Even around the holidays, Brussels sprouts can be hard to sell, but this recipe will do it, and it will be wonderful to have something fresh and crunchy to add to your menu.

No cooking is required for this recipe, making it an easy side or appetizer. We like it best on crackers, hearty bread, or Melba toasts.

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.

Have you ever tried Kombucha? It is supposed to be extremely healthy, (claiming to cure all sorts of illnesses and even reverse gray hair, according to it’s Wikipedia page), but it’s a rough one flavor-wise. It pretty much tastes like flavored vinegar to me.

So when Aimee suggested making a cocktail out of it over the holidays, I was skeptical. She left the job in the hands of our resident bartender, Wes, though, who made up this truly fabulous drink.

If you’ve ever had a shrub, this is very similar. It’s only slightly sweet, and a little sparkly. It’s a refreshing daytime type of drink. Perfect for an afternoon picnic or an afternoon relaxing in your hammock at camp. It’s a great drink to include in your January activities. You know- because January is when we’re all out there getting healthier.

Cheers! We’ll see you in 2016!

Here’s a nice organized list that includes our latest side dish recipes and additional recipes for a complete Thanksgiving menu. Let the cooking begin!

Cocktails

We think a warming beverage is absolutely necessary while you’re prepping Thanksgiving dinner outdoors. Hot chocolate for the kiddos, and for the rest of us:

• Vanilla Cider Cocktail
• Nutella Hot Chocolate (with a splash of whiskey)

Side Dishes

Here is a recap of our recent side dish recipes. Best of all, they can all be made on the campfire.

• Apple Fennel Stuffing
• Campfire Squash Galette with Creamy Cashew Sauce
• Coconut Butternut Squash
• Campfire Miso Scallion Sweet Potatoes

Mains

These recipes are the perfect centers of attention to accompany the side dishes. They bring needed protein and pizazz to the whole meal.

• Grilled Tempeh
• Campfire Roasted Pumpkin Rice

Dessert

We live for Thanksgiving desserts, but are never excited to have to cook more after eating the rest of the meal. These desserts are super simple to prepare, and can be made ahead of time. They are seasonal and a perfect end to a perfect evening under the stars.

• No Bake Apple Bourbon Cobbler
• Red Wine Poached Pears

This recipe has been campified from a traditional Armenian dish called ghapama featured in Issue 14 of Lucky Peach magazine.

Everyone loves pie and potatoes on Thanksgiving, so we put them together into one dish. It’s a rustic, free form pie that is hard to screw up. Cook it in your dutch oven over the campfire. We roasted the vegetables a bit before our trip, so assembling and cooking pies takes very little time. This is helpful if you have only one dutch oven and lots of hungry guests.

This Roasted Potato Squash Galette should be finished with a drizzle (or generous dollop) of Cashew Garlic Sauce. It’s a simple sauce that is creamy, yet vegan, making it less perishable than a dairy option. The sauce makes this dish. The recipe included makes a full mason jar, which should be enough for the galette, along with all the side munching of extra butternut squash pieces going on around you while you’re cooking it. If you’re lucky enough to have leftover sauce, it’s also great as a sandwich spread or vegetable dip the next day.

And where would Thanksgiving be without a good stuffing? Bird or no, the stuffing is an important staple on every Thanksgiving menu. Our friends at Fresh off the Grid created this gorgeous Apple Fennel Stuffing that adds needed heartiness and fall flavor to the table. I’m already imagining my day-after leftover squash, stuffing and creamy garlic spread sandwich on my hike. Click here to check out their recipe.

While you may be trying to figure out how to roast a turducken in the campfire, we decided to put more of our focus on the all important, but easily forgotten sides.

Some tips from our Thanksgiving to yours:

• Cook mostly in cast iron and foil for easy cleanup
• Use serving dishes that have lids, like Pyrex, so you can just pack them up in the cooler quickly at the end of the meal.
• Have everyone bring one extra storage container for the sake of a leftover swap the day after. Make sure they are backpack friendly (lightweight, crush-proof) so you can take your leftovers on a nice hike.

These Sweet Potatoes with Miso Scallion Butter are super simple but also very special. I find it really difficult to make sweet potatoes interesting. They’re kind of that obligatory dish on our Thanksgiving menu. I can’t not have them, but I never really want them either. This year, I think I found the answer to my sweet potato dilemma, and it works perfectly on a campfire.

I found these Japanese sweet potatoes at my local Trader Joe’s, but I’ve also seen them at Whole Foods and the farmer’s market. They have dark purplish skin and yellow flesh. They’re less sweet than most sweet potatoes, and they remind me of chestnuts.

Miso scallion butter is sharp and salty and is the perfect complement to the smokey campfire sweet potatoes.

If you want to do all the prep ahead of time, you can bake the sweet potatoes and make the miso scallion butter at home. Then just reheat the potatoes in your campfire. Either way, the best part is that you get to sit by the campfire while you cook them!

We’re pairing our sweet potatoes with this Coconut Butternut Squash from Fresh off the Grid. Butternut squash is another delicious and colorful vegetable that is perfect for the campfire, and it gets elevated in this recipe by a little hit of coconut from coconut oil. Click here to view the recipe.

Growing up, my family never did anything for Thanksgiving. I’m not sure if it’s related to cultural differences between Canadian & American Thanksgiving, but for me, it came and went without any fanfare. (By the way, in Canada, Thanksgiving is in mid-October and comes on a Monday.) It was only when I moved to Los Angeles that I realized what huge a deal Thanksgiving could be.

My fiancé and I have since developed our own Thanksgiving tradition – going to Joshua Tree National Park for 4-5 days. Part of the tradition involves fighting to get a camp spot with all the other people who have also made this an annual pilgrimage, and getting together with our friends Tom & Dara who live in San Francisco. One year, we felt especially ambitious, and decided to make a full-on Thanksgiving meal. Our menu included a roasted chicken (from scratch), stuffing, cranberry sauce, baked sweet potatoes and gravy. We pulled it off with our camp stove, a healthy campfire and our trusty Weber Smokey Joe Charcoal grill. We marinated the chicken all day while we climbed, and then roasted it on the grill for over 2 hours. Not only was it a delicious meal, it was an unforgettable Thanksgiving that continues to remind me I should be always be thankful for the great friendships and relationship I have in my life.

In the spirit of the Thanksgiving, we’ve been developing some camping-friendly Thanksgiving dishes to share with you. A couple weekends ago, we tested a giant smoked turkey leg covered in our famous Secret Weapon Spice Rub. We wrapped it in foil, and threw it on the fire grate until the skin was charred and crispy. It tasted great, and made us feel like we were at a theme park or frolicking at a medieval fair.

The official recipe that we’re going to post, however, is our Campfire Roasted Sweet Potatoes. We made these on our very first Dirty Gourmet camping trip over a year ago and we’ve been craving them ever since. This Campfire Roasted Sweet Potatoes recipe is a typical sweet potato casserole gone wild – doctored up with chipotles in adobo (yes, we are obsessed with them). The dish can get a little messy, but thats to be expected as part of the fun of camping.

This a a good opportunity for us to say we are thankful for you reading this blog and hope that you get as much out of it as we do. Whatever you may be doing for Thanksgiving, tell us what kind of traditions or meals you’ll be having. Happy Thanksgiving!