Mega speedy simple recipes

I hate cooking. My friend Jenny says "If it takes longer to make than it does to eat, then it's not worth it." This statement is a great cooking ethic to have, especially when camping.

Ok, so the following recipes are designed for this sort of scenario:
It's cold. It's windy. You've been walking/cycling all day, and now you're a little grumpy and fed-up. It's day 4 of camping. The tent flooded in night and you didn't get much sleep. You are starting to miss home. The feeling of warmth. You are getting grumpy. You think - is it even worth cooking the evening meal?

My answer is - YES! You will feel so much better. Ok, so some quick 10 minute recipes for evening meal:

1. Pasta. Pasta cooks in 10 minutes if you boil the heck out of it. Whilst you're waiting, put the radio on. Try to make it a nice experience. It's the journey as well as the destination.
Once the pasta is done, tip in some nice pasta sauce with big veggie chunks that you bought from a shop. (Cause it's not worth making your own pasta sauce. Yes it's cheaper, but it's more faff. Unless you make it up before you go camping). If your fellow camper is a carnivore, it may be kind to chuck in some bits of meat like chorizo or ham. If you're feeling adventurous, maybe grate some cheese over the top.

So ingredients are: Lots of pasta
Pasta sauce
Optional meat like chorizo or ham (stuff you can take with you all week that won't go off).
Cooking time = approx. 10 mins
Number of hobs used = 1 hob

If you want to push the boat out, you could make some bolognese before you go, and take it frozen. Eat it in the first couple of days, but it's good cause you can cook it whilst the pasta boils and it still takes about 10 mins. Although it's an extra thing to wash up :(

2. Rice. Again, rice takes 10 minutes to cook. Once it's  done, chuck in some rice sauce that you bought already. (Are you detecting a pattern here?). You could even be clever and buy the sauce with bits of meat in it already, then your carnivore husband will be happy.

3 Anything with the word 'instant' on it is good. E.g. 'instant' noodles.... 'instant' pasta.....Also look for 'just add water'. Also good. My favourite is the cheese pasta packets where you add some milk and water and stir for 7 minutes. It says that it serves 2 on the packet, but I think it only serves 1. I have learnt this the hard way.
(I know there's proper bonafide camping boil-in-the-bag stuff that you can buy from a camping shop, but in my experience it's expensive, heavy, and you can get a situation where the water doesn't sink down to the bottom of the bag so you get clumps of powdery food. For wild camping particularly when you've just got your trusty trangier and you're carrying your food, I think cheap instant pasta's good. Not so much noodles cause they don't fill you up as well).


4. When you've finished cooking the pasta/rice or whatever, put another pan of water on the stove to boil. Then you can have a nice civilised cup of tea and a cookie after you've eaten your dinner.

(I've yet to find any decent dessert recipes that are quick... the angel delight stuff tastes like soap. I think the best dessert cookie is a stroopwafel. You get your cup of tea and melt the stroopwafel over the top of the cup like so.  Really nice end to the meal!)