Recipes for finicky 10 year olds?

I am fairly new to backpacking. I am a den leader of 8 10-11 year old boys. These boys will be crossing over to Boy Scouts in March. My goal is to have them ready by then. The biggest complaints I hear from the Boy Scouts after they have been backpacking is cold, wet, and hungry. I think I can teach the boys how to stay warm and dry. Some of these boys present a real challenge when it comes to feeding them. No allergies of food to speak of. I'm looking for trail recipes that the boys can make themselves and will enjoy eating. Nothing to gormet. I plan to try cooking some meals at our den meetings prior to camping so they will already know how to prepare them before we go. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Since they will be learning most of this after they crossover, you probably want to focus on "just add water". An easy and extendable base is instant rice and ramen noodles. Adding a boullion cube and dried veggies, pepperoni,... almost anything will make a meal. The kids will experiment more than the adults. Demo a few recipes using each base and provide a "chart" with potential add-on options.

Basic recipe Examples

Pizza Rice

instant rice
spagetti sauce powder
sun dried tomatoes
pepperoni
mozzarella stick

add boiling water to first 3 ingredients, stir, cover and let rest until done. Stir again add 'roni and cheese.

Cajun Ramen Chicken

ramen noodles sans salt packet
Knorr alfredo seasoning
powdered milk (somewhat optional)
cajun seasoning
packet or can of chicken

Add boiling water to noodles, cover and rest. There should be some water not absorbed...add more if needed. Stir in next 3 ingredients, let sit until absorbed, add chicken.

The above recipes were adapted (read: simplified) from my own recipes to be age appropriate for your boys.

Go over to trailcooking.com for a whole bunch of easy just add water recipes made of things you can get at a grocery store, for the most part. The lady who runs it raised a finicky backpacking boy.

And the best part is I went from a finicky 5 year old to now a 12 year old who will eat nearly anything!

But yes.....I so understand - often kids come from families that view black pepper as an exotic spice so I recommend recipes like http://www.trailcooking.com/recipes/cheesy-couscous or http://www.trailcooking.com/recipes/chicken-alfredo-couscous or http://www.trailcooking.com/recipes/pizza-pot - kids will love them.
Also consider ramen - http://www.trailcooking.com/search/node/ramen or mashed potatoes: http://www.trailcooking.com/recipes/cheesy-bacon-mashers

Kids love these recipes!

Also....I have done a number of BS presentations over the years and one thing I do is always have it hands on. I bring in freezer bags, the dry ingredients and measuring spoons/cups and let THEM assemble meals from a couple selected recipes. There is never a bored kid! They love it!

The best compliment I have ever been paid was a mom who came up and was "My boy is cooking!!" He wouldn't at home do anything with food, but somehow being hiking it was all good!

I am an experienced Scout leader (2 years Asst Webelos Den leader, 6 years ASM), Eagle Scout and experienced backpacker.

What you teach them to cook depends a lot on the style of camping that the troop they join will be doing.

If they do mostly car camping, then you can expand your repertoire considerably. Many of the ingredients you use in freezer-bag (FB) cooking can also be used in dutch oven cooking. Unfortunately, it doesn't go the other way easily.
Learning to use the correct spices, in either type, goes a long way in making the meal more palatable.

While car camping, I've made chicken cordon-blue as well as meatloaf along with many of the traditional dutch oven recipes.

These same finicky eaters have loved 99% of the FB meals that we have used on BP trips.

Watching someone who knows how to cook in the outdoors is a true pleasure. Watching someone who doesn't is truly painful.

A critical point is to teach them to be very careful with their stoves. Keep non-cooks out of the kitchen area until the food is ready.

Tango61

Especially squirrely boys who are goofing off and rough housing. Those ones are so bad to have near stoves!

I don't want ya'll to think I do all the cooking, because I don't.

The boys plan their own menus (with a little coaching) and cook their meals. If they want to try something new, I'll show them how to do it.

Before long, they're doing it without much coaching from me.
The older boys teach the younger ones. Some pick it up, and some don't.

Thanks for all the help. We will try out the recipes before we go so that the boys will know what to expect. I may start with the finickiest (is that a word) and have them choose a recipe to try then we can actually make it. I think if I can the boys to try it they will eat it. Especially when they are good and hungry.

You have 10 and 11 year olds together? Our 10 year olds are Webelos and they become Boy Scouts when they hit 11.

Personally, I wouldn't worry too much about it. At 10 and 11, they are very picky. When they are 12, they start to open up. By 13 or 14, they eat anything placed in front of them, and then some. Last year when I was teaching Wilderness Survival, I showed them a log with ants and said they could eat the larvae. I didn't ask them to, but they ate a bunch of it. They were hungry.
I also wouldn't worry about it because you aren't taking them backpacking. You are just prepping them for being a scout. Showing them real simple meals is a big help. Whether or not they actually like is secondary. They just need to see that it can be easy to cook outdoors. Of course, if you follow the advice already given, they will probably like it.

As a scoutmaster and looking at your position, I don't see much you can do to prepare them more. Their complaints of cold, wet, hungry aren't a reflection of their cub scout training. Boy Scouts is were they learn to not be cold, wet or hungry.

Because the birthdays vary we have 10 and 11 year olds together. All the boys will be in 5th grade this fall. Our Boy Scout Troop does backpack. I have seen in the past where the new boys weren't quite prepared for the trip. I would like to take the boys on a couple of short overnight backpacking trips with a few parents just to get them acquainted with it before we put them out on their own.

When I was in girl guides here in Alberta Canada, we did some real fun breakfasts.

Breakfast Ideas:

On friday night before you leave, if you are leaving sat morning. (or thurs, if leaving friday) Prepare the following:

A)3 Eggs per person
B)seasoning (salt, pep, season salt, etc, whatever)
C)options: sweet peppers, bacon bits, onion. or nothing.
D)2 ziploc baggies per person

Scramble the eggs, put them in doubled up ziplockies, freeze.

When you wake up in the camp site, get some H2O close to boiling. (dont boil toooo hard, its not required and might make a mess)Dip the baggies, or put air in the top of each so they float. take em out every few min and make sure they are cooked.

Eggs are such good protein, and will keep you fuller, longer - have some bagels or crumpets, they dont squish easily, and they are light.

Eggs are the most perfect food in the world, says me.

We also did wet paperbag breakfasts with bacon and such, but if you dont soak your paperbag enough your bag burns up and there goes your breakfast. boo on that.

I almost forgot to tell you.

DONT EAT POWDERED EGGS!!! Dont subject 10 yr olds to powedered eggs either.

We made these things called Banana Boats. Holy cow.

1 banana
a few little mini choc chips
4 little mini marshmellows
1 12"square of tinfoil.

Slice banana up the side, (DONT PEEL BANANANANA) one side only, try to make it the side that would be up if u just set it down. Shove choc chips and shmellows in there too. Wrap up with tinfoil. put on hot coals.
Wait for the smell - the yummy gooey goodness smell. They are done in maybe 2 min - depending on your coals tho.
DONT BURN yourself either!

These are bringing back so many memories. I dont know if you will be able to use any of these, but when I was 7,8,9,10 etc I love love loved these ideas. They were so much fun, and so interactive. When your younger you just like to get right in there!

When I went out with Girl Guides, or sea cadets, all I wanted was to make my own stuff. Be independent, and do it myself. Thats what kids love, is the feeling of "I can do this!"

Another REALLY good idea, but I am sure I will catch flack for it here, but it was so super fun at the time and I felt like I was in the Army. Ration Packs. In Canada you get some pretty darn good Ratpacks. We ate them in cadets, and its a boil the bag, open, and eat with a long sundae spood type of deal.
There was tubes of peanut butter, drink crystals, choc bars, a dessert like pied cherries, pied peaches, mmmmmmm, in the box.
In the bags: Mac and cheese, spaghetti w/ meatballs, fingerparts and potatoes (sausage and potato)you name it, they make it in a foil bag!!! I think you can get them online, or at army surplus.

We used compasses the weekend we did the whole survival outback thing, and did a course at night, like a scavenger hunt, get 1 location, it gives you clues to the next, etc. Maybe not at night for the boys, but personally, it was an explosivley awesome time, its 16 years later and Im STILL TALKING ABOUT!

Unless the parents are experienced backpackers, I would suggest leaving them at home. They generally "do more harm than good", so to speak.

Take qualified supervision and spend the time with the boys in small groups explaining what you are doing. 2-3 adults or older experienced Scouts (Troop Guides) would be good.

Depending on the numbers, you will need at least one other adult and preferably two.

Just my experience.

Oh, and be sure and try out the freezer bag (FB) cooking ahead of time. You can actually do this as one of your activities at a meeting in a controlled environment (ie kitchen).
You will also benefit if you make some bag cozies (see Sarbar's site to understand). You can make them out of Reflexics (sp?) or from windshield shades. You can get the Reflexics at Lowe's or Home Depot.

We must have different rules than you. Maybe it is our charter organization rules and not necessarily BSA rules. But, 10 and 11 year olds can't go on an overnight without a parent with them.

Good Lord! I much rather deal with the kid rather than take along most of the parents unless there is a known problem with the kid such as severe ADA or autism (sp?) or something like that. Its like trying to teach a scared kid to swim with the concerned parent sitting next to the pool. The two just fed off each other's anxiety. Usually, the kid stops hollaring and gets on with learning how to swim once the parent leaves. Besides, there are things we let slide that horrifies some parents like insist the scouts brush their teeth in the morning and change their underware. One mom was very mad because her Scout came back from Scout camp with one dirty pair of underware and 4 clean pairs. She haranged the Scout leaders for not CHECKING inside her kid's pants! (Try checking with two deep leadership.) I only want a parent along if the parant is an experianced camper or demostrates the ability and attitude to develop into a good camper.

Mind you, our Troop does very little car camping but mostly hikes into our campsites. I want the young scout to rely on and learn from the older scouts in his patrol, not run back to mom or dad to ask for something he forgot. The scout needs to learn there are consequances to forgetting items. (Within reason of course, we are not going to let a tenderfoot freeze or go hungry.)

I used to have the boys change underwear every third day:

"Fellows, I've got good news and bad news. The good news is, we're changing underwear today. The bad news is, Fred's changing with Joe, Tony's changing with Sam..."

My son explained the relationship between camping trips and underwear to his mother thusly: "Underwear has two clean sides."

Fortunately I have good boys and parents in my Den. They are technically Webelos which is the last 2 years of cub scouts. Scout rules allow us to camp without parents so long as we have sufficent trained leaders. I would like to take them on a short hike to a campsite. I don't expect that they will learn everything but they will quickly realize that they (not Dad) has to carry their stuff. They will realize maybe I don't need a big cooler and chairs, and and and. This trip I will probably allow 2 trips to the campsite. The main thing I want to accomplish is the 1st exposure so that when it comes to the real thing it won't be a total shock. This goes for some parents too when choosing equipment. When the overnight low is expected to be 50 they don't need the 8 pound -10 degree bag. Realizing how little the boys can carry is going to be a challenge. My son barely weighs 60 pounds so his pack should be less than 15. By the time you add a small pack, water 1/2 tent sleeping bag and pad I am pretty much there.

I totally agree. We just wait until they are 12 to do this.

I must be reading the rules wrong then.

Cub Scouts Camping

I took a group of boys backpacking years ago and these two brothers were I guess used to getting what they wanted at home. We had pancakes for breakfast and I threw in some raisins. You would have thought it was rabbit droppings. Everyone else loved them. I just told them to pick them out or starve. My observation is they will eat when they get hungry enough and if not, they aren't going to die in a weekend of fasting.

Sounds like a good plan. We used to do something similar in conjunction with the crossover ceremony at the local Scout camp (which the Cubmaster turned into a parent/son campout.) The Webelos crossed over on Friday night (I attended, along with my ASM, SPL, and ASPL.) The next morning, the 4 of us picked up the newly minted Scouts with their backpacks (we gave them a list of gear ahead of time) and took them on a 4-mile hike around the lake to a remote campsite. We'd usually take about 6 hours to get there, stopping along the way to help them re-pack their packs, lash on sleeping bags better (this was the days of external frame packs), and teach them basic skills like how to hike, how to purify water (plop, plop, fizz, fizz in the days before filters), and spending two hours on a cooked lunch (which doubled as a How to Use a Stove lesson.) Then, in camp, we covered basic camping skills; the next morning, we hiked back to the Cub camp and went home. All the boys had earned a couple of skill awards and gotten started on a couple of merit badge requirements, and found it easier to assimilate into the Troop as a result.

Good luck - it's an idea that really does pay off.

I see what you are reading. Apparently Our council has a different interpretation based on the guide to safe scouting, under the age guidelines.

A Webelos Scout may participate in overnight den camping when supervised by an adult. In most cases, the Webelos Scout will be under the supervision of his parent or guardian. It is essential that each Webelos Scout be under the supervision of a parent-approved adult.

I agree they won't die. However if they are hungry the entire time it sure puts a damper on the fun they have. Backpacking is a much more enjoyable experience when you eat well.

To just add a vote to what others have told you, I've had good luck with kids with the sort of things you'll find on trailcooking.com - look for the "FBC style" - that's "freezer bag cooking" - which amounts to recepies you can just at boiling water to a bag.

Between that and some well prepared snacks (candy, nuts, dried fruit, sausage, cheese, bars) and maybe even some homemade stuff (any scouter can look up the hudson's bay bread recepie)
and you should be able to keep them pretty happy, or give them enough that they can make themselves happy.

In particular, trailcooking.com is laid out in a way that you could probably get the kids looking for FBC compatible recepies there themselves - probably an easy way to get them involved in it. A picky eater tends to be a lot less picky if it was their idea to make it in the first place.

Thanks for all the great info. I think I will prepare a compliation of menus and have the boys pick out a few they want to try then the next week I will have them make them at a den meeting. That way when they get the chance for real they can take things they know they like and have made before. They will be a lot more at ease with the whole process that way.

This is a great site with very helpful members. Thanks to all!!

Wow! And if they did check to make sure they changed that would have been a whole other issue! lol.

No, no checking. Not ever. I wouldn't even go in my son's room at home; some things you just don't want to know.

My wife always said boys become Scouts so they can play with fire, pee on trees, and go a week without changing underwear. I never had the heart to tell her that's pretty much why men become Scoutmasters, too.

Seems like I recall hearing about a Japanese inventor of underwear that had three leg holes. He also had the above logic because it was billed as 6-day underwear.

I am a big fan of just taking Velveeta shells and cheese with a little big of tuna in it and if your feeling like a little more tast, you can buy seasoning packets in the seasoning section at the grocery store that you can add. a very tasty easy to make meal!

At least you're not in Naval Engineering. The Gas Turbine Master Chief I know always claimed underwear had 4 sides - on the right way, backwards, inside out, and inside out and backwards.

this inspires me to stop feeding my kids MREs.