River Kitchens and Cooking

It's all about the whitewater... and the food... and the company.

Cooking on a Rafting Trip

Great food and white water rafting just go together; it's a time-honored tradition. How's that for a great sport! Maybe it's the lack of the interruptions and distractions we have in normal life. On a river trip there is no TV, no cell phones, and no chores around the house. Just have fun all day, and eat great meals. Once you make camp for the evening, it's all about sitting around the fire, socializing, telling stories, and just hanging out. Cooking and enjoying great meals just comes naturally. And food tastes so much better in the outdoors with a spectacular view and good friends to enjoy it with.

A Typical Commercial Rafting Trip

On a typical commercial white water rafting trip, the guides do the cooking, clean-up and everything. That's what you're paying for! Sometimes they let you help if you just can't stay away from the kitchen. But they are experts. The guides repeat the trip menu on a regular basis so they are very practiced at putting on a first-class meal in the wilderness. So the topics discussed below really only apply to private parties, doing their own thing.

Planning and Overall Meal Strategy

The community of private whitewater boaters take many different approaches to meal preparation, based on individual preferences, the group membership, and the nature of the trip. For example, extreme white-knuckle high-water trips in the spring may de-emphasize cooking to keep the boats lightly loaded and more maneuverable. Likewise, participants on low-water trips in mid to late summer may eat more like backpackers, again to keep loads as light as possible, so the rafts can ghost over the shallow sections of the river. Some groups have learned to do without ice entirely in order to keep loads light, yet, with practice, they can still eat very well. So every group and trip may be a little different. If you've been invited on a trip with boaters you do not know well, be sure to learn their approach to cooking early on in your planning.

Thankfully, there are lots of folks who take river trips as an excuse to pull out all the stops. Did you know you can cook prime rib in a Dutch Oven? These are my kind of people. If you can prepare it at home, you can make it happen on the river, and quite easily, with a little planning. Our family favorites are grilled salmon, a creamy pasta, basil, and tomato casserole, and chocolate cake for desert.

Cooking Teams

There are a number of strategies for handling the cooking and clean-up duties on a private (non-commercial) river rafting trip. A big determinant is the age of the participants. Trips composed primarily of adults usually split into teams and adopt a rotation whereby one team cooks several meals in a row, and then is off-duty for several days or even the rest of the trip. This approach works very well for several reasons. Often teams try to outdo each other and the result can be some terrific meals. Also, when your team is not on duty, as soon as your raft hits the beach, you're free to spend your time hiking, or sitting around, or kibitzing, or whatever you want to do. And, each team can plan and purchase its own ingredients, thus distributing the work of purchasing and packing the menu for the trip.

If the trip is composed of several families they may adopt either a strictly separate approach to cooking or share some meals, using the family unit as the team. For example, each family might prepare its own breakfasts and lunches, and then rotate with other families to take their turn at preparing dinner for the entire group. The purpose for the former strategy is to accommodate picky eaters among the kids. But a fully separate approach to meal prep usually requires redundant kitchen equipment (and heavier boat loads) allowing for simultaneous meal preparation. It also causes much more work for parents who must plan and prepare all those meals. I vote to leave picky eaters at home. I get too little vacation to have to spend it worrying about or accommodating picky eaters.

The off duty cooking teams may rotate to handle setting up and caring for the toilet, and/or the fire pan and emptying ashes in the morning, boiling water for dishes, etc. Alternatively, an entire team may skip the cooking rotation all together and provide these other services for the entire trip. The key to all of this organization is the fair allocation of duties necessary for the group to live comfortably while on the river. Whatever works for that group dynamic is the right way to go.

Dutch Ovens

Dutch Ovens or "DO's" open up a whole world of cooking in the outdoors. For those unfamiliar with Dutch Ovens, they're large covered pots that sit on stubby legs. Dutch Ovens are made of cast iron or aluminum and each material has its advantages. To use them, you place charcoal briquettes on the lids and below the pots and wait for the contents to cook, simmer, bake, re-heat, whatever. By varying the number of briquettes you can precisely control the internal temperature. Dutch ovens thus can act as regular ovens for baking, or for roasting meat, or for stews, soups, casseroles, whatever you can think up. Charts provided by the manufacturers or on the Internet show the quantity of briquettes needed for each increment of temperature. For large groups, Dutch Ovens can be stacked on top of each other to prepare various parts of the meal simultaneously. Dutch Ovens are simply and amazingly great!

Food Packaging

Planning and packaging of foods at home can both speed meal preparation on the river and keep dry boxes well organized. Also, individually packaged and sealed foods can save the day if the boat happens to flip and the dry box fails to keep the contents dry. Vacuum packaging is a great way to go. Also there are now an wide variety of plastic containers available. Preparing chili, soups, stews, or sauces at home and freezing them helps keep coolers cold and cuts down on meal prep in camp.

Doing the dishes

Organizationally, there are several ways to go when it comes time to do the dishes. Cooking teams can limit themselves to just heating water and setting up the dish washing operation, letting each individual step up and clean their own stuff. Each person can thus be responsible for cleaning their own plate and utensils and place them on a rack to dry. Alternatively, the meal team can put on the rubber gloves and do all the dishes as part of their meal rotation duty. Or maybe there's a designated dish slave. Whatever works for the group.

In any case, dishwashing on a rafting trip usually involves the use of a 4 or more dishpan system. The first dishpan is a hot or cold rinse, the second is a hot wash, the third a hot rinse, and the fourth a cold rinse with a bit of bleach in the water to help disinfect, etc. See the sanitation topic for info on disposal of dish water.

A Few Do's and Don'ts

Don't pack fresh bananas in the same dry box with breads or other foods that can absorb odors. Ripening bananas give off chemicals that cause certain foods around them to smell just like bananas, regardless of how well those other foods are wrapped or packaged. You can end up with strange meals like 'pulled pork sandwiches on banana bread' and 'toasted English banana bread muffins' all week long!

Organize the contents of your dry boxes to limit trips back and forth between the boats and the kitchen. Some parties bring buckets just for this purpose. And of course to keep cooler lids shut, pack coolers according to days their contents will be needed.

Preparation at home means less work on the river. Cook things like taco meat, or meats for stews, soups, or spaghetti ahead of time and freeze it. Doing so saves cooking time and saves some cleanup.

Kitchen Gear

Below is a checklist we use for kitchen gear.

Typical small river kitchen setup What's a chocolate cake without frosting? Mixing up a batch of Dutch Oven French Toast Lunch on the river Lots of cooks in this kitchen Dutch Oven feast in progress - main course, side dish, and desert Dinner is served!