By Christie Vanover | Published September 26, 2013 | Last Updated November 27, 2023
Enjoy the flavors of Spain while camping with this campfire paella foil packet made with chorizo and crisp white wine.
When traveling, I always find a way to make food the focal point. Usually, our itinerary includes dinner at a local hot spot, a wine tour or a stop at a farmers’ market. But this time, I wanted to challenge myself.
We hit the open road in our RV to go camping. Even though the RV has a great kitchen with a gas stove, oven and microwave, my goal was to prepare every meal on an open flame without using a pan. My only tools were foil and skewers.
I created the menu just before the trip, and I’ll be sharing all of the recipes over the next few days.
My first tip is to prep everything before you leave
I pre-sliced, chopped and minced all of the vegetables and placed them in disposable containers, so I didn’t have to pull out my knives and cutting board. This made things so much easier. Also, I brought along pre-roasted shredded chicken, instead of raw chicken. I thought that was safer for this uncertain cooking environment.
The journey from Las Vegas to Zion National Park in Southern Utah is only 3 hours. As soon as we arrived at the campsite, my husband worked on getting things settled, while I jumped out of the RV and got the campfire started for dinner.
Our first meal was Campfire Paella. I’ve made Paella on the grill before, but never without a pan.
Here’s tip two
When preparing dishes like campfire paella that use liquid, it’s better to make a foil bowl, instead of a foil packet.
Lay a sheet of foil over a bowl to shape it. This gives you a perfect cavity for all of your ingredients.
Tip 3 for Campfire Paella
Use two sheets of foil. During my first attempt, some of the food started boiling out of the sides. Once I doubled-up, everything was fine.
Now that you have your cavities, fill ‘em up. Everyone can gather around the picnic table and pile in their own ingredients. I had chorizo, chicken, onions, peppers, tomatoes, rice, saffron and salt and pepper.
Then, I topped the bowls off with equal parts arborio rice and white wine. After a quick stir, the pouch was closed up and placed on the side of the fire away from the direct flame.
Cooking times for these campfire meals are going to vary, depending on how close you place your pouches to the flames. I rotated the pouches every 10-15 minutes, and after an hour, dinner was ready.
The chorizo was cooked through and the rice was nice and fluffy. Because it was cooked near the open flame, the campfire paella even had the nice crust Paella is famous for, called socarrat.
Campfire meal number 1 was a success. Breakfast the following day was going to be a little more challenging: Blueberry Fire Pit Flapjacks, again without a pan.
Campfire Paella
Ingredients
- raw Mexican chorizo
- roasted chicken shredded (no skin)
- onion chopped
- garlic minced
- bell pepper chopped
- cherry tomatoes
- saffron salt, pepper
- equal parts uncooked Arborio rice
- equal parts white wine chicken broth or water
Instructions
- Make foil bowls, using two sheets of non-stick foil (dull side in)
- Fill the bowl with as much chorizo, chicken, onion, garlic, pepper, tomatoes and seasoning that you want.
- Add in equal parts rice and wine (or chicken broth or water). Stir everything together.
- Bring the edges of the foil to the top and close up the pouch.
- Place on the edge of the campfire near, but not on, the open flame.
- Rotate every 10-15 minutes. Cook for about an hour. Remove from the campfire and enjoy.
Nutrition
The nutrition information is an estimate created using an online nutrition calculator
Jason Lupei says
I made this camping this summer and was amazed how perfect and easy it was! I loved it so much, we’re serving it to our friends at a camping trip this weekend. This time I will precut the ingredients to make it an easy 1st day meal after putting up the tent and settling in.
Becca Niederkrom says
I’ve already made this three times this year!! Soooo good! Thanks for the recipe!
Cat says
I just stumbled upon this recipe and am very excited to use it. Can you provide measurements per foil pack? Or is the rice:liquid ratio the only thing that really matters? Have you ever tried preparing the foil packets ahead of time with the uncooked rice? Do you think that would affect the results?
BKEMT says
Hi. Do you have any tips for making this ahead of time, at home, and then packing in the RV fridge? Also, would this recipe lend itself to freezing the foil packets ahead of time at home and then packing them in the fridge for later baking at the campsite?
Bee says
This looks amazing! I’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around the wine part though. I feel like I would want to use a broth of some sort instead. Like, how much wine and rice do you put into a little pack like that? 1/4 cup? And what type of white wine? A sweeter one or a dryer one?
Pat says
I was curious about that too. I know that chicken broth could be used instead of the white wine, but quantities????. Also, the chicken is pre-cooked, is the rice? …the chorizo? It LOOKS like it’s already cooked in the preparation photos, but it that’s the case, all you’re doing on the campfire is warming everything and I can’t believe it would take an hour for that. I’m confused. I’d really like to try this too.
zestuous says
Pat, Sorry for the confusion. I’ve updated the recipe to clarify your questions. The choirzo and rice are uncooked, which is why it takes about an hour. If you wanted to pre-cook everything, you could do that, and warm things up a lot quicker. You’re also welcome to use broth or water instead of wine.
zestuous says
Bee, You’re welcome to use broth or water instead. I use 1/4-1/2 cup rice and dry chardonnay, depending on how big the foil pouch is.
Beffy says
Is the arborio rice already cooked?
zestuous says
No Beffy. I use uncooked rice. Happy Camping!
JAK says
We just tried your Campfire Paella recipe and it was off the hook! Our men were SO impressed. This will easily be one of our camping go-to dinner recipes. The only things I changed were I cooked everything including the rice ahead of time (so we didn’t have to add much wine instead just drank more of it). We only had to reheat everything in 10-20 minutes on the campfire. And, my grocery store had arborio rice with saffron in it so I just cooked it ahead of time and it was ready to go. It came out steamy and the veggies slightly crunchy. Perfection! Thank you for the tips. I love experimenting with new recipes. We also tried your maple blueberry syrup and again — perfection! We will keep following your lead. Thank you for a yummy camping food experience!
zestuous says
JAK, Thank you so much for taking the time to write this review. Cooking the rice ahead of time is a great idea! Happy camping.
Cat says
Do you still get the socarrat when you precook the rice?
Christie Vanover says
It’s not as great as when you cook it in a pan, but if you control the heat, you get some.