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Our crew hits up the pool regularly during the summer, especially on Friday afternoons. From 2:00 or 3:00 through the evening, the kids are outside, occupied and having a ball. Of course, this means we’re zooming through dinner time, so we’ve had to get creative with delicious dinners that are Blackstone friendly and easy to prep/transport to the poolside griddle. Bonus when they don’t require a lot of dishes or silverware.
Here are some favorites we’ve already tried along with some recipes on our “TBC” (to be cooked) list for the rest of the season. In case you want more inspo, I have a whole summer recipes section in my seasonal cooking board on Pinterest you can check out.
All of these ideas can easily fit into this new Target cooler I just bought, which has been holding up surprisingly well through nightly swim practice/meets and trips to my parents’ pool. Especially considering it was only $20!
1. Pizza with Pre-Made Dough
The obvious best case scenario is to order pizza to be delivered poolside, but doing that once a week would put a dent in the budget. A slightly more cost effective solution? The “take and bake” pizzas from Whole Foods that you can customize for everyone chowing down. Our family’s favorite toppings include: corn, blueberries, bacon, pineapple, peppers, olives, tomatoes and mozzarella slices. All of the toppings can be pre-prepped and stashed in small Pyrex containers. This one we don’t usually do on the Blackstone (though I’m sure you could), but all it takes is an adult to stroll into the house, dump pre-made toppings on to the pizza and throw it in the oven for a bit. We love to pair it with a big salad on the side (this complicates things with the need for bowls and forks, but you get veggies!), and also sometimes frozen french fries or tater tots.
2. Sandwiches
So far, our summer has consisted of the quest to find the perfect after pool sandwich. Pros: portable, can be eaten by hand, easy to prep ahead of time, easy to make for a crowd, easy to serve, easy to load up with protein, great fat and fiber.
We’ve tried two that have been amazing. The first is a take on Patty Melts:
We had pre-formed burger patties, added sauerkraut, lettuce, tomato, 1000 Island dressing, pickles and VOILA.
The other sandwich, I can almost not even talk about, because they were SO GOOD:
I stole the idea for these from The Naughty Fork. Sourdough bread, pickles, lettuce, tomato, bacon, cheese (mozzarella AND provolone), turkey, peppers, pickles … oh my.
Here are a few other after pool sandwiches on our wishlist:
Copycat Pub (Publix) Subs with Chicken Tenders
Courtesy of Easy Family Recipes: Publix Subs are the best of the best (grab and go with these babies on a boat day? Chef’s Kiss). Here’s a great copycat recipe that I think our whole fam would snap up in no time. I might use Whole Wheat bread to up the fiber content AND I’d be tempted to throw a veggie in there like sautéed kale or mushrooms.
French Dip Sandwiches
If we cooked the beef ahead of time, this recipe from Lentil Loving Family would be a breeze to assemble with the Blackstone. I’d add jalapeños for all the spice-loving folks in my family (myself included!). Also super easy to throw peppers and/or mushrooms on for a veggie boost.
3. DIY Salad Grain Bowls
I’m a huge fan of food that can be customized in a bowl. Salads, grain bowls, etc. It’s on my list to create epic poolside grain bowls. All we have to do is prep everything ahead of time and let people pick from the bar of options at dinner time. I include grains in my salads and greens in my grains, so this is really a combo deal with everything you could ever want from either choice.
Grains/Fiber: Farro, Whole Wheat Pasta, Quinoa, Barley, Wheat Berries, Brown Rice, Beans (Black, Kidney, Navy, Garbanzo, Black Eyed Peas, etc.)
Veggies: Peppers, Onions, Tomatoes, Chopped Kale, Carrots, Broccoli, Roasted Brussels Sprouts, Corn, Peas, Celery
Protein: Ground Beef, Ground Pork, Pulled Pork, Roasted Chicken, Tuna Salad, Mahi Mahi Chunks, Shrimp, Chicken Salad
Additional Topping Ideas: Avocado, Olive Oil + Vinegar, Pineapple, 1000 Island Dressing, Cheese, Olives, Jalapeños (pickled!), Pickles, Pasta Sauce, Alfredo
It is on my list to prep some delish chicken salad to have for summer lunches anyway, and as above, it would do double dinner duty in a grain bowl or be a wonderful snack with crackers. I think I’m gonna go with this one from Downshiftology. I am definitely team grape for chicken salad.
4. Taco Bar/Quesadillas
There are so many ways to customize these options, but this chicken and cheese combo from Tasty Treat Ideas looks like a winner to me. We are also huge fans of the cheeseburger quesadilla, topped with pickles. The night before your pool day, all you have to do is grab some buckwheat sourdough tortillas from PACHA, dice up any other ingredients you want to include, shred some cheese, and throw it all in containers to be slapped on the Blackstone at the appropriate time. Don’t forget to throw some salsa, sour cream and guac in your cooler to top it all off.
Tacos are basically the exact same, but deconstructed. Cook all the appropriate things and keep in separate containers so folks can pile their tortillas high with whatever they wish.
5. Snack Dinner
During a really hefty swim sesh, it may be wiser to just keep the kids in the pool for as long as possible without coming out completely to eat a whole meal of food. This option requires a little more ahead of time prep, but we love a good grazeable snack dinner during the summer. The trick is to make sure you prep snacks with all the nutrients you would include in a normal dinner and ensure the kids have proper servings of each snack. Here are some options:
Hefty Veggie Tray
This is key as this is the best way to get kids to eat their veggies during snack dinner. In our family, the best way to do that is to serve them with an irresistible dip. My mom makes a dill dip with sour cream and mayo, but here are a few others we’d like to try:
Creamy Spinach Dip from Julie Blanner
Loaded Hummus Dip from Peas and Crayons (would also be great with a fiber filled cracker!)
Whipped Feta Dip from Style and Grace
Meat and Cheese Tray
Here’s where the protein and fat come in. We love a good charcuterie board, and hard boiled eggs are an amazing, poppable addition to these for extra nutrients in a bite sized delivery.
Fruit Galore
Fruit is a summertime staple and it’s a great fiber addition as part of your snackalicious dinner. You could always just put some out for everyone to grab, but I also love a good fruit salad for easy and diverse helpings.
I’m partial to any fruit salad with peaches or nectarines, so I think I might try my hand at this one from Molly’s Home Guide.
Fiber-Filled Fun
As we all know, fiber is one of my one true loves. So you know I wouldn’t skimp out on it just because we’re doing snack dinner. You can fit it in to a snack dinner with a bean dip like Cowgirl Caviar from Rebecca Taig – scoop with crackers, chippos or even some sourdough bread!
6. Nachos
To prep ahead with this one, just cut up/ mix everything you want to put on top beforehand, leaving out only the meat. THAT you can cook on the Blackstone and pop on top of the chips right before you slide the whole thing into the oven for cheese melting and crispification. I know you CAN make nachos 100% on the Blackstone, but I have yet to try that.
You can really customize this one with whatever you’d like (make sure to throw in beans for fiber + veggies and of course the meat/cheese provide great protein/fat), but here’s an inspo recipe from Cozy Cook to get your wheels turning.
7. Breakfast for Dinner
This one is easy! Bring eggs, veggies, cheese and premade pancake mix (someday, I’ll have to post Dan’s special high fiber pancake recipe!), bacon or sausage and voila. It’s easy to do a whole breakfast setup on the Blackstone. You could also add in sweet potato hash browns! Fiber can also come from toast (yes, you can easily make this on the Blackstone) or adding beans into your omelettes. Adding peppers and onions to the eggs takes care of veggies! Serve with fruit for even more fiber-filled benefits – berries, watermelon, apple slices are easy to pre-prep.
8. Pre-Assembled Casseroles
Requires a bit more upfront effort, but if you have a casserole dish with a lid, simply cover, transport and then pop it into the oven for an easy dish with next to no cleanup. Here are some good poolside “casseroles.”
This pasta-based casserole from Alexandra’s Kitchen is easy to customize with veggies, whole wheat pasta and whatever meat you’d like to incorporate.
A chicken spinach artichoke casserole like this one from Real Food Whole Life could easily handle the addition of something like broccoli for added veggie and fiber content. You could also easily throw in some cooked brown rice for fiber!
Black bean, quinoa and corn all in a casserole? Perfect, iFoodReal.
9. Stuff on a Stick
Easy to grab, eat and stuff with whatever your heart desires, like …Fruit, a la Six Sisters’ Stuff
Steak, my personal favorite, as shown here in Cooking Classy
Shrimp and more veggies, like on Molly’s Home Guide
10. Hot Dog Bar
This is something my daughter found in one of her kid-friendly cookbooks and she’s made it for our family multiple times. My disclaimer about this is that I have yet to find a good hot dog bun with decent fiber content (PLEASE someone make this happen – it’s 2025, for pity’s sake!) AND I know that hot dogs themselves are really not the “pinnacle” of nutrition. But it’s summer and a pool day, so hot dogs are an obvious and unanimously loved choice. Just cook up a bunch of dogs and then put out some fun (perhaps unusual) toppings in addition to your usual ketchup, mustard, relish.
You can get some ides from this hot dog bar post on BellyFull:
Or this one from BSugarMama:
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