30+ Easy and Delicious Beach Vacation Recipes

If you are like most people, this summer, you will likely spend a week or two at the shore or beach with family members. While renting a home and preparing meals at home is more affordable than staying in a hotel and eating out every night, planning dinners for the week can also be a source of stress. Below, I will share my favorite recipes to minimize your daily cooking and how to create your own custom beach vacation meal planning sheet. No one wants you to spend a long time cooking while you are on vacation. Whether you are making Keto meals or just family dishes, these recipes will help you keep your meal prep to a minimum. These delicious vacation rental recipes include freezer dinner dishes and slow cooker (Affiliate Link) recipes as well. Come along, and let's start cooking!

Jump to:

• Do this before planning your meals!
• Beach Vacation Meal Planning Tips
• Make Your Own Beach Vacation Recipes Meal Planning Sheet
• Pasta and Chicken Salads
• Quick and Easy Pasta Salad Recipe for a Crowd
• Light Waldorf Chicken Salad on Romaine Lettuce
• Yummy Curry Chicken Salad Recipe
• Chicken Salad with Walnuts and Cranberries Recipe
• Slow-Cooker Dinners
• Slow Cooker Sweet Potato Bean Stew Recipe
• Slow Cooker Easy Beef Stew Recipe
• Italian Black Beans and Rice Slow Cooker Recipe
• Chicken Cacciatore Recipe in the Slow Cooker
• Homemade Soups
• Turkey Lentil Soup Recipe For The Family
• Chicken Taco Soup Recipe {slow cooker, Dairy-Free, Gluten-Free}
• Chicken Tortilla Soup Recipe in a Slow Cooker
• Low-Carb Stuffed Peppers Soup Recipe
• Freezing Meatloaves
• Delicious KETO Turkey Meatloaf Recipe
• How to make a KETO Freezer Meal Mini Meatloaf Recipe
• Delicious Instant Pot Meatloaf Recipe
• Amazing Italian Meatloaf Recipe
• Mac and Cheese Recipe Options
• How to Make Dairy Free Mac and Beans recipe
• Spinach and Artichoke Mac n Cheese Recipe
• Taco Mac and Cheese with Beans and Tomatoes
• Meatless Buffalo Mac and Cheese Recipe
• Lasagna option in a Crock Pot
• Easy Crock Pot Lasagna Recipe
• Homemade Chili Recipes
• Quick Sunday Chili
• Keto Spicy Chili Recipe in Slow Cooker
• Delicious Zucchini White Chili Recipe
• GF Chipotle Instant Pot Chili Mac Recipe
• White Turkey Chili Recipe
• Slow Cooker Chicken Chili Recipe
• Easy Turkey Chili Recipe {Freezer Meal, Make Ahead, DF, GF}
• Chicken Chili Instant Pot Recipe
• Amazing Texas Chili Recipe
• Dairy Free Gluten Free Pesto Beef Burger Recipe
• Asian Infused Turkey Burger Recipe
• Keto Freezer Meal Ranch Burger Recipe
• Visit our other recent recipes!

Do this before planning your meals!

First things first, you need to determine what the rental kitchens have for you to use. If it's a place you've been before, that will make it much easier to decide on your low-cost meal plan. However, if this is not the case, you will need to obtain some information from the realtor's office and see what they are providing for your use. Ensuring you have a fully equipped kitchen will make your meal planning easier and help avoid issues with your meals at the rental house.

Beach Vacation Meal Planning Tips

First, let's discuss how to create your vacation meal plan.

It's best to determine how many meals you would like to have made for your trip. You can check out my post on 'How to Easily Pack for a Shore Vacation Without Stress,' where I share a checklist (Affiliate Link) that helps you organize your thoughts in order and belongings for your vacation.

It's a good idea to make your own meal vacation checklist (Affiliate Link). Start with the days you will be on vacation. List them all on a piece of paper. Then, have an area for Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner. This will help you plan when you need meals and when you plan to eat leftovers and dine out. Fill in the other meal activities accordingly so you do not make too much food.

Now, go through and add the recipes you want to make (feel free to pick from the ones below) or pull from your collection of family favorites. You can add the name of the recipe, page, or website where you found it.

Place the paper recipes in a folder or create a digital folder on your device or computer (Affiliate Link) for the digital recipes. Then, go through and add up all the ingredients you need for each recipe. You may have 12 onions for all four recipes, for example. And add them to your meal planning shopping list (grocery list).

Now, determine when you plan to cook these meals. Answer these questions.

• Will these meals be prepared before you go on vacation, and just heated through?
• Will you need to bring a small appliance, such as a slow cooker (Affiliate Link) or an air fryer (Affiliate Link), with you?
• Do some of the meals require more prep than others? When will you plan on doing those meals?
• Will the family be OK with eating the same breakfast for at least a few days?
• Are the kids okay with eating the lunches you plan to make for the other days?
• What are your family's favorite things to eat? Make a list.

Answering all these questions before you determine the meals and buy the ingredients will save you a lot of money and heartache for the week.

Below are some additional tips that help decide on the recipes you will make for vacation:

• Use simple ingredients. Prepping your meals with fresh, easy-to-find ingredients can help with cost savings.
• Using ingredients like already-cooked rotisserie chicken to buy will speed up the process of making your meals.
• Tomato sauce (Affiliate Link) is an excellent addition to your meals, whether you decide to make pasta and sauce or add it to your slow cooker (Affiliate Link) recipe as a part of your freezer meal.
• Sometimes, local markets would be more expensive since the beach adds a premium to the food you buy there. Making meals at home will save money during the week.
• Bring a good knife for cooking. A chef's knife (Affiliate Link) is beneficial when prepping in a vacation house. Sometimes, the cooking utensils (Affiliate Link) at the rental property are not of excellent quality. So bring what you need to enjoy cooking on vacation.
• Bring your crockpot. Not all vacation houses will have a slow cooker (Affiliate Link), so you may want to bring your own. Be sure that yours is newer and reliable for safety purposes. Ask your rental company if you can bring it with you.
• Bring ice packs and a cooler when transporting your food. We used two coolers to transport my frozen dinners, and it worked wonderfully.
• Bring extra trash bags (Affiliate Link). If you do not want to bring things back, you will have enough trash bags (Affiliate Link) to dispose of items at the end of the trip.

Make Your Own Beach Vacation Recipes Meal Planning Sheet

I started the meal planning sheet with Saturday's dinner, as it is usually when renting that you arrive in the afternoon. And I ended on Saturday morning because, usually, the rental office wants you to leave in the morning so they can prepare the house for the next tenants.

Below is an example of what the meal planning sheet would look like for your beach vacation recipes.

If you want to pick up a copy of this meal planning checklist (Affiliate Link), feel free to sign the form below and get this checklist (Affiliate Link) plus all our other free ebooks/checklists (Affiliate Link).

Pasta and Chicken Salads

Preparing food ahead of time works great when going away. A pasta salad is a wonderful option. The vinegar-based dressing in this recipe below will keep the food fresh for at least a few days.

Chicken salad is a quick way to use up leftover chicken breast. It's great for lunch in a sandwich or a light dinner on top of a salad.  These are my favorite go-to chicken salad recipes. It does need to be refrigerated and is perfect for the first night at the rental property.

Slow-Cooker Dinners

Slow cooker meals are convenient when going on a beach vacation rental property. There is even a vegetarian version. It's nice not to eat meat daily, so this one is a good option. The beans fill you up, and you don't have to spend much money. It's a win-win in my book. The ones below are super easy to put together at home, then freeze, and then reheat while you're on vacation.

Chicken cacciatore is a delicious dish and wonderful for a vacation meal. This one is a quick, throw-together recipe that you can prepare in the morning and have ready by dinner time.

Homemade Soups

Creating homemade soups (pre-cooked) is an excellent option for dinner. If you have several slow cookers (Affiliate Link), you can set them up the day before you leave, make the meals, and then freeze them all for the trip. Then, when on vacation, you need to reheat them.

You can make these below in the morning, put them in the slow cooker (Affiliate Link), and they will be ready for dinner that night. Easy peasy.

If you like ground beef, you can also make this soup recipe in a Dutch oven (Affiliate Link). It is hardy and great for a crowd.

Freezing Meatloaves

I like freezing them after they are cooked. Then, when we want to reheat them, I cut them into slices and saute them in a skillet with a little oil for a quick meal with a side of salad or veggies. Below are a variety of options from using turkey to beef.

If you like meatloaf individually sized, a mini meatloaf, low-carb recipe may be for you.

Mac and Cheese Recipe Options

You can't forget about mac and cheese!

Let's not forget about the super easy slow cooker (Affiliate Link) mac and cheese. This one adds veggies and artichokes to it and can be placed in the slow cooker (Affiliate Link) in the morning for a delicious dinner that night.

If you are staying away from Dairy, this mac and cheese recipe may be perfect for you. This recipe uses beans to make the sauce.

Lasagna option in a Crock Pot

Yes, it's a thing, and you can do it too! It's delicious, and you won't want lasagna any other way. If you bring your slow cooker (Affiliate Link), you can easily prepare this lasagna dish for your vacation.

Homemade Chili Recipes

You can substitute the flour with a gluten-free variety if you are gluten-sensitive or have a gluten allergy. I like to double the recipe and then freeze it in portion-controlled sizes. These are my favorite chili recipes.

If you prefer a non-beef chili dish, try this one. This recipe is a turkey chili recipe and freezes well. This recipe can be easily doubled or tripled in size for larger groups of vacation attendees.

If you'd like to try a chicken chili recipe, consider this one. It has zucchini, cannellini beans, and is also a slow cooker (Affiliate Link) recipe. Great for cooking ahead or making while at your beach home.

All these recipes are below.

Lastly, our Delicious Vacation Rental Recipes are also available for specific types of diets.

Low Carb Recipes

You can still stay on your diet, when on vacation. Just make some low-carb dinners! And, a quick freezer dinner can even be keto-friendly. This meat burger recipe is incredibly easy and can be frozen, then reheated in a skillet or on the grill when you arrive at your rental.

Many of my recipes are low carb; feel free to visit all of them here.

Well, there you have it—my home-cooked recipes plus how to make your own beach vacation meal planning sheet for your next unforgettable vacation rental home at the beach. I hope this helps you plan your vacation dinner with little effort. Please share your favorite recipes in the comment section below.

Want more recipes? Here are some other shore house recipe posts for your next vacation:

The 15 Fresh Summer Recipes Perfect for the Beach House Kitchen

12 fresh recipes for your summer vacation

Feeling overwhelmed with what to pack for your shore vaca? If you are looking for some help on how to prepare for your shore vacation rental, check out our recent post that includes FREE Shore Rental Packing checklists.

Below are Amazon (Affiliate Link) cookbooks that share recipes for make ahead and slow cookers (Affiliate Link). (affiliate) If you click through and purchase from Amazon (Affiliate Link), we will receive a referral fee at no additional cost to you.

Looking for fabulous cookbooks? Check out these below

Cookbook: Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking: 30th Anniversary Edition

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Cookbook: Gluten-Free Living Cookbook: Gluten-Free Living Cookbook

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Cookbook: The Best Mexican Recipes

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Visit our other recent recipes!