Campfire Meat Pies (easy weeknight supper!) with Brady

I had my first meat pie during my brief stint in the SCA, a group of very fun people who completely re-enact medieval times (I loved sewing my own garb!). People would make them ahead of time, wrap in foil and refrigerate, and then we’d heat them by the fire whenever someone got hungry. They were awfully handy and awfully good.

So when Brady goes on camping trips this is the first recipe I go to for convenient food to take with him. The options are endless and I hope you’ll use this one as a springboard and get creative to suit your personal tastes. I’d LOVE to hear about your combination ideas in the comments section! These also make a fun supper for those rushed evenings when you have to head out the door as soon as everyone gets home. They’d work for family movie night or just a lazy evening meal as well.

Campfire Meat Pies

Ready to get cooking? This is another great recipe to make with your kids or just let your kids make all on their own. Brady is going to help me with this one. He’s quite the cook!

Today I’m using deli roast beef, deli chicken, mozzarella cheese, and cheddar cheese. You’ll need some crescent roll dough to seal it all up in and as you can see I grab whatever I get to first.

I’m also using Ro-Tel in mine. I really love the flavor of chicken, cheddar, and a bit of Rotel. This is where I’d like for you to come in in the comments section and give us all some more ideas for fillings in these pies. Here are a few of mine:

  • Chicken and BBQ Sauce
  • Leftover pulled pork and BBQ Sauce
  • Ground beef, mozzarella, and a bit of spaghetti sauce
  • Sloppy Joe Meat Pies
  • Deli roast beef, peppers and onions, and mozzarella
  • Chicken nugget (a single frozen one) and cheese

What else can you think up? Lets brainstorm together in the comments!

I pull out a few slices of deli meat and give them a good dicing up .

Like this

Now open your crescent rolls and separate them all out like this.

This is best if your dough is really cold. If you let it sit at room temperature it gets very sticky and stretchy and harder to work with.

Spray a baking sheet with cooking spray

Place a bit of meat in the center of each crescent roll as my chief assistant is doing here.

Sprinkle a bit of cheese over the top.

Look at that little face? He’s gotten so tall this year. Yesterday he was in the kitchen with me (we kinda live there) and said

“Ma, I can’t believe how fast this year has gone by, can you believe I’m almost in fifth grade?”

I told him “I know Baby, and the thing is, the older you get the faster it goes.”

He thought about this a moment in his very serious way and nodded saying “Yeah, I’m gonna be all grown before you know it.”

~sighs~

If you are going to use Ro-Tel, make sure you drain it well and then add that, too.

Ooh, chopped green chiles would be good in this!

Here is that a little closer up…

Meat and cheese

Then fold the edges over however you can to get it all sealed up.

These are Brady’s, didn’t he do a great job?

mine usually end up looking like little round packets.

Bake them at 350 for ten to fifteen minutes (mine take about thirteen), until browned.

Allow to cool completely. Im’ using a cooling rack but you don’t have to.

If you’re having these for supper, you can just eat them right now!

Once completely cool wrap each one in foil and write the filling on the package so folks know which one they’re about to eat.

To be honest with ya (I really hate that phrase but I’ll get to why in a minute*) I have no idea what is in this packet because I made them all at once and didn’t keep up. I just wrote “beef” on it as a little visual example. Whoever bites into this one has a 50/50 chance of getting beef and I figure those odds are better than most!  So you might want to cook them separately, make all of one variety first and then move on so you know what is what.

*I really dislike that phrase because anytime someone says “To be honest with you” they are basically saying “up until this point I haven’t been…”

So now I gotta go repent for saying it myself.

Place in a zipper seal bag and put in the fridge. Before heading out, place this bag in an ice filled cooler. At the campfire, simply place at fire’s edge  or over hot coals until heated through.

If you are having these at home, just eat ’em! You can refrigerate them and reheat in the microwave as well, don’t fret with the foil, I toss them all in a zipper bag unwrapped for the fridge.

Aren’t they pretty?

These chicken, cheese, and Ro-Tel ones are my favorite.

Campfire Meat Pies

  • Canned Crescent Rolls
  • Deli Meat
  • Cheese
  • Sauce and other add ins of your choice*

For each little pie you’ll need about 1 heaping tablespoon of chopped meat, 1 tablespoon of shredded cheese, and 1 teaspoon to 1/2 tablespoon of sauce or other add ins. Make sure you leave plenty of room at the edge to seal packet.

Roll out chilled crescent roll dough and separate into triangles. Place meat, cheese, and other add ins in center of each triangle and fold dough over to seal. Bake on greased cookie sheets at 350 for ten to fifteen minutes, or until lightly browned. Serve warm if you like or allow to cool and wrap each individually in foil. Refrigerate foil wrapped sandwiches and place in zipper seal bag in cooler for transport to campfire. Heat at fire’s edge or on coals until heated through.

With a lot of folks planning camping trips this summer, I’d REALLY love to hear your ideas for add ins in these little sandwiches in the comments section on this post!

Nobody cares if you can’t dance well.

Just get up and dance!

Submitted by Ruth Lail. Brighten our day and submit your funny or uplifting quote here!

123 Comments

  1. I do something similar, but with two crescent rolls sealed together making a pouch with the stuff in the middle. I take 1 cup rotisserie chicken, 2 ounce of cream cheese, 1 tbsp of milk, 2 tbsp of butter, some onion and any other veg that you like (I’ve used red pepper, celery, broccoli – all good). So, you 4 squares with the chicken mix in the middle, twist the ends together and seal it and bake if on 350 for 20-25 min. Very yummy!

  2. My 4.5 year old son and I made cheeseburger pockets last night and we all loved them. I used thin-crust refrigerated pizza dough and it worked great. I have a picture but don’t know if I can add it or not! 🙂 Thanks Christy. Oh we did the burrito dessert too with sunflower-butter and marshmallows. YUM!

  3. Made something like this last night. Made up our pizza dough recipe, pull off small piece (after allowed to rise a little bit), roll out into a little round form, put in cut up kielbasa, onion, cheddar cheese, roll up and bake at 400. I personally like green pepper in mine and I’ve made them with chicken, broccoli, onion and cheese. No sauce. We dip in BBQ sauce or hot mustard. That way, if decided to travel with it, you can opt on the mess of sauce dripping out! We call these….ROLL UPS!! I’ve done leftover pot roast, pork, pepperoni, whatever and dip in favorite condiment. Oh, when just out of oven, rub a stick of butter over top and sprinkle with garlic salt, if you like.

  4. My 11 year old daughter has informed me that we need to make these with pizza ingredients. Thanks Christy!

  5. These look amazing!!!

    One more variation that I have made in the past, in a more bite-sized way (Cut the crescent into 3 separate triangles, then fill and fold):

    Cream cheese and chopped pepperoni, using pizza sauce for dipping.
    I am sure you could change the meat or add some veggies depending on your taste, but the heated cream cheese is rich and flavorful.

    As always, thanks for posting such a great recipe!

    1. Great idea! I just made some (regular sized though) with cream cheese, oregano and pepperoni. Also made some with cream cheese and pastrami. I sprinkled oregano on the pizza ones so we can tell them apart. Both of them are SO good! I even used the light crescent rolls, light cream cheese, turkey pepperoni and turkey pastrami. Also, I can definitely see making them into appetizers by making them even smaller like you said!

  6. All these variations sound great, gonna do the rueben ones soon. We do shredded Mozzarella, Spaghetti sauce, and 1 or 2 large shrimp in 2 crescent triangles with a salad side dish.

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