Griddle Cheesesteaks at Camp
Steak strips, peppers, and onions on one hot surface, then foil-wrapped until the cheese gives up.
- calories
- 720
- weight
- 11 oz
- cal / oz
- 65
- protein
- 38 g
- serves
- 6, scales
- prep
- 10 min
- cook
- 20 min
- total time
- 30 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Grill grate
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Nut free
- One pot
- Grab and go
- Needs a cooler
- Basic
Ingredients
| Ribeye steak strips | 1 lb | sliced thin at home, frozen flat, thawing in the cooler |
|---|---|---|
| White onion | 1/2 large | sliced thin |
| Green bell peppers | 2 | diced |
| Hoagie rolls | 6 | |
| Provolone | 12 slices | |
| Butter | 1/4 cup | olive oil works and keeps better |
| Steak seasoning | 1 tsp | |
| Heavy foil | 6 sheets |
Method
- Get the griddle or a wide skillet over the grate at medium-high and melt butter across it.
- Onion and peppers first. Cook until they slump, 6 to 8 minutes. A lid or an inverted pot speeds this up by trapping steam.
- Push the vegetables to a cooler edge, lay the steak on the hot side, and hit it with the seasoning. Five to ten minutes, turning once. Pull it while there is still pink in the thickest strips.
- Drag everything together and chop it through with the spatula until the meat and vegetables are one mixture.
- Split the rolls most of the way, not all of the way, and set them cut side down on the grate for a minute to dry the crumb out.
- Load each roll, lay two slices of provolone on top, and wrap tight in foil.
- Park the foil packets on the coolest corner of the grate for 5 minutes. The trapped steam melts the cheese and softens the roll at the same time.
This is griddle cooking, which means everything happens on one surface in a fixed order: vegetables until they soften, meat fast and hot, then the two chopped together. The order matters more than the technique. Peppers and onions take three times as long as thin steak, so starting them together gives you either raw vegetables or grey meat.
The foil wrap at the end is the part worth keeping. A sandwich sitting on a grate melts cheese from the bottom and dries the bread from the top. Wrapped, it steams in its own heat and the roll goes soft instead of brittle. It also buys you a holding window, so six sandwiches can be ready at once instead of one at a time. This one needs a cooler and a real fire or grill, so it belongs to car camping, not a pack.
Packing
Slice the steak and vegetables at home and pack them in separate zip bags; sliced meat cooks faster and takes up less cooler space than a whole steak. Rolls go in a hard container or they arrive as flatbread.
Variations
- Swap provolone for a block of white cheddar if the cooler is unreliable. Sliced cheese sweats and sticks.
- No rolls? Skip the bread and serve the mixture over instant potato flakes.
- Sliced mushrooms go in with the onions if you want to stretch a pound of steak across more people.
https://campfirefoodie.com/blackstone-philly-cheesesteak-recipe