What kind of traveling pantry holds enough food and gear to travel across the American west on cattle drives? That would be a cowboy pantry, also known as the chuck wagon.

The cowboy pantry, or chuck wagon, fed American cowboys on their travels. This mobile field kitchen was essential for cowboys on long cattle drives that covered the miles from Texas to New Mexico or to train rail heads across the American west.

Before the cowboy pantry, cowboys were responsible for packing all of their own food individually. Having a chuck wagon and a cook was one way of  attracting top tier cowboys to an outfit.

Many say Charles Goodnight invented the chuck wagon around 1866. Henry C. Harding wrote about a different inventor of the chuck wagon in his book Tales of the Range.  He attributes its invention to a camp cook named Goat:  “If “necessity is the mother of invention,” it was certainly so in the case of the chuck-box, for, in the beginning of the cow-hunts, the pack-horse outfit sufficed. Then progress, always in the minds of men, called for more supplies, more cooking utensils and greater convenience. So the wagon and the camp cook became the vogue among the bigger outfits.

But the smutty pots and other fire utensils became the bane of the camp cook’s life. He had no place to put them, except in the wagon among the beds, supplies and the cowboys’ wardrobes, all of which were blackened by the contact. Then someone invented what was known as a “kaiak,” a beef-skin stretched under the wagon in which to store the pots.Then came the chuck-box, and it was a box; at least the first one I ever saw was. There was a Black camp cook named Goat in the outfit of Johnny Blocker, who had moved a herd up from near Austin, and located a ranch — free range — just above us on the Colorado River. Goat had selected a goods box from the back of a dry goods store in Austin; had bored holes in it, placed it in the back end of the wagon, after the end-gate had been discarded; ran the wagon-rod through the holes to fasten it securely, and built compartments which took care of the soda, salt and other condiments, as well as knives, forks, spoons, plates, and so on.

This box didn’t fit snugly into the back of the wagon, being a little too narrow, but a block of wood filled in the vacant space and held it fast. Then he took the lid of the box and fixed a standard under it so it served as a table when let down. Later, “mess boxes” were made by skilled cabinet makers, which were practically portable kitchen cabinets, and fitted perfectly into the back of any standard wagon.”

Cowboy essentials

As described above, the cowboy pantry, or chuck wagon, was essentially a box wagon about ten feet long and three feet wide, customized and equipped with a chuck box and drawers and shelves. A hinged lid provided a work surface for the cook, referred to by the nickname”cookie.” The  wagons also held water barrels, a box for cooking supplies, and a built-in shelf underneath that held cookware and firewood.

Cowboy Dishes

The menu consisted of beans, onions, potatoes, biscuits made from lard and flour, fresh, salted and dried meats, and coffee.

Supplies would have included a coffee pot, a dutch oven, ladles and cooking implements, dishes and cutlery. I bet there was also a large stack of tea towels to grab hot pots and dry dishes.

Want one of your own?

Do you want your own cowboy pantry?  Visit Hansen Wheel and Wagon for custom-made chuck wagons or see an antique original for sale at Grandview Mercantile.

For more traveling pantry on horseback information, see our post about the Victorian Camp Wagon Pantry.