Hot Italian Sausage Campfire Soup
My Hot Italian Sausage Campfire Soup Recipe is the perfect meal to enjoy while sitting around a roaring campfire. It’s warm, creamy and a little spicy with hot Italian sausage as a main ingredient.
This simple one-pot recipe makes for easy clean-up too. When the weather is a little chilly, having easy campfire recipes to make quick and hearty camping soups is essential.
Why I Love This
This soup is so creamy and hearty, it can absolutely be served as dinner. The meat, potatoes and spinach are a great combination with the chicken broth and heavy cream. This is also a great recipe to serve as a starter with an Italian main dish.
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Equipment
This hearty and satisfying soup is one of our favorite winter camping recipes that keeps us warm while we are cooking it over our campfire! Here are a few campfire cooking equipment tools you may need when making this soup for camping…
Dutch Oven Lid Stand
Camp Chef Heat Guard GlovesCamp Dutch Oven Lid Lifter
Dutch Oven Soup Tips
Camp Cooking Tip: You want to cook your campfire recipes over the part of the fire ring that has the hot coals rather than the campfire flames.
Start your campfire early so you have time to develop the coals.
Then, move them off to one side for cooking and keep the other side for the burning wood because you will be increasing the temperature from medium to medium-high heat during the cooking process for this Italian sausage Dutch oven soup.
- When preparing your campfire for cooking, I like to use “tweezers” to arrange the campfire logs and coals, they provide more control than just using a fire poker or shovel.
- You’ll want to keep your campfire flames roaring to keep you warm and your Dutch oven soup recipe on schedule for your hungry campers.
- Are you a pro when it comes to getting your campfire started? Or, are you like most people who can’t seem to get the flame started no matter how hard they fan the spark? Actually, no matter which group you fall within, you will love our tips in our post, Fire Starters Camping Enthusiasts Must Have.
Camp Cooking Tip: Whether you are cooking on a campfire grill grate or using a camp Dutch oven tripod, you want to make sure your oven is stable and safe. You also want to point the handle away from the fire so when you reach for it, you are as far away from the heat as possible.
If you are cooking this campfire soup in a remote camping environment without amenities like campfire rings with racks, don’t worry, you have options. Using a camp Dutch oven tripod allows you to easily cook over a campfire by hanging your oven right over the hot fire.
Lodge Adjustable Camp Tripod, 40 to 60-Inch Tall
Camp Cooking Tip: A hanging oven can have a tenancy to swing a bit while you are stirring so be cautious when cooking hot liquids over a hot campfire. Don’t burn yourself while stirring and checking on your Dutch oven soups … If you don’t already have a lifter, you will want to get one! These things are awesome! A Dutch oven lid lifter allows you to stay a safe distance from the hot campfire while removing the hot cast iron lid from your Dutch oven while it is still cooking over the campfire.
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Camp Cooking Tip: The easiest and safest way to remove a lid from a Dutch oven that is sitting over a campfire is to use a camp Dutch oven lid lifter. It allows you to stay a safe distance from the hot campfire while you cook.
Lodge Camp Dutch Oven Lid Lifter
Timing & Knife Cuts
We like a rustic chunky soup so we cube our potatoes into large bite-sized pieces, but that also means it takes a little longer to get them to the fork-tender consistency.
- Don’t add the rest of the ingredients before the potatoes are done cooking; there is no room for “crunchy potatoes” in the best campfire soup recipes.
A Dutch oven lid stand is handy for keeping your lid clean during the cooking process. When you remove your Dutch oven lid to stir your camp soup recipes, have a “landing pad” ready for the lid. There is nothing worse than setting it directly on the ground and picking up dirt and rocks.
4-in-1 Cast Iron Folding Finish Camp Dutch Oven Lid Stand
Using a camp Dutch oven lid stand allows you to keep you hot cast iron Dutch oven lid off the ground and clean while cooking your camp meals.
Scaling Servings
Chili, stews and soups are easy camping meals for large groups. Just scale up the servings and get big batches cooking to feed as many people as you have in the crowd.
Pairings
- If you want to serve this as a starter course, you won’t need anything heavy for dinner. Try something like our Campfire Grilled Fish In Foil Packets With White Wine And Garlic Sauce.
- This soup is a GF recipe which is fantastic for gluten intolerant campers so to keep the meal free from gluten, you can serve it with these easy Chicken And Veggie Camping Kabobs as a main dish or just serve a simple dinner salad alongside this soup. See all of our recipes to make amazing gluten free camping food.
- We love eating this campfire sausage soup as a main course with crusty bread and butter on the side. It really is that hearty and filling (and that is saying A LOT with my family who typically believes a meal is not complete without a big piece of meat as the centerpiece on the dinner table!) It is one of our favorite one pot camping meals on cold-weather trips.
Meal Planning
Use my camping menu planner to stay organized when planning meals for your next trip. It’s FREE and you’ll get it delivered instantly to your inbox!
Substitutions
- For a milder flavor, instead of hot Italian sausage, use mild Italian sausage, ground beef or ground chicken. If you use beef or chicken you will need to add a little olive oil to the bottom of the pan before browning the meat. Also, Italian sausage has lots of flavor in it so add a few dried herbs and spices to your meat like dried oregano, basil, rosemary and cayenne pepper.
- 8 cups vegetable broth or beef broth can be substituted for chicken broth. If you prefer to use bouillon cubes, dissolve them in 64 ounces or 8 cups of water.
- To reduce the carbs, swap out the potatoes and replace with cauliflower.
Similar Recipes
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Recipe
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Hot Italian Sausage Soup Campfire Recipe
Equipment
- Heat Resistant Leather Long Sleeve Insulated Grill Gloves (or heavy duty oven mitts)
Ingredients
- 1 pound bulk hot Italian sausage (substitute mild Italian sausage or 1 lb ground beef for a less spicy flavor)
- 4 slices bacon diced in 1/2 inch pieces
- 1 medium onion diced
- 4 cloves garlic minced
- 2 (32 oz) cartons chicken broth
- 6 medium sized potatoes cubed to rustic bite-sized pieces (see Note #1)
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 2 cups packed fresh spinach stems removed
- Salt to taste at serving
- Black pepper to taste at serving
Instructions
- Get the campfire going to cook over medium heat. If you don’t have a campfire grill grate, you can use a Dutch Oven Tripod to hang your oven over the fire.
- In 12-inch DEEP camp Dutch oven (the size for soups and stews, not the regular depth oven), brown the sausage until no longer pink, breaking it up with a wooden spoon as it cooks.
- Remove the crumbled meat to drain on paper towel lined plate.
- If there is a lot of grease in the Dutch oven remove most of it, but if your sausage is relatively lean, you can skip removing the grease.
- Now, add the diced bacon to the Dutch oven and cook until crisp. Same thing here with the grease, if there is a lot of it, remove some of it … you want a fair amount to coat the bottom of the Dutch oven for cooking your onions and garlic.
- Just before the bacon is crisp, add the onions and garlic, sauté them until softened.
- Add the chicken broth and bring to boil.
- Raise campfire to high heat, adding more firewood if necessary. Place lid on the soup pot to bring the liquid to boil faster.
- Now, remove the lid from the cast iron pot and add the cubed potatoes, then, recover with lid. Bring mixture back to boil cooking the vegetables until they are tender.
- When the potato chunks are tender, add the hot Italian sausage back to the pot along with the heavy cream. Continue cooking at a simmer with the pot uncovered until those ingredients are heated through and the soup thickens slightly.
- Just before serving, stir in the fresh spinach then use a ladle to portion the sausage and potato soup into sturdy bowls.
Notes
- We like a rustic chunky soup so we cube our potatoes into large bite-sized pieces, but that also means it takes a little longer to get them to the fork-tender consistency. Don’t add the rest of the ingredients before the potatoes are done cooking; there is no room for “crunchy potatoes” in your soup!
What do you think?
Leave me a comment, question or suggestion below. I’d love to hear from you so let’s chat.