What To Eat While Camping In Bear Country

I went against the grain this weekend, skipped the farmers market (this is the second time I've missed it all summer, I'm seriously considering taking a half day this week to hit another one) in order to camp and shoot some 'antique' rifles in Northern NH. I'm not usually a camper, target shooter or a sleep-on-the-ground-in-bear-country-during-black-bear-season kind of a girl, but this was so much unplanned and unexpected fun. Unplanned being the key term, as we didnt even pack until 9am the day we were leaving, and I didnt pack any food. That would be up to our host, my brother.

I have never camped with my brother. His favorite food is kielbasa, and he inhales pizza flavored Doritos at an almost inconceivable pace, considering his thin frame. So what did I eat while in his care? I ate hamburgers, made only of hamburger, not even salt and pepper. I ate sausage. I ate beans cooked inside their can over a fire. I ate white toast. I drank cheap beer and my own weight in bottled water. (a mistake when you have no toilets, I learned,). I cooked everything over a campfire with nothing but an old grill grate and a pocket knife. I felt like a pioneer woman. -Like a pioneer woman in a covered wagon, not an uber successful blogger.

The only thing I can say about this trip that might set anyone aflame with culinary jealousy is that I sat on the tailgate of a pick up truck and road down a grass path, picking raspberries and blackberries and shoving them into my mouth as we drove. Take that for fresh fruit and put it in your hat, farmer market. When we got back to our own little kitchen at home, exhausted, dirty, but more happy and rested than a night on the chilly New Hampshire ground should warrant, what did we eat? We ate salad. We stopped at the priciest of chain grocery stores and bought vegetables and an in-house roasted chicken, (supposedly organic and free range, and not pumped full of preservatives, but realistically, I didn’t know, and at that point I didn’t care.) Arugula, red radishes, a lemon cucumber (score!), green peppers, tiny yellow cherry tomatoes, and Vermont Creamery goat cheese found its way onto our plates. Topped with a small roasted chicken breast. Drizzled with Julia Child’s fail – safe dressing, a lemony shallot laced vinaigrette with enough Dijon mustard to really keep it together. I dumped the dressing ingredients into a Ball jar, capped and screwed on the lid and gave it a hearty shake. It made my night to eat vegetables. It also made my night to shower, sleep on clean sheets, and sip pinot noir in my living room with my feet, now sorely in need of some professional attention, up on my coffee table.

I ate that salad so fast; I don’t have a photo of it for you. The dressing is so vibrantly good that I could bathe in it, and so I will share it with you. As ridiculous as it is to share a salad dressing with you as the first recipe and a salad dressing that has been around as long as it has, at that. Put down the Good Seasonings, and pick up the mustard, because this, my friends, is worth the little time and trouble it may cost you.

Julia Child’s Classic Vinaigrette

 1 tablespoon shallot or scallion, finely minced (we had a bit of shallot, but most often I use scallions)

 1 tablespoon of Dijon mustard (I used store brand, shocker.)

 1/ 2 tablespoon of kosher salt (I thought this was too much, so I salted to taste)

The juice of 1 enormous lemon, or 2 ‘normal’ lemons

2 tablespoon red wine vinegar

Freshly ground pepper (to taste)

Dump all of the ingredients in a jar, cap securely, and shake until the mustard has emulsified the oil and vinegar. The dressing will look ‘cloudy’. Dress greens, potatoes, the protein of your choice, or your pasta salad

So much for a healthy and unprocessed life. More whole foods to come this week. I promise.