Camping Potato Side Dishes for the Grill and Campfire

Potatoes are the universal camping side. They’re cheap, filling, travel well, and work with every cooking method you have at a campsite — campfire coals, grill grate, foil packets, or prepped ahead and served cold from the cooler.

This is every good way to make potatoes while camping, from the simplest (baked potato buried in coals) to the most crowd-pleasing (cheesy bacon potatoes in foil). Most of these can be prepped at home and cooked at camp in under 30 minutes.

Garlic Herb Potatoes in Foil

Baby potatoes halved, tossed with olive oil, minced garlic, rosemary, thyme, salt, and pepper. Wrapped in a double layer of heavy-duty aluminum foil and cooked over campfire coals for about 25-30 minutes.

The double layer of foil matters. Single layer burns through over direct coals, and then you’re eating potatoes with ash on them. Heavy-duty foil is non-negotiable — regular foil tears when you flip the packet. Halve the potatoes at home so they cook faster and get more surface area for the garlic and herbs to stick to.

Test doneness by pressing the packet with tongs. When the potatoes give easily, they’re done. If you’re unsure, open one corner and poke a potato with a knife — it should slide in without resistance.

Cheesy Campfire Potatoes

Sliced potatoes layered with butter, shredded cheddar, diced onion, and crumbled bacon in a foil packet. Basically scalloped potatoes on a campfire.

Slice the potatoes thin — about the thickness of a quarter. Thicker slices won’t cook through before the cheese burns. Layer them like shingles: potato, butter dot, cheese, onion, repeat. Seal the foil tight with some air space inside so the steam can circulate. About 30 minutes over medium coals, flipping once halfway through.

Pre-cook the bacon at home and crumble it. Trying to cook bacon at a campsite at 7am while making foil packets is a recipe for burning both.

Campfire Baked Potatoes

Whole russet potatoes rubbed with olive oil and salt, wrapped in foil, buried in campfire coals.

The simplest thing on this list and somehow the most satisfying. Poke each potato a few times with a fork before wrapping — this prevents them from building up steam and splitting. Nestle them into the coals, not on top of active flames. They need about 45-60 minutes depending on size. Rotate them every 15 minutes with long-handled tongs.

Bring toppings in separate containers: sour cream, shredded cheese, chives, butter. Baked potatoes at a campfire hit differently than the ones from your kitchen oven. Something about standing around a fire splitting one open on a paper plate.

Foil Packet Parmesan Garlic Potatoes

Diced potatoes tossed with olive oil, garlic powder, dried parsley, grated Parmesan, salt, and pepper.

The Parmesan gets crispy where it contacts the foil, which gives you these crunchy cheese bits mixed in with soft potato. Dice the potatoes small — half-inch cubes — so they cook in about 20 minutes. Bigger chunks take 35+ minutes and the cheese burns before the potato centers soften.

Assemble these packets at home and stack them flat in the cooler. At camp, pull them out and lay them directly on the coals or on a grill grate over medium heat. Shake the packet gently halfway through to redistribute.

Campfire Roasted Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes wrapped in foil, cooked in campfire coals the same way as regular baked potatoes.

Sweet potatoes take slightly longer than russets because they’re denser — plan on a full hour. The payoff is that sweet potatoes caramelize in their own sugar as they cook, so the flesh turns soft and almost custard-like. No toppings needed, though a pat of butter and a pinch of cinnamon is good.

Choose medium-sized sweet potatoes that are roughly the same size so they finish at the same time. Poke with a fork, rub with oil, wrap in foil, and bury in coals.

Make Ahead Potato Salad with Dill

Small yellow potatoes, hard-boiled eggs, celery, red onion, and a dressing made from mayo, yellow mustard, dill, and a little pickle juice.

The pickle juice is the move. It adds acid and salt in exactly the right ratio without making you measure anything. Dress the potatoes while they’re still warm so they absorb the dressing — cold potatoes just sit there and taste like potatoes with stuff on them. Warm potatoes drink it up.

Make it the night before. The flavor development from 12-24 hours in the fridge is significant. Transport in a sealed container nested in ice — potato salad is the one item on this list where temperature matters for food safety.

Grilled Cheesy Corn and Potato Packets

Diced potatoes, corn kernels, shredded cheddar, butter, garlic powder, and paprika in a foil packet.

The corn and potatoes cook at about the same rate when the potatoes are diced small. The cheese melts over everything and the butter creates a sauce at the bottom of the packet. About 25 minutes over coals. This is the two-sides-in-one solution — you get your starch and your vegetable in the same packet with zero extra effort.

Dice the potatoes at home and keep them in water to prevent browning. Drain and pat dry before assembling the packets.

Campfire Hasselback Potatoes

Medium russets sliced almost through at quarter-inch intervals, stuffed with butter and garlic between the slices, wrapped in foil.

The slicing happens at home — use a chopstick on each side of the potato as a guide to stop your knife from cutting all the way through. Tuck a thin slice of butter and a sliver of garlic into every other cut. Wrap in foil and cook in coals for about 45 minutes. The cuts fan open as the potato cooks, and the butter and garlic melt down between the layers.

More work than a plain baked potato, but the presentation when you unwrap the foil is worth it for steak night.