Eating Healthy While Camping: It's Easier Than You Think

Back in '94, my first year full-timing in a beat-up Fleetwood Bounder I bought off a fella in Tulsa, I ate like a raccoon. Hot dogs, canned chili, gas station burritos, those horrible little powdered donuts that leave white dust on everything you own. By the time I pulled into a KOA outside Flagstaff that December, I'd gained thirty pounds and my doctor told me my cholesterol was "concerning." I was forty-one years old and felt like sixty.

So I figured I better learn to eat like a grown man.

Now look, I ain't gonna sit here and tell you to make quinoa bowls and acai smoothies. I don't know what half that stuff is and I don't care to learn. What I AM gonna tell you is that eating decent food in an RV is simple if you just commit to a few basics.

First thing: buy vegetables. I know. Revolutionary advice. But you'd be amazed how many RVers I meet who haven't eaten anything green since they left home. Bell peppers, onions, zucchini, broccoli — this stuff keeps for a week easy in your fridge. Throw it in a skillet with some olive oil and garlic salt. Takes ten minutes. Tastes good. Won't kill you.

Second thing: get a decent cooler for when you're boondocking. I use a Yeti Tundra 45 that I bought in 2016 and it still holds ice for three days in the summer if you pre-chill it. Keeps your produce and meat cold when you're off-grid. Before I had that Yeti I lost more food to spoilage than I care to admit.

Third thing, and this is the big one: stop eating out so much. I know it's tempting. You're in a new town, there's a barbecue joint that smells amazing, the Mexican place has a line out the door which means it's probably good. And hey, eat out once in a while, life's short. But if you're hitting restaurants or drive-throughs every day you're gonna get fat and broke. I speak from experience on both counts.

I do most of my cooking on a two-burner Coleman propane stove that I set up outside. Been using Coleman stoves since 1989. They ain't sexy but they work and you can find parts for em anywhere. I make a lot of one-pan meals — chicken thighs with whatever vegetables I have, rice on the side. Pork chops are cheap and cook fast. Eggs for breakfast with toast, maybe some avocado if I'm feeling fancy. See, none of this is complicated.

Farmers markets changed things for me too. Started hitting them regularly around 2008 when I was spending a summer in the Willamette Valley in Oregon. The produce is better than the grocery store, it's usually cheaper, and you end up talking to the people who grew it which is kinda nice when you spend most of your time alone in a rig.

I also want to say something about water. Drink it. More than you think you need. I keep a half-gallon jug next to my driver's seat and I finish it every day on driving days. Used to get headaches all the time and it turned out I was just dehydrated like an idiot.

My buddy Gene, rest his soul, he full-timed for twenty years eating nothing but diner food and microwave dinners. Had a heart attack at sixty-three in a Pilot parking lot in Amarillo. Made it through okay but it scared the hell out of both of us. He started eating better after that. Wish he'd started sooner.

Point is, you don't need a culinary degree or a fancy kitchen. You need a skillet, a cutting board, a sharp knife, and the willingness to spend twenty minutes cooking instead of pulling into another drive-through. Your body's the only rig you can't trade in for a newer model.