is genuinely life-changing.
5. Pancakes
A basic pancake batter requires 1 cup of self-raising flour, 1 cup of milk and 1 egg.
You can make your usual standard-sized pancakes, or just go for gold with one mega pan-sized pancake, topped with chopped fruit.
This recipe is easy enough to remember after a late night under the stars, but if you want to make this breakfast one handed, blindfolded and balancing on the horn of a narwhal, bring along a ready-mix pancake shaker mix and just add water.
Breakfast is served.