Cooking | Meals for a One-Ring Burner

Whether you’re camping or caravanning, meals you can make in one pan on a one-burner ring are always a winner… Or make them just for fun at home!

We’ve collated our six favourite meals for cooking on a one-ring burner. (On the seventh night, we think you should head to the pub or get fish and chips). Crack out the Travel Scrabble and gather round the teeny kitchen (or the open fire) and cook up a tiny storm!

One-pan Full English

As good at breakfast as it is for lunch or dinner, here’s how to do a cooked breakfast with just one thing to wash up. 

• Heat the pan high and fry chiplota sausages for around three minutes. 

• Add bacon, turning repeatedly until in goes crispy

• Add chopped mushrooms and cook until soft

• Drain any fat and liquid off, then spread the ingredients out evenly across the pan’s surface

• Beat some eggs and add to the pan to create a breakfast omelette. Cook for two minutes on a low to medium heat

• Scatter over tomatoes and cheese if liked and continue to cook until melted

• Serve in wedges once fully cooked

Chilaquiles

A holiday twist on nachos. We’re not saying this meal includes all the major food groups (other than crisps) but it is warming, filling and delicious!

• Heat oil high in a pan or skillet and then fry tortilla chips in single layers, draining each layer on kitchen towel as you go

• Reduce heat and gently fry some chopped red onion until softened and add some chopped garlic for the last half a minute

• Tip in some passata or tinned tomatoes and reduce. Once reduced and simmering, put the fried tortilla chips back in and stir to coat them

• Create a well in the middle and drop a few eggs into the sauce, cooking them through gently

• Top with chopped herbs, spring onions, grated cheese and whatever else you fancy

One-pot Orzo with veggies

A clever pasta dish, in which the water boils the pasta and the veggies together and then disappears like magic!

• Prep your veg. Anything that cooks in less than 10 minutes, like the orzo, is good… Asparagus, peas, broccoli and the like

• Put the veg with the orzo, enough water to cover it, a tablespoon of oil and any spices you like to your cooking vessel and bring to a low boil

• Once boiling, cook for a further five minutes until orzo and veggies are tender

• Reduce heat and add grated cheese, and any of the following you fancy: pine nuts, olives, sundried tomatoes, other deli veg

Chick pea and Chorizo Stew

Hearty, warming and pleasingly simple, this stew is great served with crusty bread or any other carb you fancy it with. 

• Heat a little olive oil in a large pan and then fry a chopped onion until it softens. Add chopped carrot, celery and herbs such as thyme and bay leaves. Continue to cook for around three minutes, stirring to prevent the veg sticking

• Add chopped garlic, chorizo and paprika and continue to fry with the veg for a few minutes

• Add a can of chick peas and a can of tomatoes and cook down

• Add a couple of handfuls of spinach and let wilt

• Remove from heat, season and serve with bread

Bubble and squeak

An oldie but classic. Another recipe that works for any meal from breakfast to supper - and it helps you get your greens in, too.

• In your pot, layer a chopped whole cabbage, five medium chopped potatoes and chopped Polish sausage or hot dogs from a jar

• Add a cup of water and simmer for 20 mins

• Once water is all soaked up and veg are tender, serve up

Black bean burgers

You can customise these burgers to your own tastes with many additions. Serve in big burger baps with ketchup. 

• Mash a tin of drained, rinsed black beans

• Mix in a tablespoon of ketchup and the same of mustard if desired along with a third of a cup of instant oats

• Throw in any extras for customisation - chopped onions, leftover diced veg, grated Cheddar etc

• Form the mix into patties, heat a little oil in the pan and then fry on each side until nice and crispy

• Serve in buns with plenty of sauce

If you think the caravanning life might be for you, don’t miss our Home Tour feature in our August issue, which features this beautiful van (above) in Sardinia, as well another retro van on the Kent coast.
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Games | for campervans, caravans and tents

Gather round the foldy-up table and join us for some fun and games for small spaces

If you’re heading off camping this summer you’re probably planning a few games around the campfire. There’s nothing like staring into the flames over a hand of cards with a steaming mug of tea (or a whisky) by your side. 

But the reality of British weather means you need a back up plan, too, and we’re all about embracing the back-up plan. While basking in the great outdoors, under the stars on a warm night is a wonderful thing, we love just as much the cosiness of playing a game, crammed happily around a tiny table with hot drinks on the Primus and rain battering the roof (or canvas) over your head. 

Camping accommodation wasn’t built for large board games with many pieces. So here’s our round-up of games for small spaces that require few props, or nothing at all, and won’t end with someone’s tea being spilt during a particularly riotous round of charades. 

Monopoly Deal
Monopoly without the board and, better still, without the commitment of hours! This tiny travel version of the classic board game can be played in around 15 minutes.. Buy Monopoly Deal. 

Mini Jenga.

As much fun as the giant, building and balancing game, but fits easily into your rucksack and can be played on the teeniest of caravan furniture or on a fold-up camping table. Buy Mini Jenga.

Wink Murder

An oldie but a goodie. Take as many sheets of paper as you have players. Write ‘potential victim’ on all but one. Write ‘murderer’ on the last one. Chat, eat, drink and go about your business as usual. The murderer must secretly wink at others to ‘murder’ them without being spotted. If you are winked at you must silently count to five then enact a grisly ‘death’. If you think you have spotted the murderer you may accuse them by ordering them to turn over their card. 

Balderdash

All you need is a pen and paper for this. A dictionary is useful but you can also look up ‘Balderdash free words list’ on your phone to get you started. Take it in turns to choose an unusual word and secretly write down the definition. The other players make up their own plausible definitions. The person who picked the word then reads out all the definitions including the real one and everyone votes on which they think is the real word. Players score points for every person who votes for their ‘definition’. You get a point if you guess correctly, too. 

Bulls and Cows

For the mathematically inclined… One player writes down a secret 4-digit number. The other players take it in turns to guess it. Player one tells them how many they got right or wrong and how many were in their correct position. (Clue: it pays to write down each guess and how many were correct or incorrect and how many were in the right positions). By process of elimination someone will eventually work out the correct number. Good for anyone who has ever felt the pain of forgetting the combination to the padlock on the shed. And no, we’ve no idea why it’s called bulls and cows either.

Bananagrams

This is basically Scrabble but faster and with no board. Even more fun when camping and you have no access to a dictionary for anyone to check if you’re cheating or not. Buy Bananagrams. 

Find me on a Map

OK, we’ll admit we just made this one up but it’s great for when you’re in an area you don’t know well and want to know better. Get out the OS map. One person chooses a square and everyone takes it in turns to ask a question. Is there a church in your square? Is it close to water? Is it on a fold? You get the picture. The first person to get it goes first. Bonus points if you choose somewhere with a rude place name in. 

Ultimate Werewolf

Our favourite game of the moment, again in a very compact little cards-sized box. You need at least five players and are all given roles - as seers, witches, werewolves and more and you have to work out who the werewolf is amongst you. There’s an excellent app to make it more atmospheric but you can just play it with one of you as the ‘moderator’. Lots of fun and excellent for nights when there’s a storm howling outside your campervan. Buy Ultimate Werewolf. 

The After Eight Game

You will need a box of After Eights. Everyone sits around a table, tips their head back and places and After Eight on their forehead. The aim of the game is to move the After Eight down your face towards your mouth using only your facial muscles and gravity (no hands), and then eat it. Delightfully silly and immature and lots of fun. 

Pub Cricket

This is one for the way home in the car. You can play in teams or as individuals. Team one or person one goes in to bat. Every time you pass a pub you get a run for each leg in the name of the pub, so The Dog and Duck scores 6 (4 for the dog’s legs and 2 for the duck’s). The Coach and Horses would be 8, though you could probably argue for more horses based on the painting on the sign. You keep batting as long as every pub you pass has legs in. If you score no points (The King’s Arms, The Crown etc) you head back to the pavilion and someone else goes in to bat. You keep your score as it is for your next turn in to bat. 

If you’re inspired by the idea of living a campervan life, don’t miss the feature in our July issue about people who’ve adopted the campervan lifestyle in a more permanent way.

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More from our July issue…

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