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Food

Campfire cooking

Out on the range, the best way to rustle up dinner is in cast iron cookware. The setting may be rustic, but the food doesn't have to be.

By TERRY TOMALIN
Published November 1, 2006

	Campers gather around a big pot of stew simmering in a Dutch oven at a recent gathering at Fort De Soto Park at the southern tip of Pinellas County.
[Times photo: David Zentz]

ADVERTISEMENT [Times photo: Bob Croslin] Outdoor Dutch ovens have flanged lids where briquettes nestle, heating food from above. Flames and charcoal cook from below.

Chef Tom Pritchard, the man behind the culinary success of two of Tampa Bay's most successful restaurants and another rising one, boasted that he could whip up a gourmet meal anywhere.

"You have to start off with the right ingredients," said Pritchard, executive chef of Salt Rock Grill, Island Way Grill and the new Marlin Darlin'. "Then just give me a good wood fire and some cast iron, and I'll show you some magic."

Pritchard, like most good cooks, has several pieces of cast iron cookware in his kitchen.

"You can saute, braise, stew, cook short, medium or long," he said. "Cast iron does it all. It is very dependable and predictable."

Most Boy Scouts learn the basics of cast iron cooking when they are tenderfoots.

"The first time I ate something out of a Dutch oven, I was hooked," said Jack Smetzer, president of the Suncoast Dutch Oven Society. "I went back to my troop and told them that we had to get one. That was back in 1972. I've been cooking in one ever since."

Pritchard, who agreed to cook in the great outdoors of Fort De Soto Park after being challenged by this reporter, got to choose the weapon.

"The two most common pieces of equipment are the cast iron skillet and the Dutch oven," he said. "Each has its strong points."

Skillets are great for frying - everything from chicken to catfish - and the Dutch oven is best for baking breads and biscuits, as well as roasting shanks of venison and simmering a hearty backwoods stew. There are two types of Dutch oven: one that's used for inside cooking, both on the stove and in the oven, and another for outside cooking over an open fire. The camp version usually is footed so it can sit above the coals (though it sometimes hangs from a tripod) and a flanged lid where coals nestle. This allows heat to cook the food from above and below.

"The great thing about cast iron is that it distributes the heat evenly," Pritchard said. "You can cook slow and steady. ... It really brings out the flavor."

Pritchard is never short of ideas, but part of the friendly bet was that he pick a recipe from a book recently published by the National Museum of Forest Service History called Camp Cooking: 100 Years (Gibbs Smith, 2004; $9.95).

He considered making Pioneer Night Stew but couldn't find a moose on deadline, then toyed with Mile High Stew but thought ground beef was too common. In the end, he opted for Son of a Gun Stew, a pleasant blend of beef, bacon and onions, with a touch of Worcestershire sauce.

Generally, one-third of the coals (or briquettes) are placed under the pot and two-thirds on the flanged lid. Pritchard cooked the stew slowly over mild heat to give his friends a chance to enjoy the campfire before eating.

After an hour and a half, the stew was steaming, and Pritchard served the glorious mixture to a dozen hungry campers.

"You win," I told him. "I'll wash your Jeep for a month."

Scraping the last lickings from the pot, we simply took the Dutch oven over to the water faucet (after it had cooled, of course) and rinsed it.

"You never use soap on a cast iron pot," said Mark Kelley of Lodge Cast Iron Manufacturing Co. "If seasoned properly, cast iron is the original nonstick cookware."

Lodge, which has been in the Appalachian mountain town of South Pittsburg, Tenn. (population 3,300) since William McKinley was president in the late 1890s, is the only maker of cast iron cookware left in the United States.

"Our business has increased dramatically in the last few years," Kelley said. "We can't make it fast enough. Thanks to the Food Network and celebrity chefs like Paula Deen, more and more people are getting into traditional cooking. And it doesn't get any more traditional than cast iron."

If properly cared for, cast iron cookware can last for generations. "When I got married 60 years ago, my mother gave me a cast iron skillet that her mother had given her, and she got it from her mother before her, who got it from her mother before her," said Harriet Jackson, whose outdoors store in Pinellas Park, Bill Jackson, has been selling cast iron cookware to campers since 1966. "That is four generations, all using the same pan. Nothing else today will last that long."

Jackson said cooks shouldn't be intimidated by cast iron. In the old days, half the battle was properly seasoning the pan so it would become impervious to rust. But now Lodge has come out with Lodge Logic, factory-sealed cast iron cookware.

"It takes a lot of the guesswork out of it," said Kelley, the company's spokesman.

There are also cast iron "support groups," such as the Suncoast Dutch Oven Society, which are more than willing to bring newcomers into fold.

"We hold regular gatherings," Smetzer said. "It is a great way to get started. And the food is usually pretty good."

Besides the obvious culinary advantages of cast iron cooking, Kelley said some people think a Dutch oven is simply chic.

"It is cowboy cooking," he said. "You have got to admit it looks pretty cool."

COWBOY ROUNDUP

Dutch oven cooking

The Suncoast Dutch Oven Society will host a "gathering" on Dec. 3 at Lake Seminole Park, 10015 Park Blvd., Seminole, Shelter 9. Setup begins at noon, with eating at 4.

To learn more about the Suncoast Dutch Oven Society, e-mail suncoastidox@yahoo.com or call Jon Hoegstrom at 727 397-9382.

For information, contact the International Dutch Oven Society online at www.idos.com. The society will hold its spring convention in April in Utah.

Terry Tomalin can be reached at tomalin@sptimes.com or (727) 893-8808.

[Last modified November 1, 2006, 08:13:30]