Absolute necessities for cooking in a hotel suite

On a recent trip, we ended up staying in a hotel instead of in a rental home. While we love our VRBOs, sometimes, it is just not an option. How can you save money on meals and keep your family’s tummies happy when all you have is a hotel suite kitchenette?

The first thing to consider is the type of hotel you’re choosing. If you’re choosing a normal hotel, and they happen to offer a room with a kitchenette, you may find that you’re missing some of the basic tools you need to make things happen. On the other hand, some of the larger hotel brands offer suites, which are far more intuitive in the planning of the kitchen area. Many of these suites have a dishwasher and enough counter space to really get serious about food prep. One of our favorites is the Comfort Suites brand, which often has a small oven, a cooktop, and a variety of pots, pans, and utensils available for our food prep needs.

We are members of the Choice Hotels program, which gives us access to discounts for Comfort Inn, Comfort Suites, Quality, Sleep, EconoLodge, and a myriad of other options. We also recommend that, if you plan to do much road trip travel, you become a member of a hotel group like Choice Hotels in order to maximize your rewards. Many times, we are able to earn a free night with just 2-3 nights paid. This is a great way to optimize your travel budget!

The first priority to help you stay on your food budget when traveling is to make a menu of the meals you will cook in the hotel suite. Of course, in order to know which meals you will cook, you probably need to know which days you are doing ‘excursions’ out and about, and which days you’ll be staying at the hotel, swimming or playing board games. I’m a planner, so I generally create a table in Word or Excel to list out each of the days of our trip, where we’ll be staying, and what we’ll have for each meal. This schedule might look a little like this:

	Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday
Breakfast	At home (cereal or smoothies)	Cereal	Pancakes	Eggs & sausage	Cereal & leftover smoothies	French Toast (leftover bread)	Leftovers (leave for home)
Lunch	Packed sandwiches	Deli sandwiches	Grilled Cheese	Mac n Cheese w/dogs	Chili w/leftover dogs	Baked potatoes (leftover chili)	Fast food
Snacks	Fruit	Smoothies	No-bake cookies	Smoothies	Ice cream (at a shop)	Leftovers	Fruit
Supper	Local diner	Pizza	Dad grill burgers & dogs	Crock pot: Chili	Crock pot:	Leftovers	Local diner

You’ll notice that travel days generally begin with something that the kids can get for themselves without messing up the kitchen. We put our dishes in the dishwasher and set it to run, even if it’s not full, so there’s nothing growing in the sink when we return. Since we travel with teens now, I usually remind them to plan their travel food the night before. Hubby and I don’t eat until noon most days because of intermittent fasting, so it’s just a matter of making sure our teens, who love to snack, are happy until the first fuel stop. I do always make sure there’s a disposable container, such as an old cool whip container or an ice cream bucket, of some kind of fruit – cherries, grapes, clementines, etc. This is also why I recommend taking the plastic-wrapped cups from your hotel room whenever you travel. I keep a small stack of these in a seat pocket or the side of a cooler. It is especially handy for the driver to be able to have a cup of grapes or cherries that he or she can pick at while they drive.

I try to plan my menu in a way that allows multiple meals from a single purchase. If we buy three loaves of bread on Monday, we have what we need for Monday’s sandwiches, Tuesday’s sandwiches, and toast with our eggs on Wednesday, and we finish what’s left with French Toast on Friday. This does not allow us to pack sandwiches for the trip home, but generally by that time, the teens are ready to hit some fast food!

You’ll also notice that, after we grill hot dogs on Tuesday night, we serve them with mac n cheese on Wednesday and with chili on Thursday. That chili, in turn, was originally cooked for Wednesday night dinner, and shows up with hot dogs on Thursday, then on baked potatoes on Friday. If you have teenagers like I do, everyone has his or her favorite thing that Mom makes. I happen to know that, if I offer a combination of hot dogs, chili, baked potatoes, and mac n cheese, all of it will get eaten, but some will eat the same thing for every meal until it’s gone. I don’t mind, as long as they’re eating a balanced (not all starch or all protein) meal, and not complaining about it.

For dinners, I keep things much simpler than I would if we were at home. At home, where I can incorporate leftovers into another meal even several days later, I can serve a starch, a vegetable, and a protein in a creative way. On the road, we might make s’mores and serve microwave steamed veggies the same night that Dad grills burgers, and call it good. At home, chili might be served with chopped green onion, cilantro, and avocado. On the road, I’m probably only putting out shredded cheese and sour cream.

So what should you bring if you want to make simple meals in a hotel suite? In general, I find that these suites have a great variety of pots and pans, but cooking utensils are often lacking. Here are my absolute necessities: I like to have my meat chopper, because it makes life soooo much easier! I recommend this one, which I’ve owned for more than ten years. Every time it gets melted on the stove top, I just buy another, because I can’t live without it! Yes, I take it with me in a shoebox of basic cooking utensils. I also like to have my cookie scoops on hand, because my family loves to have no-bakes during a game night. They can also be used for ice cream, in a pinch. If you’re not one to use specific tools for specific meals, just use what is on hand at hotel.

When it comes to seasonings, you’ll find there are some tricks of the trade that can help you out. First, ask for salt and pepper packets if you make a stop for fast food. It doesn’t take many salt packets to season a single meal the next day in your hotel. But, especially since covid hit, I’ve found I need to have my own seasonings on hand. (Before covid, there were sometimes open salt or pepper shakers in the cabinet, but not anymore.) If you start your meals with good quality protein, you should be able to get away with a small shaker or Tupperware-style container of salt, pepper, minced onion, and minced garlic. If you want to be fancy, I recommend this set, which can easily hold spices or baking powder and other baking necessities. I usually buy a bottle of olive oil with my grocery run, because it is more susceptible to elevation changes, and you don’t want it leaking in your packed items! I also take a set of dish gloves everywhere I go, because I’m a big wimp about nasty floaty stuff in the dish water, and you never know when you’re going to have to scrub something really gross out of the car or the bottom of a suitcase. Yuck!

A divided container is a great way to keep basic spices handy.

All of the utensils I’ve listed here will fit in a plastic shoe box, or in a lunch-box style cooler. The nice thing about a road trip is that you don’t have to pack like you’re flying on an airplane. If you have a favorite knife that makes life easier, bring it along. If you simply must have the marinade you always use at home, there’s no limit on how many ounces you can pack in your cooking kit!

What tool is on your list of “don’t leave home without it?” What seasoning would you add to my basics?