Cooking on Outings

Being a Grubmaster

What is a Grubmaster? A grubmaster is the person in a patrol who is responsible for planning, purchasing, and bringing food to an outing. This is a flexible role, but they would usually also take the lead in cooking on the outing. 

Budgeting

Our troop uses a budget of $5 per person, per meal. Meaning that on an outing with 6 scouts in your patrol, you would be permitted $30 for a single meal, or $60 for 2 meals. This is also a flexible rule, but it's important to budget when you plan and purchase your food for the meal. 

Transportation

On camping trips with 582, we usually drive to the camping location, and need to find ways to transport all the food for the entire trip. Things to think about are whether we need refrigeration/a cooler for any foods, or perhaps padding for particularly fragile items. Especially with things like raw meat, eggs, and cheese, a grub master must make sure they are aware of how to properly store and transport those foods. 

Cooking on the Trip!

Cooking together can be a huge team-building experience for patrols, as well as help scouts gain experience by helping out in the kitchen. There is usually a "lead cook" role, oftentimes the same person who is the grub master. We encourage every member of the patrol to participate in some way, whether they are manning the stove, chopping vegetables, or washing dishes. 

Something very important to consider in your planning is to consider what meals it is possible to cook with the supplies we have. Our patrol boxes have a large number of cooking supplies, as well as time constraints. We usually bring a propane stove and see here for a list of patrol box supplies.