Road Food: Good food that travels well
Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.
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Middle Eastern Meatball Wraps
Road food notes: Packs easily • Stays warm for hours in an insulated container • Delicious hot or at room temperature • Delivers that well-fed feeling you get from a home cooked meal even when eaten from your car
These meatballs are spiced with cumin, coriander, paprika, cinnamon, and garlic, fried until crispy on the outside and tender and juicy on the inside, then smothered with a garlicky lemon yogurt sauce and wrapped up in a warm flour tortilla. This is the kind of simple, no-fuss, handheld meal that you can wrap up and take with you anywhere.
I’ve been sitting here trying to describe the kind of food that gives me that visceral, grounding feeling of being well fed.
This is not the same feeling as being full. Being full can be pleasant or very unpleasant, depending on the situation. This is also not the same feeling as just not being hungry. A bag of chips, while delicious, might curb my hunger but it does not make me feel well fed.
Many years ago, when I was pregnant with one of our children, I had a few weeks of particularly bad morning sickness coupled with the actual flu. One morning, I woke up feeling better, and Steve suggested we go out to eat. We went to a restaurant where I ordered roast chicken and mashed potatoes and it was, I am not exaggerating here, the best thing I’d ever eaten in my whole life.
Was it actually the world’s best roast chicken? Certainly not. But for me at that particular moment in my life, it was life itself. Nothing had ever tasted better or made me feel so completely nourished, from the tips of my toes to the satisfied smile on my face.
That’s the feeling I’m talking about here. The feeling of deep satisfaction that comes from a meal that really feeds you. It doesn’t have to be fancy. In fact, in my experience, the food that makes me feel the most nourished is quite simple and down-to-earth.
I still don’t feel like I know exactly how to describe it, but I know you know what I’m talking about.
That’s what these meatball wraps do for me. And honestly, that’s kind of the entire point of the Road Food series. Most of us live a significant amount of our lives on the go, whether we are traveling, or commuting, or driving kids to sports practice. We get hungry, and our modern world offers about a million ways to curb that hunger.
But how many of those options leave us feeling well fed?
These delicious meatball wraps will. The meatballs and the yogurt sauce are quick and easy to make. Warm up a few flour tortillas and fill each one with meatballs, piping hot straight from the pan. Roll the wrap in a double layer of aluminum foil and tuck it into an insulated container, if you have one. The wraps will stay warm for several hours.
Even if you don’t have an insulated container, the wraps will still stay warm for at least an hour. And, the meatballs do not have to be hot. They are just as delicious at room temperature.
If you’re packing these to go, I’d recommend packing the yogurt sauce separately. Open up your wrap and spoon some sauce over the meatballs or just dip the wrap in the sauce, bite by bite.
If you’re not taking these wraps to go, spoon the yogurt sauce over the top of the meatballs before wrapping them up.
One final word about the tortillas. I almost always make these homemade tortillas because they are superior in every way from the packaged variety, and the payoff far outweighs the minimal effort required to make them. So that’s what you see in these photos. But packaged flour tortillas, or any other kind or wrap, work perfectly well.
Packing and serving tips
To keep the wraps hot for a few hours, pack them in an insulated container. I have this one and I like it because it has two separate containers. This allows me to pack hot food in one container and cold food in the other. For these wraps, that means I can pack the wraps in one section and the yogurt sauce in the other.
I like to serve these with a simple salad made from diced tomatoes, cucumber, and onion tossed in nothing more than lemon juice, olive oil, salt and pepper. I pile the salad into a container with a lid and tuck it into the “cold” compartment of my insulated container along with the yogurt sauce.
Three more great salad options: White Bean Pasta Salad, Israeli Salad, and Veggie and Couscous Salad. All three of these salads can be packed into single-serving size jars for easy serving.
And, if you’re the kind of person who likes something sweet at the end of a meal, you simply can’t go wrong with these Bourbon Vanilla Caramel Bars.
Food safety tips
For longer trips, keep the wraps hot in an insulated container that maintains a temperature of at least 140°F. Pack the yogurt sauce separately and keep it cold. The meatballs are also delicious at room temperature; just eat them within two hours without temperature control, or within one hour if it’s above 90°F.
More Road Food Recipes
Bourbon Vanilla Caramel Bars
Here’s what we’ve got going on here: Salty, sweet, bourbon and vanilla flavored shortbread bars, dripping with caramel and covered in bourbon glazed pecans, toasted coconut, and chocolate chips. They are seriously seductive, so you might want to be careful who you share them with. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
White Bean Pasta Salad with Sun Dried Tomatoes
All the ingredient amounts in this recipe are suggestions, not rules. Adjust everything to your personal tastes and preferences. This is also one of those salads to which plenty of other delicious things can be added or substituted. Toss in some chopped marinated artichokes, any kind of pickled vegetable, banana peppers, chopped cucumber, broccoli, or cauliflower.
Blueberry Pie Bars
These sweet, jammy little bars are much easier to transport than blueberry pie but still deliver plenty of bright blueberry flavor. Use your favorite can, or jar, of prepared blueberry pie filling, or make the filling from scratch. You'll find my favorite recipe below.
Roasted Eggplant Dip
This roasted eggplant dip is smoky, garlicky, just a little bit spicy, and exactly the kind of thing I want to eat with pita chips or warm buttered naan—and maybe a stash of cut vegetables and a handful of roasted nuts.
Paprika Chicken Bites
Tender, juicy paprika chicken bites made with just a handful of pantry ingredients, one pan, and ready in about 20 minutes. Delicious served hot, at room temperature, or cold, they're perfect for easy weeknight dinners, meal prep, packed lunches, road trips, picnics, and travel days.
Spicy White Bean Harissa Dip
This dip is the kind of thing you could take anywhere. It’s snack food that could easily be the whole meal. Because it’s made from beans, it’s high in fiber and protein, plus all the other good stuff that beans contain. Also, there’s no mayonnaise or sour cream in this recipe, so it’s a little more forgiving when it comes to sitting out for a while. Toss in a bag of tortilla chips, some pita bread, crackers, or veggie sticks. What more could you need?
White Bean Tuna Salad
This bright, protein-packed salad is tossed in a simple lemon-Dijon vinaigrette and loaded with crisp scallions, creamy white beans, flaky tuna, and your favorite briny vegetables. It’s endlessly adaptable, requires no cooking, and is perfect for meal prep, road trips, picnics, or easy lunches on the go.