Every day cooking - how do you do it

[myotis]

In the days when I started camping, we went camping for camping's sake and keeping a fire going, while pottering about around the camp site, was relatively straight forward.

Today, camping is likely to be mixed with other activities and while we still cook over fires for special occasions, stoves have really become our standard method of cooking.

I would like to use a fire more often, but while I can get a hot and fast fire going relatively quickly (though sometimes I fail miserably), getting a good bed of embers for cooking is trickier and takes longer to sort out. It also needs looking after. Which is fine, when it suits the mood of the day, but at other times is a bit impracticable. I also need to be prepared for ending up on a camp site that doesn't allow fires.

As I am musing about how to mix and match stoves and fire, I wondered how other people cope with this.

Do you stick with a fires, do you just use a stove when camping and leave fire for more bushcrafty activities, or do you have a mix and match approach.

Not looking at cooking anything fancy, but stews, boiled potatoes, rice, pasta, bannocks etc are common fare.

Graham

 

[SimonM]

Mix and match for me.

I have a range of stoves that I have built up since being a Scout. I still regularly use the Trangia that I used back then (I'm 38 now so have had it for about 25 years - still going strong)

These days I tend to use my hobo stove, with a meths burner as back up, that is part of the set up.

I prefer to cook on an open fire, but where this isn't possible, the hobo is a good compromise.

If I am car camping with the family we take a kitchen tent and triple burner stove, but even then we try to find a camp site that allows open fires.

Simon

 

[Hammock_man]

Quote
Not looking at cooking anything fancy, but stews, boiled potatoes, rice, pasta, bannocks etc are common fare.
Unquote

Hobo stove is the way to go for me. Plus they require so much less wood. If I really want a flame to sit around, I find I can place a few small, no more than inch thick, branches flat across the stove opening and that will give an "external flame". As they burn down they can fall /be pushed into the stove to provide charcoal to assist the next lot to burn.

I also have a swedish army meths cooker which has a nice big pot to do a soup/stew in. Good size meths burner, built in wind sheld, its the one I keep coming back to.

 

[durulz]

It all depends.
If I am on my own then I tend to use a stove of some sort for cooking - it's only me and all I'll want to do is warm up a tin of soup or do some super noodles or something like that. So I keep it simple.
If with others then 99% of the time we cook over a fire. This is because there are more of us and so some kind of stew or casserole is easiest. But this takes a while to cook and it's not practical to cook on a gas stove or similar. It has to be fire because you want something that's going to stay hot for a couple of hours. And also because it requires less monitoring and gives us chance to talk, do stuff etc. The necessity for good coals is one of the reasons why getting the fire going is just about the first thing I do when camping - build up a bed of coals and a nice hot fire. Having said that, we tend to cook over a flame - the cooking pot suspended over the fire by a tripod.

 

[sapper1]

Mix and match.I set up the stove and get a brew on while I wait for the fire to settle into a hot bed of embers then start cooking my food over the top of it.

 

[Tadpole]

I’m going to admit that I cheat when camp cooking, (and after reading a thread started by Wayland I don’t feel so bad about admitting it.)
Unless all I plan is a quick brew, when I use wood, and pine cones or anything I can lay my hands on that burns, I now use charcoal. Both in the hobo and for a main cooking fire Mainly I use lumpwood, but when using my Dutch oven or slow cooking, I use charcoal brickets. I know that the brickets are just charcoal dust glued together with starch and pressed into shape. However, they last longer burn hotter and are cheaper than lumpwood. Overall, they are using a waste/by-product, of charcoal making.
(I avoid imported brickets if I can, as some use an filling agent of limestone that does not breakdown in the ash.)

On camping sites that ban fires, I use the hobo unless told otherwise, and so far, I’ve had no problems. One site I used last year were perfectly happy for me to use my hobo in the sites fixed barbeque area. Which for me was not a problem as it was almost right next to where I had pitched my tents. Another site near Bath ask all the campers to use the old fire scars. Other than that, I’ve a trangia and a gas camping stove.

 

[myotis]

Mix and match for me.

If I am car camping with the family we take a kitchen tent and triple burner stove, but even then we try to find a camp site that allows open fires.

Simon

I think the comment on family camping may have addressed a lot of musings.

Thanks,

Graham

 

[Chainsaw]

My only cooking appliances are;

Trangia
Whisperlite
Ghillie Kettle
Yukon firebox
Big gas double burner

We use the double burner doo-dah for car camping with the family. Wild camping or if there is just 2 of us in the canoe, we use the trangia (whisperlite fits in beside the meths burner) the ghillie kettle and the firebox. Normally we have the stoves during the day but the firebox in the evening when there's more time.

Cheers,

Alan

 

[myotis]

Hobo stove is the way to go for me..

Is that also when you are cooking for more than one person?

Graham

 

[myotis]

lots of useful replies here, and a lot of logical mixes between stoves and fires.

Some approaches are blindingly obvious, but had escaped me

Its certainly consolidated how I think I am going to work things.

Thanks everyone, that has been really useful.

Graham

 

[Barney]

For cooking food I always use a camp fire, If the site doesn't allow fires I don't go on it.

My downfall, if you can call it that, is that first cup of coffee in the morning I usually cannot be bothered to re-start a fire lay so the optimus gas cooker gets the treatment. The water is usually boiled by the time I have found my cup and found the coffee.

After that first brew its fire all the day

 

[myotis]

For cooking food I always use a camp fire, If the site doesn't allow fires I don't go on it.

My downfall, if you can call it that, is that first cup of coffee in the morning I cant usually cannot be bothered to re-start a fire lay so the optimus gas cooker gets the treatment. The water is usually boiled by the time I have found my cup and found the coffee.

After that first brew its fire all the day

I can understand the problem.

It does seem for me, that the suggestions here for stoves during the morning and day, with a fire for the evening might be the solution.

Graham

 

[Sniper]

I reckon we all or most of us use a mix of fire and stove depending on site, but I doubt if many will disagree in the effect of an open fire and cooking, it just seems to taste better IMO. I bought one of those £3.99 round BBQ things donkey's years ago, you know the type of thing, tinny thin and sits on 3 wobbly splindly legs? Well I came across it recently when I was clearing out the garden shed, and of course it's just the perfect thing for an open fire where ground fires are not allowed cos to all intents & purposes it's still a BBQ and it does the job admirably.

 

[myotis]

... I doubt if many will disagree in the effect of an open fire and cooking, it just seems to taste better IMO.

I think food just tastes better out doors anyway, but there is just something special about cooking and sitting around a fire.

Graham

 

[Broch]

On my own I will use my multi-fuel stove or a 'tin-can' fire.

With a group (a large group for me is 4) I will use a 'Son of Hibachi' or an open fire. It's amazing that some camp sites don't allow open fires but allow BBQs - so I just cook on it with charcoal then feed it with small wood. This great little fire can even be closed up and fed from the top to act as a kind of wood-burning radiator when it's really cold.

 

[myotis]

With a group (a large group for me is 4) I will use a 'Son of Hibachi' or an open fire..

That's an interesting gizmo. Not seen that before, but looks useful.

Graham

 

[Graham_S]

I tend to use a camping stove for breakfast, and a fire (when appropriate) for other meals.
If I'm solo camping I was using a kilckstand and trangia burner, but now I tend to use a petrol stove I got of ebay as it cooks a lot faster, saving fuel.
I also have a woodland edge stove which I love, but it's heavy so doesn't come out that often.

 

[forestwalker]

Open fire (or my tentipi firebox) for every meal, unless they are banned due to fire hazard.

Use small stuff you're just stopping for a quick meal.

 

[myotis]

I tend to use a camping stove for breakfast, and a fire (when appropriate) for other meals.
If I'm solo camping I was using a kilckstand and trangia burner, but now I tend to use a petrol stove I got of ebay as it cooks a lot faster, saving fuel.
I also have a woodland edge stove which I love, but it's heavy so doesn't come out that often.

A similar pattern to many. I tend to use parafin stoves, except when I'm being lazy and a gas stove fills the instant stove role.

Graham

 

[myotis]

Open fire (or my tentipi firebox) for every meal, unless they are banned due to fire hazard.

Use small stuff you're just stopping for a quick meal.

Glad to see your dedication to fire.

Graham