What food to take to a festival

Last Updated on 12 December 2023 by Colette

Typically at festivals, Dave and I plan to make breakfast at the tent and then to eat two meals a day within the festival itself but as the kids have got bigger and we’re essentially buying five adult meals at a time, you’re talking £50 or more for each meal, which when you multiply that over two meals a day for up to four days at a festival, you’ve suddenly spent over £400 – which is about two weeks’ worth of groceries for our family of five. Bearing in mind we did this at two festivals last year – that’s a fairly enormous spend on burgers, pizzas and waffles – and doesn’t even include beers (of which there were many!)

This year, to try and save a bit of money, we’re going to do one meal a day within the festival (most likely our teas) and two meals back at the tent. Some festivals, like Camp Bestival, do actually allow you to take food (and drinks!) into the main festival arena so it’s perfectly feasible to pack a picnic lunch and not have to go back to your tent to eat – this is a bonus if you’ve got smaller children with you who may find it exhausting to walk back and forth to the tent several times a day. It also means that you’re not going to miss out on any of the festival action (though there are certainly occasions where a bit of chill time back at the tent might not be be a bad thing!). Other festivals, like Y Not Festival won’t let you take anything at all in – no soft drinks, no snacks, no booze – so you’re going to be doing a lot of walking back and forth to eat at your tent if you don’t want to spend on festival food.

If you can justify the cost, then eating the odd meal on site is definitely worth it – festival food is really expensive on the whole but let me tell you, the Ruben I had at the Big Feastival last year lives on in my mind, and treats like churros are our secret weapon to keeping the kids up to see the headliners! We find setting a budget / spend limit per person, per meal is really helpful.

What food should I take to a festival?

When it comes to deciding what food you should take to a festival, there’s a number of factors to consider – mainly how long you’re going to be there for and how many meals you will need. Don’t forget to factor in plenty of snacks too!

Once you’ve worked out how many meals you need to cover and whether you’re able to take food into the festival itself or will be heading back to the tent to eat, then you need to think about how you are going to store it. Typically at a festival you’re not going to have access to any electricity to be able to run an electrical cool box so your best bet is to freeze as much as possible – bottles of milk, capri suns (these are a staple of our summers as they freeze so well!), bacon for a cooked breakfast, homemade chilli – and store that in a standard cool box. Anything that you can freeze will not only keep the rest of your food cooler for longer but will make it last longer too.

When we’re camping at a festival, we try to take as little as possible so that might mean we only have one gas stove rather than two, or we’ll only take one pan – this means we want things which are easy to cook or reheat rather than anything too fussy.

The weather forecast will also impact what food we take to a festival – if it’s going to be cold and wet, we’re going to be wanting hot drinks and warming meals, whereas if the forecast is hot then our biggest concern is going to be keeping the food cold and making sure we’ve got plenty to drink!

Can I you take a BBQ to a festival?

Make sure you check the guidelines for the festival you’re going to as there are usually rules around the use of BBQ’s and gas stoves – you don’t want to rock up thinking you’ve got all your festival meals sorted only to find you’re not actually allowed to use the BBQ that you’ve brought.

Breakfast ideas for festivals

Typically we choose to have a cooked breakfast at a festival – something that will be nice and warming first thing in the morning and that will make sure we feel nice and full. Bacon sandwiches are always popular in our family and are an easy option in terms of just needing bread rolls, bacon (frozen of course) and a bottle of ketchup. Alternatively the kids will often choose cereal (we tend to take a “treat” cereal that they wouldn’t normally have at home) and pain au chocolat or crepes – you know the pre-packaged ones from the supermarket? These also make for a good snack during the day or a bit of supper at bedtime.

Dave will always make coffee in the morning, Amy might have a cup of tea and we’ll usually have a bottle of fruit juice too (again, if it’s cold then I’ll whip up a pan of hot chocolate or maybe a hot Ribena for me and the kids).

Easy Festival Food

If you just want a sandwich or something for lunch then we tend to take “thins” as they don’t need any preparation – just open them up, shove a filling in and you’re good to go. If it’s colder and you want something to warm you up, then anything that comes in a tin is a nice easy idea – beans, soup, hot dogs, chilli – you get the idea (just don’t forget the can opener!)

With a bit of preparation, you can cook at home, freeze and just reheat at the festival – so spag bol, chilli, curry or stew would all be good food to to take to festivals – just remember if you’ve only got one pan or gas stove then you might have to be a bit clever about how you heat everything up, one pot meals are a win in that sense!

Really, the best food to take to a festival is anything that you can heat and eat without too much fuss – you don’t want to create loads of washing up and you probably don’t want to spend a really long time faffing about making your meal either. You want also want to take food that won’t melt or spoil if it gets hot – so if you’re thinking about snacks then flapjack and crisps will win over bars of chocolate etc.

Typically I don’t really have any pictures of food we’ve taken to festivals before now so I’ll try to update this as our festival season kicks off!

For more festival content, check out our guide to festivals next where you’ll find festival reviews, tips and listings!

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