Speaker 1: 0:00

Well, hello, sunshine. Have you ever been preparing for a trip away from home and felt unsure about what you were going to eat while you're away? That's not time consuming, but it's actually enjoyable and makes you feel great too. We get it, jared, and I know how hard this scenario can be, so today we're gonna share the four easy meals that you can enjoy at your next camping trip or wherever the road takes you. If you're ready to get prepared for your best plant-based trip yet, then grab your pen and a notebook and let's dive right in. Hey there, sunshine. Welcome to the Power On Plants podcast. We're your host, jared and Anita Roussell, and we're absolutely head over heels for whole plant foods and helping you navigate this incredible plant-based journey. That's because our lives have been completely changed by plant-based goodness. We used to struggle every day with excess pounds and low energy, vascular disease, joint pain and lack of sleep, just to name a few, and even though we're medical professionals, we still weren't getting practical answers that actually worked. So we dug into the research, we started living what we learned, and now we both have our lives back, and that's what we want for you, too. The truth is, you can do this, and it's not hard. You just need a way that will bring real and lasting change, and that path. It has to be simple and enjoyable and it's got to be delicious too. So are you ready to live your life to the fullest? Then you're in the right place, because living without limits, that's what Power On Plants is all about. So pull up your chair, grab a matchelate and let's get started. Hey there, friend. Today we are gonna be talking to you about our recent camping trip. Now, this is Fresh, sister. I'm talking last week, this past week, actually. We just got back a couple of days ago. We met with another couple. We have four children ages 12 to 19. Almost. They have seven children ages not even one to 18. That's the age range we're looking at here. So imagine 11 kids, two couples and we want to have fun together. Two campsites right next to each other, right? So funny? No joke, this is a true story. Our neighbor next to us comes by and says hey, how are you? We start talking and he says so, are y'all with a camper? Or something Like he thought we were an official camp because there were so many of us. That's what happens when homeschool families congregate. You know what I'm talking about if you're a homeschool mama. But anyway, it is so much fun to get together with friends and we were celebrating a special time of Sukkot. It's a biblical feast we celebrate each fall and you know it's a biblical feast we're going to be keeping when Yeshua Jesus returns. So you may be thinking when did that ever stop then? Well, it didn't. There's nowhere in the world it ever stopped. Now we're not in the land, obviously we're not in Israel, so we can't keep it specifically how it says, like going to the temple and things like that. But we can get outdoors, we can live in a Sukkot in a temporary shelter, because this whole celebration is about God dwelling with us. It's what he did in the garden, it's what he's coming back to do and it's what he wants to do with you today. He wants to have a loving relationship with you. So this is such a fun celebration because we're out there camping together and we want to spend time together building our relationships with God and with each other, and we certainly don't want to be cooking the whole time. Right? And that's why we want to bring you this episode, because we want to give you this tactical information of how can I make this work. How can I go on a family vacation, still eat healthy, still save time, still have energy at the end of the day, because I'm not drained from all the crap food I ate in the name of quick and easy, or drained because of all the time I spent around my Coleman stove because I was doing that in the name of health. That's just never gonna work for us long term. Not when we're camping and not when we're at home.

Speaker 2: 4:10

Now, you may not be going camping, you may be doing something different, but if we can make this work camping, you can make this work just about anywhere.

Speaker 1: 4:18

That is such a great point. We want to share with you four easy camping meals, because I know you're thinking okay, that's great and all I need. It sounds good, but what did you eat? Bring it, tell me what was on the plate. So this is what we did. These are just four of the meals we had this week. We made it simple, we made it delicious and, of course, we made it plain base. Those are our big things. Meal number one was very simple. It just doesn't get any easier than this. A sandwich. Don't worry, I'm gonna tell you what we put on there. Okay, you could do peanut butter. You could do peanut butter and whole free. You could do peanut butter and bananas, or peanut butter and bananas and whatever little sweet thing you like. I like a little date syrup. Jared sometimes likes a little maple syrup. But I'm not just gonna tell you about peanut butter sandwiches. We're gonna break away a little bit. Sometimes sandwiches are a little tricky because when you think about sandwiches, your go-to might be like my old go-to, it might be like a deli meat or smoked meat. But now you've heard us say multiple times that we know, processed meat, including sandwich meat, is a group one carcinogen. Okay, that's the same group that tobacco products are in. If you didn't know that, we're here to tell you these things. We want you to know these things because there was a time we didn't know that either. Boy, do we wish somebody had told us this stuff earlier on.

Speaker 2: 5:37

But this was even after we had gone through all of our healthcare training.

Speaker 1: 5:41

Oh, yeah, we still didn't know it then. No, that's the crazy part of this you don't want to be putting those things in medical school or nursing school. No, not until things change, and we do hope it changes soon. But these things you do need to know, and the research is there, the facts are in, and so you don't want to be putting those things on your sandwich, not even the healthier kinds. I mean, I was buying things without the nitrites added, without the nitrates, without the things that I thought were bad for me. Come to find out just the item in general, the main meat processed product. Even though I was buying whole smoked turkey breast. It's still processed, so it's still very unhealthy. Okay, so let's talk about sandwiches. Then what do we put on our sandwich? This isn't something you have to cook, so it doesn't get any easier than eating raw foods. Do you want to choose a whole grain bread, preferably organic, something with seeds, nuts in it? That's great. Maybe oatmeal, something like that. Choose your favorite whole grain sandwich bread. You could even do a whole grain wrap. That's fine too. But what are we going to get on there Now? We've got to have some kind of sauce on there. If you were a mayo user like me, or maybe you're a mustard user, you could still use mustard, but mustard has a lot of salt, so don't go slathering mustard on there and thinking you're going to be a whole lot healthier. Try to use small amounts of things like mustard and pickle, because it's salty. What are we going to get on that sandwich? We need a yummy sauce. We need a five minute sauce or less. Now we can pretty much make the sauces in one to two minutes, right? The Power On Plants Cookbook is filled with these sauces, so you could do something like make a very quick, simple hummus or bean dip to spread on your sandwich. There's pretty much nothing better than a hummus, or you can buy one. There are brands that are oil-free or very low oil. You could buy one of those. Spread that on your sandwich. Done so, now you've got your base. You've got a sauce on there. It's either ranch dressing, something like that from the Power On Plants Cookbook.

Speaker 2: 7:40

Maybe that's Thousand Island type dressing.

Speaker 1: 7:42

Thousand Island is delicious, absolutely. Or you've got your hummus. Now we are going to pile it up. You're going to pile this sandwich up with what? Raw vegetables? A ton of raw vegetables. Now, if you've used hummus, you've already got beans in there. I mean that's a great source of protein. Of course you're savvy I'm feeling You're savvy and you know that all plants have the building blocks of protein. All plants have protein, so you don't need to worry about your protein. But we've got that bean base or that sauce, whichever it is, and now we're just going to layer it up with the veggies. So we could do a mixed green. We could buy a box of mixed greens and put those on there. Or just your favorite lettuce Get something crunchy on there. It's really delicious. I love tomatoes. I like cucumbers on my sandwich. I mean that's honestly one of my favorites Lettuce, tomato, cucumber. You can add a little bit of pickle on it and you've got your hummus. That's a delicious sandwich right there. But you could pile it up. I mean you could get fancy. You could grill a mushroom if you wanted to, but you can keep it raw and make it really fast.

Speaker 2: 8:45

I was even thinking. Maybe if you have some leftover grilled onions or some leftover sautéed mushrooms Now, granted, that wouldn't be raw, but there have been times when we have done these things for other meals.

Speaker 1: 8:55

Right.

Speaker 2: 8:56

Had some leftover, boom Done, pull it out of the fridge, put it on your sandwich. So, layer upon layer of flavor there.

Speaker 1: 9:04

So he's bringing it again, sisters, he's bringing the top level strategies, all right. So you want to think about this. If you're making a sandwich, you've already made or bought this sauce, that's Hulfe Plant Base. So what are you going to do? Do you think you're going to use that whole container of sauce on one or two sandwiches Even with six sandwiches? For us, we don't usually use a whole container of sauce.

Speaker 2: 9:27

Probably not. No, probably not.

Speaker 1: 9:31

You're going to use a cooler, or maybe, if you've got an RV, you're going to have a refrigerator there, or you're in a little hotel room. What you're going to do is you're going to save that sauce. We're going to use Jared's tip. We're going to save the sauce for a future meal. Could you put veggie dippers in that later? Absolutely. Maybe you've made it dinner the night before and you've got sautéed veggies you can put on your veggie sandwich. You see what I'm doing here, so you can take things from this meal and use them in the next meal. You can take things from the last meal, like Jared said, and use it to make your sandwich. So always think about what you've got left over in that cooler, in that refrigerator that you can use again and again throughout the week. That's a brilliant tip. Meal number two whole grain pasta dishes. Listen, no-transcript. This one is so easy. I practically cooked it in the dark. Okay, I used the light of a tiny little laner. It might as well have been in the dark, most literally in the dark. It was it was so late at night we came back, we had gone to the beach, we came back to the campsite and we had all. The kids were hungry and so they were lighting the fire and getting stuff running around the fire and I mean I'm talking about I threw this together in the time that my pasta water boiled and I tossed my pasta in in another little pot. I just threw in some vegetables to saute. I had a quick cashew cream sauce, literally five minutes in my Nutribullet and all the while the water's boiling, getting ready for the pasta. Okay, and then I'm gonna pour that in when it's done. It sounds complicated Maybe, but it's not. So think about it two pots, one with water, water's coming up to boil. I put in my veggies to saute. Listen, they're already pre-cut. The mushrooms are pre-chopped. I've got onions that are pre-chopped and bell peppers and I'm putting all that stuff in there. I'm sauteing it up now. I'm going to add some flavor to it. So I've got an organic red miso that was in my cooler. I bought some frozen green peas along, I'm gonna put in. I brought my bottle of low sodium tamari and Vegan Worcestershire and a five-minute cashew cream base. I've got either you can pre-make that at home or you can make it right there in a Nutribullet at your campsite. Literally takes two minutes pour all that together, I ended up with this creamy sauce that, honest to goodness, it tasted like beefless stroganoff. It tastes like beef stroganoff with mushrooms in it. I call it mushroom stroganoff. That's what I call it. The kids Loved it. Jared loved it. There were no leftovers.

Speaker 2: 11:56

It was always love stroganoff and it tasted just as good as any that I've had in the past.

Speaker 1: 12:01

It was amazing. But maybe you think, anita, I don't know the exact ingredients, but I don't know how to make that stroganoff. Listen, just make it so simple. Do a pasta with a red sauce that's already pre-made like a marinara and throw some kale into it. If you want to get really chopped, fine, you know. If you want to get some greens in there, that's such an easy way to do that. Or Make the Alfredo sauce from the Power and Plants cookbook. I mean, we get rave reviews. I literally get I don't know how many letters a week about the Alfredo sauce. The last letter I got about the Alfredo sauce I have to share this with you all. Okay, here's the letter. This is the email I got. Good morning, anita. I want to share with you that I made the Alfredo sauce yesterday, the one with the cashew, scarlet, salt, pepper and water. Omg, honey, if even half the recipes turn out that great and simple, I am sold. It was so good. I steamed some vegetables. That's exactly what I'm telling you to do just saute some vegetables. I mixed them in with the sauce and the noodles. It was so filling. Even my husband liked it and said he would eat it again. Thank you so much. I'm really looking forward to trying more of these recipes. So look, it is this simple. It really is a simple. It tastes so, so good and you're not gonna mess it up. You just throw the veggies that you want in there and put the Alfredo sauce on top, and then you start getting fancy and Add in a little sprinkle of tamari and a little sprinkle of vegan Worcestershire and you're at mushroom stroganoff. I mean, that's how simple it is. Of course, I love pepper with it. I had to put some black pepper in there too.

Speaker 2: 13:29

Now, before we go, are you about to go to meal number three? I'm getting ready, but what you got? Okay, I was gonna say just to add a little extra on this Experiment with different types of pastas, because a lot of times people want to do just spaghetti.

Speaker 1: 13:43

Lately we've been doing about shape, shape.

Speaker 2: 13:46

Yes, I'm talking about shapes, because that actually does. It adds texture, it adds a layer of fun, and you wouldn't think so, but it really does. Lately discovered one called Mifalda. Which is like little tiny lasagna noodles, because they're flat but wavy on the edge. It's just fun to experiment with the different noodles that noodle makes me think of Bob Ross painting.

Speaker 1: 14:06

You know, happy little trees, these are happy little noodles.

Speaker 2: 14:09

Happy little lasagna noodles they are, they're happy little noodles, but other ones that we love are the Fusilli, the spiral, and a lot of these will hold on to the sauces really well and then, but they're small enough that you can scoop them with a spoon and quick enough that you can make them at your campsite, which is really important oil and about eight, nine minutes, yeah, so it gives you enough time to where you can make the sauce, you can saute the veggies and just do everything that you have to do together.

Speaker 1: 14:35

Exactly and listen, it's beatings up this. This night I was cooking by small lantern light. Everybody else was around the campfire. I think the other mom was getting some of her younger kids ready for bed, and by the time I had this meal done and handed out to the kids, we were all ready to join each other around the campfire. I mean, it was so easy to do. Everyone loved it, came back for more. There were no leftovers to have to store. Now Sometimes it's nice to have those. If you have a family of six it may not always happen or if you cook a meal that everybody likes, which is a plus. So nobody was complaining, everybody was full everybody was full and satisfied, so this one is fast. This is why you want to learn it, because the goal is to not miss out on the campfire talk and all the other memories that you're there to make right. Number three beefless stew. This was one of my favorite things growing up beef stew. You know if you have heard my story. You know I grew up in a barbecue restaurant. My parents can make a serious stick to your ribs hearty stew and I am all about that, especially now that we're hitting fall. Jared says about fall. Do you know what he says about fall? Every time we go out you know, you know what am I gonna say.

Speaker 2: 15:50

This is weather. You left off the nail Now this Okay yes, now this is weather.

Speaker 1: 15:56

Yes, that's true Every time.

Speaker 2: 15:58

I probably can have a t-shirt with that on there, but every time the weather cools down, the humidity level drops. I live for that time of year. I absolutely love it. And I'll look to one of my children, look to Anita, and I'll just say now this is weather.

Speaker 1: 16:13

Always. It's so funny. Now the kids will look at me when we've got a good breeze going. Now, this mom, this is weather and they'll just smile real big. Yeah, it's just one of those sayings that's gonna keep on giving.

Speaker 2: 16:23

It's gonna outlive me.

Speaker 1: 16:25

It is Okay, but maybe not because you're plant-based, so you never know.

Speaker 2: 16:30

Well, I'm plant-based, but I'm saying that's gonna be one of my legacies. I remember grandpa, yeah, every time it got October. Now this is weather, Now this is.

Speaker 1: 16:40

Ha ha ha. That is awesome. And what goes better with weather than beefless stew? All right, so meal number three it's hearty, it sticks to your ribs. Think about the yummy kind of beefy, tomato-based stew that you ate. So you're going to, instead of having those big chunks of meat, you're gonna have chunks of mushroom or something else that you love in its place, with carrots, like the baby carrots. They're already peeled, they're already chopped. Okay, the mushrooms can be already chopped. Then you've got potatoes so easy to do. Onions you can buy those pre-chopped or they're super simple to do. Garlic or garlic powder, diced tomatoes already chopped. Then you've got again your Worcestershire we brought that for the other dish. So we already have that. A little bit of ketchup and water. Season that to taste. You are gonna be so happy. So you just add the seasonings that you like. After that, I love more red miso paste in that. So, instead of salt because we know that miso paste is a bit easier on our vessels we eat more miso paste than we do salt. So red miso is an amazing replacement for beef, so that's why I add it to this stew, and always, always. Meal number four is going to, of course, be a potato. Why? Because we always wanna put some kind of loaded potato in there. Because why do you think, jared, why would I always put a loaded baked potato in there?

Speaker 2: 18:09

Because we just love it.

Speaker 1: 18:11

Okay, not what I was going for, but 100% agree, and I'm high-fiving you across the table, seriously, because we just love it. You heard it from Jared first. It is one of our go-to meals. Why is that? Because mama busy and it's quick and easy and it is loaded with good vitamins and nutrients. It is a healthy whole food carb. It doesn't have to be a white potato, although that's fine. It could be a sweet potato, an orange one, a purple one, a white sweet potato. If you haven't tried that before, do yourself a favor. Oh my goodness, probably my second favorite of all time. They're not stringy, they're fluffy, they're delicious. We might need to have an episode just about those. Meal number four, of course, is then going to be this loaded baked potato. But what did we put on it? This time? We had a regular russet potato. You could do gold or whatever you want. How do you make those camping? Could you throw them an aluminum on the fire? You could. We don't use aluminum, so we didn't do that. What do we do? We threw it in the Instant Pot. Yes, I took my Instant Pot. You better believe I did, because it makes things so easy. It's where I cooked my beefless stew. You could cook it on a campfire stove if you wanna, keep it on it, make sure bugs don't get in it, or you could snap the lid on, press start and walk away and come back in 15 minutes, done. That's what I'm talking about, okay? So yeah, my Instant Pot was in our trunk and I'm so glad we took it. I mean it was just. It made things so much easier. So you throw everything in there, press start it. Beeps, it's done, you release the pressure and you eat it and you enjoy. Same thing with the baked potatoes. Sister, did you know that you can bake potatoes in your Instant Pot? You can boil potatoes in your Instant Pot too. But this is one cup of water in the bottom of your Instant Pot and then you're gonna stick the potatoes on your trivet. They don't even sit in the bottom of the water. But what did Anita do? Anita forgot her trivet, left it at home. Of course she did. So I go to cook my potatoes and I don't want them sitting in the water getting on the she right.

Speaker 2: 20:13

You want them to steam.

Speaker 1: 20:14

I want them to steam and so I wanted to just use the regular Instant Pot function, have them up off the bottom. And so I'm talking to the neighbors, to our friends that went with us, and I said y'all, do you have a trivet? I know you brought your Instant Pot, yeah, we did, but we didn't bring our trivet. And then one of them, the guy, of course, what does he say? It wasn't you.

Speaker 2: 20:34

It was me. No, it wasn't. Yes, it was. I said put a stack of who was Matthew? No, I said put a stack of forks For real.

Speaker 1: 20:41

Yes, I totally don't remember it being you. Okay, jerica says it was him. So, matthew, if you're listening and it was you, y'all are gonna have to dig it out about who said it.

Speaker 2: 20:51

Or correct me. I said let's just put a stack of forks in the bottom. That way it builds it up so it keeps the potatoes out of that layer of water Brilliant.

Speaker 1: 20:58

There's always a way. This lends credence to what you always say don't say I can't Say, how can I?

Speaker 2: 21:07

And that's exactly what he did.

Speaker 1: 21:08

That's exactly what he did. So he took the idea and said hey, why don't you just stack some silver wrap in there which, by the way, came out quite clean after it boiled in the Instant Pot water, right, and it was clean anyway, but we know there were no germs on that when it came out, and what's hilarious, though, is I forgot that I told you that prior, and when we opened the drawer, I thought what happened to all our forks.

Speaker 2: 21:29

Oh, our forks go I didn't even know that you didn't tell me that.

Speaker 1: 21:32

Why didn't say anything, I just had that thought. That's hilarious. I thought what happened to the?

Speaker 2: 21:36

forks. Oh yeah, that's right, they're in the bottom of the Instant Pot that is hilarious.

Speaker 1: 21:41

I love that. Okay, so you want to always always be flexible? Okay, but what you don't wanna do is spend your entire trip in the kitchen while everybody else is having fun around the campfire and going on walks together and walking down the beach at the bay to enjoy it, and going to the swing set and running around playing games. You're sitting there cooking the whole time. No, you're not. No, you're not. And you're still gonna walk away With these tips we've given you today these four meals. Just eat you started. Do you have to do it just like we said? No, you don't. These are just jumping off points for you. Maybe you thought of a different sandwich or a wrap you'd like to make when we talked about sandwiches and wraps. Maybe you thought of an entirely different pasta dish that you absolutely love, that would be so simple to make right there at your campsite. Maybe you thought of a different stew or soup that you'd like? Oh, speaking of the beef stew. So if you own the Power and Plants Cookbook Bundle or if you're a Power and Plants Society member, you have access to our beefless stew recipe, so you can look at that ahead of time or even print it out on your computer. You can have it good night. You can have it on your digital device right.

Speaker 2: 22:51

Have it on your phone, whatever digital device you want and you can just click to it.

Speaker 1: 22:54

It'll take you right to the recipe and you can see how simple and easy it is. You only need a couple of ingredients. You can grab those at the store before you go and you're set. You've already got one meal taken care of. You know what else you can do. You can cook some of this stuff ahead of time, particularly if there aren't six of you to go. Maybe you only have four in your family, or maybe there's three or two, or you have six, and you just thought you know what. It'd just be so much easier for me if I cook this ahead of time. Cook it, make it in your Instant Pot, pull out the insert, right the actual pot of the Instant Pot, pop on the silicone lid. Take your whole pot of beefless juice, set it down in your cooler and eat it within the first day or two of being at camp. I mean it's already cooked, you just have to heat it up. You could heat it over the stove in the exact pot right Over your Coleman stove if you heat it on low, or over your stove if you have an RV. I mean that's gonna work. So some of these things you can do and just make ahead of time, like this time. I made hummus ahead of time. It worked out great. I didn't have to worry about having a sandwich spread or finding one that was oil-free. It literally took me five to 10 minutes in my home before we left. It was in ball jars. We popped it in the cooler. Now you don't wanna drop it like we did, because one whole ball jar of our hummus totally got dropped and smushed.

Speaker 2: 24:09

It fell out of a little fridge that we had and, yeah, it got sacrificed.

Speaker 1: 24:14

You know you're plant-based. If you feel like crying when your ball jar of hummus hits the grapple and burst, or or you have that split second moment of how can I salvage this?

Speaker 2: 24:25

Like no shards of glass. You can't do it, don't even go there.

Speaker 1: 24:28

No, there's no way to salvage that. That is just not happening, sister, it's a sandwich, it's a whole grain pasta dish. It's a stew of some kind that you love Probably the beefless stew from the cookbook. If you haven't tried it, you got to, because it's absolutely dog-on good.

Speaker 2: 24:43

It's amazing.

Speaker 1: 24:44

And then a potato always a potato of some sort. Pick your favorite kind, get your favorite toppings on there. This time we did the regular potato. We put black beans and frozen corn, salsa and cashew cream. That was it. So easy. You can prepare the cashew cream ahead of time or make it in your NutriBullet right there at the campsite, and that's another one of those things you can have and use all week. Like I could have made the baked potato first, you know, as one of my first meals and then in a couple of days, I could have used that cashew cream to make the pasta dish right. Or I could have used it as a spread for my sandwich. I mean really I know you've heard us say this 100 times, maybe 232 times if you've been listening to every episode that plant-based really is just this simple, just this enjoyable and just as delicious. We want you to learn how to make it so easy for yourself that you realize this is the easiest way you've ever lived. You're spending the least amount of time in the kitchen than you ever did before and your body is feeling better and better every day. You have more energy. Your cholesterol's going down. It's getting back to normal. You're coming off your cholesterol meds, you're coming off your blood pressure meds, your diabetes could be reversing. You'd be like us you could lose 70 pounds without even trying, without any of the miserable dieting ways. This is what we want for you. We are so excited to have you go out and enjoy your next trip together, whether it's just you as a couple or as a family with your kids or your grandkids. Take these strategies that we've shared with you today because I'm telling you, sister, they are gang changing and use them in the way that works best for you. We have loved having you go on this camping extravaganza with us, sharing four of our favorite meals that we had on this recent Sikote camping trip with you. But what if you think that sounds great. I don't know where to start. I don't have the cookbook. Well, the cookbook is the perfect place to start for you, because I've intentionally designed the recipes in there to be easy, quick and delicious too. I've given you over 50 plant-based recipes from all the different categories. It's not just mains. I've put breakfast and sauces and snacks so that you can sample different things from different categories and have a great place to know where to start your plant-based journey and you'll have some new go-to favorites. We talk about that. You've got to have your new go-to favorites or you'll never make this sustainable. But when you do, it's more than sustainable. It's actually enjoyable and it's something that you look forward to living every day. You can grab your copy of the cookbook at PowerOnPlantscom forward slash cookbook and we look forward to seeing you again next time on PowerOnPlants.