Campfire Griddle Breakfast Hash with Sausage, Eggs and Crispy Potatoes

Set a flat griddle or large cast-iron skillet over a campfire that has burned down to steady embers with a low flame — you want even, medium heat, not a roaring blaze.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 500g baby potatoes, parboiled and halved (do this at home before the trip)
• 400g smoked sausage or kielbasa, sliced into coins
• 3 tbsp vegetable oil or bacon fat
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 1 green bell pepper, diced
• 1 yellow onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 8 large eggs
• Salt and cracked black pepper
• Hot sauce and chopped chives, to serve

Instructions

1. Set a flat griddle or large cast-iron skillet over a campfire that has burned down to steady embers with a low flame — you want even, medium heat, not a roaring blaze.
2. Heat the oil or bacon fat until it shimmers, then add the parboiled potatoes cut-side down. Let them sizzle undisturbed for 5-6 minutes until deeply golden and crusty.
3. Push the potatoes to one side and add the sausage coins. Cook 3-4 minutes, turning once, until browned and the fat begins to render.
4. Add the onion and both peppers and toss everything together, cooking 4-5 minutes until the vegetables soften and pick up char at the edges.
5. Stir in the garlic and smoked paprika and cook 1 minute more until fragrant. Season generously with salt and pepper.
6. Make 8 wells in the hash and crack an egg into each. Cover with a lid or foil sheet and cook 3-5 minutes, until the whites set but the yolks stay runny.
7. Pull the griddle off the heat, scatter with chives, pass the hot sauce, and serve straight from the pan with strong camp coffee.
8. The campfire breakfast hash is an American camping institution, born from chuckwagon cooking on 19th-century cattle drives, where the cook's cast-iron skillet turned whatever survived the trail — potatoes, cured meat, eggs — into the most anticipated meal of the day. The technique hasn't changed because it doesn't need to: cast iron over embers gives a crust no kitchen stove quite replicates, and everything tastes better eaten from an enamel plate as the campsite wakes up. Parboiling the potatoes at home is the modern camper's one upgrade — it cuts cook time in half and guarantees crispy edges instead of raw centers.

Nutrition (estimated, per serving)

• Calories: 560 kcal
• Protein: 28g
• Fat: 36g
• Carbohydrates: 30g
• Fiber: 4g
• Sugar: 5g
• Sodium: 980mg