February CDO Challenge.....

Happy Sunday afternoon everyone.  It's Pod back again today with the blogging duties.  Today, Rob decided since it was mostly warm and sunny, to complete the February CDO (Camping Dutch Oven, for those of you not in the know) cooking challenge.  The best part of this was I got to watch.

This month's challenge was to make a meal of what you had on-hand in your kitchen, pantry, freezer, etc.  So once Rob had all the cooking gear set up, he went in the house to gather the food and start preparing lunch.

Here is a picture of the ingredients he used for the CDO dishes that he cooked today.....

He told me that all of these things were items he keeps on hand normally, or in the case of the bacon and the chicken, things that had been around a little too long.

Here you can see the expiration date of the chicken he took out of the freezer.....

Next, here is a shot of the bacon he used for his Bacon Baked Beans.  He said it was still good to use because it didn't have any green fuzzy stuff growing on it.  I sure hope he was right!!

Up first, is the breaded chicken breasts.  He cut them in half, trimmed them as needed, then sprinkled them with the fajita seasoning and rolled them in the bread crumbs.  He then placed them in the foil pan and put it all in the 10" CDO.

Next, he prepared his Bacon Baked Beans.  To the can of baked beans, he added brown sugar, yellow mustard, ketchup, dried onion flakes, and topped it all with the bacon.  When I asked him how much of each item he added to the beans, he answer was, "enough." 

Of course, while Rob was looking after the food prep, I was watching charcoals get hot for him.  (We make such a good team in the kitchen or the camp!!)

Rob says the nice thing about getting me to help cook at home, is that it's kinda like we're on a camping trip.  It wasn't long either till Rob had the CDO's all stacked up and cooking.

Of course, he and I both sat down then and observed some rule called #9.  I'm not sure what that rule is all about, but Rob sure seemed to enjoy it!!  

In just a short while, he carried the CDOs in the house and well here are the results.

Rob said that everyone (Trisha, Trish's dad Arnold, and Rob's mom Von) enjoyed the CDO meal very much.  

And what does Rob get for this cooking fun, well besides a great meal, he gets a patch that looks like this.....

Picture thanks to Cousin Sharon!

Well that's about it for today.  I'm not so patiently waiting for my first camping trip in March, and I sure do hope some more CDO cooking is involved!!

Until next time, stay safe out there......-Pod

A Stabilizing Influence......

Happy Saturday everyone!! It's Pod here blogging again today.  I sure hope everyone has been doing good since my last blog post.  I'm just hangin' out in the Pod-Port waiting for the 2016 camping season to begin.

The last couple of afternoons, I've noticed that familiar big brown truck stopping by the house.  Then this morning, Rob brought two boxes down to the shop, and as he walked by me he just smiled.  

So a little later, I asked Rob what was up, and he said it would be Pod-mod time later on today.  Seems he was planning to fix a problem I've been living with ever since I came to live with Rob and Trisha.

You see, my driveway has a sharp incline at the very end, and even though the driveway is gravel, my rear stabilizers have always dragged through the gravel every time I both leave and return from a camping trip.  In fact, furpod had this same problem when they were here for the Christmas holiday.  

The last couple of trips, Rob has had to straighten my right, rear stabilizer jack after backing in the driveway.  After our last trip of the 2015 season, Rob said he had plans to fix this problem for good.  

Here you can see both of my rear stabilizers, and a close up of my mangled right, rear stabilizer.

Next, here are some pictures of the boxes Rob carried to the shop this morning.  The first picture is of my new stabilizer jacks and the special mounting plates Rob plans to use to mount them.

Below, is a picture of just the mounting plates. They are called Save-A-Jack.  They came in a set of two (for two jacks) and they allow the stabilizer jack to be quickly removed for travel.

Here's a picture of all the new hardware un-packed and checked over by Rob prior to install.  Rob said that while the new stabilizers included no mounting hardware, the Save-A-Jack plates had all the necessary hardware.

So Rob just jumped right in and started by removing my old mangled stabilizer jack.  Here's a view of my old jack removed and of the old mangled jack itself.

In the next two pictures, you can see the top half of the mounting plate attached to my frame.  Rob said this used two self-tapping screws and you have to be very careful not to over tighten them.

The second picture is of the other half of the mounting plate attached to my new stabilizer jack.  Rob said having all of the hardware included sure was nice.

In this next set of pictures, you can see the new jacks mounted, a close up of the clips that hold the jack in place when it is attached to me, a shot of both the jacks attached to my rear, and finally, a picture of the jacks extended.  They sure did feel sturdy.  I really liked them and Rob said he really did like this new set up.

Here's a picture of my jacks removed and safely stowed for travel in my storage bay.

Rob says I shouldn't have any problems with my jacks dragging now.  Rob also did one little mod to the jacks themselves.  He said the two clips which hold the mounting plates together looked liked something easy to loose.  So, he used some scrap wire to attached the clips to each jack.

Yup, I think that was a great idea too!!

Well that's about it for now.  I'm going to wrap up this post, take a nap, and  dream dreams of warm sunny days on the road.

Until next time, stay safe out there.....- Pod