Road Trip Delicacies

So our road trip is in full swing and there are some definite trends. Timbo and Maggie have revealed themselves as the real mountain people (or masochists depending on how you look at it) because they sleep outside every night while the girls and I snuggle up in the warm belly of Fey. We’ve started honking at herds of sheep just to see them panic. Its way more fun than it sounds. We’ve also started cooking wayyyyyy better.

The early meals weren’t exactly bad, but they were, shall we say, plain. We tolerated rice and beans for a few days before we began experimenting with our various items. Here’s a few of our more creative concoctions:

Sausage O Delish
• Lamb Sausages (cause their cheap in N-Zed) cooked to tender perfection and then sliced open, covered in cheese, doused with a cajun seasoning and topped with a drizzle of Sriracha. The sausage is then placed on top of budget brand bread roles that have been slathered with simmering garlic butter and slightly salted. Picture a Cajun chilly cheese dog on garlic bread, but better and all for a price under 2 New Zealand dollars each.

Fettuccine Al-beano
• Delicious fettuccine pasta topped with a can of baked beans and baked bean liquid (whatever that is), and a Budget brand can of tomato sauce. The dish is scrumptious as is, but with the optional additions of cajun seasoning, black pepper, and Sriracha it is to die for. It is a melting pot of international cuisine. Italian pasta meets the explosive Thai spiciness of Sriracha and the zesty flavors of the bayou, while at the same time the whole piece is grounded by the calming flavor of good old North American beans.

Tuna A Yuck
• Canned Tuna or Canned Salmon with anything and pasta. We’ve tried hard, but no combination of Sriracha, Cajun salt, beans, pasta sauce and pepper can go well together. Its simply impossible and we all secretly dread it when the we have to use fish for dinner.

Peanut Butter and, Well, Anything
• Due to the fantastic cheapness of peanut butter and its extremely high calorie count we’ve started combining it with pretty much everything in an attempt to stretch our money. Peanut butter and granny smith apples is stellar. Peanut butter and Musslie is great. Peanut butter and a spoon is also delicious. I actually store a spoon in my Costco sized jar of peanut butter at all times.

The JAP
• This was actually created in the dog days of ski season, but it’s brilliance should be mentioned. It is a combination of Jelly/ Jam, Apple and Peanut butter, thus JAP. It not sound that special, but it actually combines perfectly the fruitiness of jelly, the tanginess of a Granny Smith apple and the saltiness of peanut butter, while turning your regular PB&J snack into a full fledged meal. Once you go JAP, you won’t go back.

In many ways we were painters with only a couple colors; some nights we managed to painted rainbows, other nights we had stick figures with uneven arms and one eye. Obviously we were limited to basic cheap ingredients and a few spices, but necessity catalyzed creativity and creativity gave us a few eats. So if you’re ever strapped for cash, learn from our experimentations (i.e. Tuna A Yuck) and give these cheap gourmet dishes a shot.