Easy No-Cooking-Required Camping Meals to Try

Camp cooking is delightful, no question, whether it’s going down around a picnic-table cookstove or over the coals of a campfire. But on any camping trip—from a weekend getaway in a front-country campground to a weeklong backpacking trek into the big wilds—you’re going to want to have some meal options that don’t require cracking out the stove or building a cookfire.

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Having some easy, no-cook camping meals at the ready can ward off the dreaded “hanger” when you return to the campsite with a mean appetite after a morning of boating or hiking. They’re an absolute lifesaver when you’ve been pounding out the miles all day on the trail and are bone-tired by the time you pitch camp in the fading light. And when you’re otherwise a bit crunched—say, waking early to get to a ranger-guided tour or make that critical push for the summit—a no-cooking-required dish saves you time while delivering the metabolic fuel you need.

The following suggestions should give you some tasty ideas for easy no-cook camping meals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, not to mention those in-between snack attacks! Needless to say, Mountain House freeze-dried pouches (though you do have to add water) set the standard, but there are plenty of other good options to consider.

Why Choose No-Cook Camping Meals?

We’ve stressed the time- and energy-saving value of no-cooking camping meals. They also help you conserve your stove fuel (all the more important on high-elevation trips when water takes longer to boil and food longer to cook). They’re also convenient in the sense that they typically result in fewer dishes and utensils to wash—and, again, don’t require you to wrangle cooking equipment or build a fire (if a fire’s even allowed).

So, yes, convenience—whether you’re car camping, backpacking, river running, hunting, or climbing—is an obvious benefit of these kinds of eats. But it’s worth emphasizing they also have real practical utility in an emergency: Having hearty and nutritious food that doesn’t demand the time and effort of cooking is a major asset when you’re dealing with an injury or sickness, life-threatening weather, or the unexpected loss of your cooking gear.

Essentials for Preparing No-Cook Camping Meals

There’s some planning and prep work that goes into preparing no-cook camping meals, but they’re well worth the effort for the sheer convenience and deliciousness they provide.

Meal-Planning Beforehand

As with any camping food, you want to make sure your no-cook meals include some well-balanced, nutritious fare—all the more so if you’re backpacking, mountaineering, rock-climbing, rafting, ski-touring, or otherwise engaged in intense physical exertion on your trip. And regardless of the kind of camping trip you’re doing, think in advance of where no-cooking options might best fit into your camping meal plan—as well as making sure you’ve got some for emergencies across the spectrum (from legitimate life-or-death situations to “emergencies” involving a campsite full of suddenly ragingly hungry kids).

Having non-perishable, lightweight, and packable no-cook food items is a good idea on any trip and essential in the backcountry.

Key Ingredients to Pack

The below ingredients are superheroes when it comes to meals that don’t require cooking, checking off some important macronutrient boxes and encompassing both ready-to-go snacks and the sorts of flavorful accoutrements addable to all sorts of different dishes.

• Fresh Fruits & Veggies: e.g., cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, apples, carrots

• Pre-packaged Items: e.g., granola, trail mix, jerky

• Proteins: e.g., canned tuna, chicken salad, hard-boiled eggs, Mountain House freeze-dried meats

• Condiments: e.g., nut butter, hummus, cream cheese

• Water: for freeze-dried and other instant meals

No-Cook Breakfast Ideas

• Overnight Oats: Combine oats, milk, dried or fresh fruit, and nuts for a hearty, make-ahead brekkie.

• Greek Yogurt Parfaits: Layer up with granola and fresh fruit on top of some yogurt for a nutritious start to your camping day.

• Bagels & Spreads: Bagels are a hardy, relatively non-perishable staple for many campers and backpackers. The possibilities for dressing them up are almost limitless! Spread on some cream cheese, peanut butter, or guacamole for a flavorful base. Then, add your favorite toppings—deli meats, fresh fruits, or crunchy veggies—for a satisfying and customizable meal.

• Freeze-Dried Breakfasts: The Mountain House breakfast collection boasts absolute winners such as Biscuits & Gravy and the Breakfast Skillet. (Now, by the broadest definition of “cooking,” you technically need to cook Mountain House meals—but, hey, the process is simply adding water and waiting a few minutes for the food to rehydrate! Boiling water is recommended, but in fact you don’t even need to heat water up to reconstitute our freeze-dried foods; cold water will do the trick as well, just requiring a little more waiting time.)

Photo by Tom King on Unsplash

No-Cook Lunch & Dinner Ideas

• Wraps & Sandwiches: Packable and non-perishable pitas or tortillas paired with fillings such as deli meats, hummus, and/or veggies give you an easy-peasy lunch or dinner. Ideas include peanut butter and jelly or tuna-salad wraps and chicken-salad pita pockets.

• Charcuterie Boards: Hey, charcuterie’s not just for the gourmet picnic or wine bar! Salami, cheese, crackers, and dried fruit are all primo camping eats easily combined into a satisfying campsite or trailside smorgasbord.

• Salads: Salads, of course, aren’t restricted to the category of sides. A camp cooler gives you the option of bringing along fresh leafy greens and dressing, and, of course, the sky’s the limit when it comes to what to add—from cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, or avocadoes to nuts, bacon bits, or hard-boiled eggs.

• Pasta Salad: Cook pasta ahead of time and mix together with olive oil, veggies, and feta so you’ve got a crowd-pleasing no-cook lunch or dinner option.

• Canned Delights: Canned beans, chickpeas, or tuna make a great foundation for easy no-cook camping meals—toss in some fresh veggies and you’re good to go!

• Instant Soups: Just heat up water to pull off the tried-and-true “cup-cooking” (which, come on, is essentially no-cooking) method of prepping instant soup: a campsite classic.

• Freeze-Dried Entrées: The magic of our proprietary Mountain House freeze-drying process means the beautiful simplicity of “just add water” yields such delectable camping entrées as Beef Stroganoff With Noodles, Pad Thai With Chicken, Creamy Macaroni & Cheese, Mexican-Style Adobo Rice & Chicken, and Pasta Primavera in mere minutes.

No-Cook Snacks & Desserts

• Trail Mix: This stone-cold icon of the campsite and the hiking trail is completely customizable: nuts, seeds, dried cranberries, freeze-dried bananas, chocolate chips—you name it.

• Jerky & Cheese: This is an excellent shelf-stable, high-protein, and 100% snackable option.

• Fresh Fruit: Apples, bananas, berries, and the like provide a healthy dose of quick energy.

• No-Bake S’Mores: Can you even have a camping trip without this almost universally beloved mashup of marshmallow, chocolate, and graham cracker?

• Freeze-Dried Desserts: Yep, we’ve got you covered in the dessert category as well here at Mountain House thanks to our beloved freeze-dried ice cream sandwiches, available in both Mint Chocolate Chip and Vanilla. (We suggest going with both.)

We’ve got a whole library of other Mountain House articles focused on various aspects of camp meal-planning as well as easy camping recipes, including the following:

• “7-Day Camping Food Meal Plan”

• “Lazy Camping Food Hacks for Quick Trips With Large Groups”

• “Designing a Camping Meal Plan & List for a Quick Weekend Trip”

• “Simple Yet Tasty Food for Camping With No Fridge”

• “Easy, High-Protein Meals for Camping or Hiking Trips”

• “Hiking & Backpacking Meal Plan”

• “70+ of the Best Backpacking Meals, Recipes, & Trail Food Tips”

Quick Tips for Packing & Storing No-Cook Meals

Keep ingredients and meals fresh using reusable containers or resealable bags. You might consider organizing and labeling these by day or meal type. Perishable items ought to be kept in a cooler with ice packs.

Why Mountain House Meals Are a Great Option

The best no-cook camping meals are quick to put together and delicious. After all, if a dish is bland and unexciting, it doesn’t really matter if it’s super convenient. Mountain House pouches are packable, lightweight, and require nothing more than water to prepare—and, again, that water doesn’t even need to be hot if you don’t have the means to boil—and they produce soul-satisfying comfort food when and where you need it most.

We use the freshest ingredients and cook every meal in small batches ahead of freeze-drying. The freeze-drying process better preserves the flavor and texture of the original food as compared with other methods of dehydration. Importantly, the same goes for the nutritional value. All of this helps explain why our Mountain House meals so consistently bowl people over, given how faithful they are to the taste, mouthfeel, and nutrition of the freshly prepared, scratch-cooked versions.

Throw in the unbeatable shelf life, and you’ve got the perfect option for your no-cook camping meal plan!

The Best No-Cook Camping Meals

None of the above should be taken as a pushback against the undeniable pleasure of cooking a meal at the campsite. (Including the various fancy hacks one can pull off with Mountain House!) But no-cook options are a must to have along as well, given their convenience and in-a-pinch satisfaction.

Explore our entire Mountain House collection and stock up on some hassle-free goodness for your next camping getaway!