Just started camping with my young family, kids are 3, 4 and 5 and thought it would be a good idea to discuss ideas with other people.

My previous camping experience is purely just looking after myself while hiking, kayaking etc so cooking was all done on a Trangia with light weight ingredients.

Building up the Car camping equipment now and would love to know what's good and what is a waste of space and money.

From North Central Victoria.

Welcome Jack,enjoy pokeing around the pages here,I,m sure you will get some good ideas and advice.
cheers George

g'day jack

enjoy your time on cocia, plenty of great ideas here

Mmmmm Jack, everyone will give you different advice, I was interested in camp oven cooking so I started off by watching and talking to people cooking at Camp Oven Cooking Festivals, I bought a Bedourie oven and soon a after that a cheap 12" cast iron oven which I took camping and experimenting with.
As your skills improve buy better ovens etc, I have a box I take camping with all the basic ingredients like flour etc, my knives, spoons and three favourite ovens, a 9" an 11" and a 13". Things like measuring spoons, flour sifters etc come later as you find you need them, it's all a case of personal choice.
Hope that helps.

pd

G'day Jack,

Welcome!

In regard to a suggested camping kit. I've always adhered to the philosophy of 'travel light travel far'. When my kids were young, they slept in swags under the stars on fine nights and  under a fly during  inclement weather. We generally cooked around a camp fire with one or two camp ovens and a billy for hot water/tea.  

For what its worth, I've found that young kids generally enjoy the camping experience providing they have plenty of exercise and activities to entertain them during the day, lots of good food to eat and a warm dry bed at night.

A minimalist camping kit is inexpensive and easy to set up and there is always the option of adding to it in the future.

Welcome Jack

I can see a need for a basic kit to get me started. But looking at storm kettles I wouldn't be suprised if I develop a kit that is good to cook with and pleasing to the eye. It will be nice to have purchases driven by something other than weight and basic functionality.

We've actually just come back from our first camping trip were my 5 year old took me on a 7 km morning walk. He loves exploring and I generally just let him go and keep a tab on where we are.

The 3 year old was introduced to cooking marshmallows and spent the whole trip looking for the perfect marshmallow stick.

They're all very keen to go again.

G'day Jack & Co.
It's great to hear you kids are keen to go camping again.  So many adventures waiting just around the corner!


As for equipment, I would first consider your cooking method eg. camp fire or portable gas stove -  at what time of year?

In my opinion....
If your cooking on a portable gas stove then anything you can use on a home stovetop can be used for camping ... normal fry pans, saucepans etc.  So for summer camping when fire bans apply [in WA] no special equipment is needed.  
I have used my bushranger (steel camp oven) on the gas stove for boiling water for pasta/washing up/bathing, cooking a casserole, stir frying vegies etc.

The non-plastic, longer handled pots and pans come into play when we start talking about cooking over open flame camp fires.

FirePro gloves are handy to reduce radiated heat issues ( ask your local VFRS brigade for old ones ).  I use mine when stirring pots over open fires, lifting lids off camp oven covered in heat beads etc.  
**Pot holders / lid lifters are still required for direct contact with hot handles etc**

I LOVE my multigrips, they are brilliant when handling hot grills and other metal items.  The lid of my bushranger doubles as my frypan and I find a multigrip better and more stable than the supplied handle for moving it around, lifting it etc.

Busy campgrounds - school holiday periods etc
Spring steel change tent (no poles) which erects in 60 seconds with a flick of the wrist. Great for adults to bath in - you can stand upright and don't have to worry about knocking the bowl of sudsy water over in the sleeping tent.  

A portable toilet which folds up like a camp stool and has a [rubbish] bag hanging under the seat rim.  Great for those times when the facilities are too far away at 3am, or the kiddies develop a 'shy' bladder in busy campgrounds!  Place it inside the spring steel change tent for privacy.  You may need to dig a hole and bury half the stool so it is the right height for the little kids.

A pack of cards - we all have trips when we get rained in for hours at a time!

HTH     :)