Book Review: Cook It Wild by Chris Nuttall-Smith
Within this hardcover book by Chris Nuttall-Smith (celebrated journalist, food writer, and critic, as well as a Top Chef Canada resident judge) is a whole smorgasbord of inspiration for your next adventure! You’ll be guided through every step of the way on your camping trip meal plan from gear selection, shopping, packing, cooking to final clean up.
Every page has real-world brand suggestions of foods that have been chef approved including sub-options that elevate every meal and are shelf stable, or have a long lifespan to last as long as your trip. Symbols denote which recipes are best suited for frontcountry or backcountry, campfire or no cooking required, which ingredients will have to be frozen and which recipes you will want to snap a photograph ahead of time to help you when you’re ready to cook.
Full page colour photos from family camping trips (by Maya Visnyei) are abundantly scattered throughout the book along with well designed black and white illustrations (by Claire McCracken) of camping and cooking gear are a great addition and really highlight the recipes within this 240 page book. Each meal has serving sizes and ingredient weight, perfect for backpackers or managing longer trips into the backcountry.
Multiple varied options for Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Dessert and even snack time are all thoroughly detailed by the author in this book. Chris elevates your possibilities past your typical slab of frozen meat cooked over a grill on a fire, to mouthwatering meals such as shrimp burgers, ash-roasted eggs, chili-spiked flank steak, blistered herby fingerlings and at end the day… deserts that will really wow your fellow campers… such as the fire-baked pecan sticky buns. Each recipe also includes a ‘notes’ section that details why certain ingredients were chosen, modifications you can make or storage suggestions to make sure the food doesn’t spoil.
On first flip-through some of these meals might sound a little elaborate for backcountry camping, but the first third of the book is dedicated to first-hand tips from the author to set you up for success. The secret is that a lot of it comes down to doing a little preparation ahead of time. Each stage of prep not only makes it easier to cook when you’re at camp, but also bulk in your food barrel and leftover scraps when cooking. There are also many great suggestions of ingredients that…
are great for your pantry and are staples for multiple types of tripping meals or snacks
are easy substitutions of ingredients that would ordinarily spoil on a trip
can be readily found in Canada
We all have stared at our food barrel before a trip wondering what to put in it and Chris has really done a fantastic job of offering some inspiration. Chris’ suggestions are also catered to not just being something you would order from a restaurant, but a caloric balanced meal suited to you taking on the rest of your journey. I highly recommend this book, especially after trying out these meals. Hopefully it will be the springboard for you too, to spend a few more minutes before you head out on a trip so that you can sit down and actually savour a healthy meal cooked by you!
Cook it Wild is from Penguin Random House Canada and you can purchase your own hardcover copy through your local bookseller or at Amazon or Indigo. You can also read an Ebook version from Apple Books, Amazon, or the Google Play Store.
