Cooking on a compact stove with limited kitchen space can present challenges, but the food that you make in your camp kitchen usually tastes better than anything you make at home. 

The best camping food ideas don't have to involve a lot of ingredients and preparation time though, with these pre-prepared meals camp cooking becomes a completely stress-free task. It also makes transporting your camping food easy as none of these meals requires refrigeration and, they are super lightweight.

Freeze Dried Camping Food

These meals only require hot water to prepare. The freeze drying process removes all moisture from the food whilst retaining its shape and texture, something dehydrated food does not retain. It usually only takes 5-10 minutes to re-hydrate a freeze-dried meal and you can usually eat straight from the packaging which means no washing up. You won't find any freeze-dried scotch fillets, the food is usually cut up into small pieces, but freeze-dried vegetables are a great alternative to fresh if you still want to get your camp chef on.

Retort Packaged Camp Food

In these meals, you will find chunks of chicken, meatballs and sauces, stews. They are a bit like the canned meals you buy from the supermarket, only they are in soft packaging from which you can eat the meal from cold. Warming them up is as easy as dunking the package into boiling water, then you can use the water for washing up. The packaging process of these meals removes all bacteria, so they have a long shelf life and do not require refrigeration.

Energy Bars, Snacks and Smoothies

Quick and nutritional hits of energy that can be transported and prepared with ease. Energy bars are like muesli bars, only with an extra dose of nutrition. We don't recommend living off of these on your camping trip, but for a quick on-the-go lunch, an energy bar might be what you need to get you through until dinner. Also, check out the powdered smoothies for a refreshing and fruity drink in the outback.