The celebration of the actual holiday in the outdoors adds to the revival of what truly matters about it- bonding with the people you love.We have heard many stories of Thanksgiving camping trips, and love spending it in our local wild areas ourselves. Even more exciting are the trips venturing deeper into the backcountry. In these cases, it is important to keep the logistics of food simple to allow you plenty of time to reach your destination and enjoy a relaxing time with your loved ones. Keep the meal confined to the essential dishes, and spread out the work among all the guests.

We thought through a few of our must-have dishes and adjusted to make them possible in the backcountry. Cranberry Bourbon Compote is simple and perfect to accompany any other Thanksgiving dishes. It is not as saucy as a standard cranberry sauce, but has the same flavor profile and is lightweight and non-perishable. It is delicious spooned over your other Thanksgiving dishes and would also be a great addition to a breakfast made out of leftovers.

Everyone knows kale is a superfood, filled with with tons of nutrients. It’s also sturdy, ultralight, and goes with just about any type of meal you would like to make. There’s still a chance that fresh kale could be ruined in your pack on a hot day, but once it’s dehydrated, it becomes invincible.

Yes, you can dehydrate just about every vegetable (great news!), but kale and other dark leafy greens are what to choose before everything else. They dehydrate quickly, but also rehydrate quickly, which is more important. If you’re looking for a side of creamed greens to go with your dehydrated mac n’ cheese, no problem!

This recipe takes dried kale a step further, though, by crumbling it into super versatile flakes. No more worrying about it breaking up in your pack- it’s already broken! No need to worry about a separate pot, or the disgusted faces on the picky eaters of the group. Throw some of this into every meal, and it will melt right in. If you’re short on time, try roasting your greens instead of dehydrating them.
The flavor deepens and you can eat them sprinkled right on top of your food instead of cooking the greens into it. Here’s a great recipe for how to roast them.

Some of our favorite options:

• Roasted kale flakes as a popcorn topping
• Green mac n’ cheese
• Quinoa and eggs with kale crumbles

Try this recipe out for your next trip (which will hopefully involve some snow!) and let us know what recipes you put your dehydrated kale flakes into!

Whether you got the flu of the year, ate and drank your way through the holidays, or are just excited about the opportunity of a new fresh start, here’s a super easy recipe to start with. Layered Picnic Cabbage Salad is great on it’s own, or as a slaw-style topping to a burger or sausage. Cabbage is hearty enough to take outside with you fresh, which is such a nice treat. You have the choice to keep the dressing separate and add at the time of eating, or add the dressing to a jar first, place the cabbage on top, and shake to combine at the time of eating. It’s mayonnaise free, which reduces it’s perishability.

Make it easy on yourself as you try to implement new habits. Camping recipes like this one will make it more likely that you’ll bring fresh, homemade food on your trip. That, in turn, will make you want to go outside. Hopefully that will get you outside more often!

Have you been on an amazing winter camping trip that we should know about? We’re making plans and looking for advice. Share your winter adventures with us in the comments or in photos on our Facebook page.

We experimented with this using pomegranate juice first, and that was actually quite good. I wanted to remake it and happened to have a kitchen full of oranges, so that’s what I used here. The orange juice seemed to have an easier time thickening up than the pomegranate juice, so that was a plus. I also liked having some zest to add.

I took this on a climbing trip recently, and my friend Samantha helped me style the photos and test the recipe. We’re so lucky to have so many volunteers willing to sacrifice for our cause.

I’ve not had an easy time satisfying my need for good ol’ southern cookin out here in the west. You know my frustration with locating favorites like grits, and now that I have a vegan boyfriend, I gave up and thought it was just impossible. The Vegan Soul Kitchen cookbook has changed my attitude. The nicest thing about it is that it doesn’t rely on all the overprocessed fake foods. He uses things like coconut oil and homemade almond milk (which doesn’t sound that difficult to make).

Along with grits, I love lima beans. They were one of those things you were told to hate as a kid, so I avoided them for a while. When I found out what I was missing, I cooked them all the time, spreading their deliciousness throughout college. Lima beans aren’t any easier to find out here than grits. Not even frozen. I found some dried the other day, and asked Aimee to help me ready them for dinner. She lives in a household of about 15, so she soaked and cooked the entire package, and I was stuck with a pile that seemed to grow every time I ate some. I found this Garlicky Lima Bean Spread recipe in my new cookbook, and the rest of the lima beans disappeared into bellies instantly.

The spread is like a hummus, and very good on sandwiches or with crackers or hunks of bread. It calls for a lot of garlic, and didn’t taste like enough when the spread was still warm, so I added more. It got a lot garlickier after chilling, though, so go with the amount listed. This is a great make-at-home food to take on your next camping trip, or you could definitely try making the whole thing in a dutch oven over a fire if you’re out for a long trip with a lot of people.

Both Figueroa Mountain events happened to come just after breakups. The first was my own. Our camping trip had been planned for a while before that for Aimee’s birthday, and I was hesitant to want to go when the actual weekend came, but I knew I needed an escape. It ended up being one of the best trips of my life. I was so determined to get my mind off things and have a great time, that I filled each day with great activities and lots of laughter. Being in the natural world, bonding with people that loved me, and of course afternoon beers all contributed greatly to the speed of my recovery. I knew my life was still going to be great.

The second trip involved the recent breakup of a friend. She came knowing she’d be among a bunch of people that she didn’t know well at all. That didn’t stop her from getting just what she needed to start her own healing process. Its easy to do exactly what you want and need when you’re camping, so she read books in her hammock when she felt like it, and went hiking with us when she felt like doing that (mainly because it included round 2 of banana slug licking- the true cure to a broken heart, even though she was immune to the venom).

The broken-hearted weren’t the only ones in need of healing either. Aimee’s back had been majorly tweaked for a good week before that trip. Adam got hit on his motorcycle the day before. Wes was dealing with pure exhaustion from racing the clock to remodel his kitchen for a TV show (Professional Grade on HGTV- watch for him in December!). Mary Anne ended up getting stung in the eye while we were there, but we credit the location more for healing that injury than providing it. It was like a hospital trip, really. And by the end of this trip, I decided that Figueroa Mountain has especially special healing powers.

We ate some especially amazing food this weekend, but the one recipe that contributed the most to our collective happiness and healing feeling was this Tomato Relish. Yes, we stole the recipe idea from the July issue of Martha Stewart’s Living, but ours is very different. It was described by Mai-yan first, and the rest of the party guests later as “Oh My God.” That’s all I really have to say about it. Most of us used it as a ketchup alternative for our Vegan Sausages but it was delicious also on bread and mixed grilled vegetables when we made it again at our home BBQ last week. It was made in a cast iron skillet which made all the difference, but don’t let the relish rest in the skillet after you’re done cooking. The acidity of the tomatoes will negatively affect the seasoning of the skillet.

If you are struggling with anything in life right now or in the future, don’t underestimate the power of the “real” world to take care of you and refresh your perspective. Get outside and do something you love to do. You’ll feel the good start rushing back into your soul immediately.

The whole family piled into my parents’ new house for Mother’s Day last weekend. Aimee and I took over the kitchen (its a good kitchen) and let the creativity flow. I was handed two giant packages of chicken wings and a big pile of corn on the cob to prepare. My mother demanded my spice rub, so I made it for one package of chicken wings. I used a smoked porter that my uncle brought to braise the other package of wings. I’d never tried braising something on a grill before. The beer chicken went first, and came out beautifully tender and smoky. Then I put the spice-rubbed chicken wings on the grill and closed the lid. I walked away- for too long.

When I came back, every piece of chicken was on fire!! I ran through the house screaming “the chicken’s on fire!” and hardly got a response. Finally, I dragged some family members out to save the day, and they did. But the chicken wasn’t lookin’ so good. Everyone kept euphemistically calling it “blackened chicken” and it got placed in the warmer drawer (told ya- good kitchen) to deal with after dinner. Maybe the skin could be removed and some of the meat could be saved for sandwiches tomorrow.

Dinner was great, and plenty filling without that other pile of chicken wings. The corn had been “blackened” at the same time as the wings, but the husks did an amazing job protecting it. The beer-braised chicken fulfilled us and we were all fat and happy by the end of it.

After dinner, the mom’s went back to the kitchen to deal with the black chicken. My mom decided to try one. There was an immediate look of surprise, and she started scarfing down that wing. Then my aunt tried one. Same thing. Though they were full and it was almost 11:00pm, they were happily chowing down on burnt chicken wings, announcing that these were much better than the other ones.

Almost everyone ate the burnt chicken for breakfast the next morning, agreeing that these were definitely better than the juicy tender smoky beer-braised ones from the night before. I was shocked, but I realized then that this spice rub was my secret weapon.

Rub anything you like with this. Its good on any kind of protein (burgers, steaks, fish, tofu), and most vegetables that I can think of as well (I wish I’d used it on the corn that night). Its portable and dry, and made for the grill or campfire, which means its made for camping. Just remember that sugar burns, so watch your meal carefully.

**If you have some leftover, you can definitely save it. Treat it like you treat your brown sugar (I heard putting a marshmallow in the container will keep it moist)