Author Description

I originally created this book as a booklet, which I passed out to participants when I taught the B.A.L.O.O class for Cub Scout Parents and Leaders. B.A.L.O.O stands for Basic Adult Leader Outdoor Orientation; which is a course that gives the adult a very brief exposure to a lot of facets of Scout camping. I quickly realized that the Scouts, Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts, could benefit from the recipes and the ideas of the recipes tremendously. The fact that most teens have not had a great deal of kitchen education and experience is not a secret, nor is it a shock when you learn this; but Scout Leaders need to understand that trying and failing, even if it is edible or not, is still training, experience, and education. Every single person who has ever been an active member of the Boy Scouts of America as a youth has eaten a burned pancake, possibly you were the Grubmaster for the campout and thought pancakes were easy to do. You saw your Mom or Dad make them all the time, and it looks easy. So, why not. As you place the finished pancake, looking all golden brown and delicious on the top as you can see, onto the camp plate of your patrol member, you decide to leave the bottom side down; this hides the fact that on the bottom of that breakfast you prepared for your friend, you are serving charcoal in the shape and somewhat smell of a pancake. We have all been there, either the maker or the eater. Sometimes both. Same is true for the first time you use a Dutch Oven, or a Griddle, or a Frying Pan. What about the heat sources; there is the two burner camp stove, backpack stove, charcoal, and a wood fire. Each of them has their own unique quirks that need to not only be experienced, but learned and practiced. Seriously, the hardest thing for someone to teach a new Scout when cooking is a stove, or the fire, or on charcoal for that matter is that there are a lot more levels of heat than OFF and MAX. Cooking over low or medium heat is better and safer for the meal in some resp