DLor1

So i've just joined this forum and i've got a question for you guys.

A group of 7 students and I are working on a design project. We need to design an outdoor kitchen-cooking set to be used during activities like backpacking, climbing, kayakking, hiking etc. etc.
We're working on it pretty hard and were wondering how the group we're aiming to design this for thinks about this kind of stuff. Which outdoor cooking sets do you guys like, which ones do you really dislike. More importantly; what do you guys really want in a cooking set like that. We know it needs to be firm, easy to set up, compact, water resistant and durable. Lastly, what are you prepared to pay for a decent outdoor cooking set? Any tips or comments are welcome.

Thanks for you guys' help!
cya later!

Mountain Man Tim

well, first the set needs to come with someone to carry it and use it to cook for me.

GJeep

I’ve used all types of cooking gear.
Liquid fuel is a mess.
The one exception are Alcohol stoves. They’re too small for cooking for more than one, maybe two people, and you have to carry the fuel cans.
There’s no room for innovation with Alcohol stoves, as this old method has reached the optimum.

Gas cans are a bother and not echo friendly.

What I’ve been using for quite a while now, and like better than other methods, is a wood-gas stove.
Out of the various options, I found the Solo Stove Titan to be the best made.
Link - http://www.solostove.com/solo-stove-titan/
Bio-Fuel – dry twigs etc.’ – are everywhere.
There’re wood-gas stove with a battery and fan, even a USB charger… which seems to me like “ruining the outdoors fun” and unnecessary complications.

With a wood-gas stove, you can innovate, by making it somewhat larger than the Solo Stove Titan, so it can be used for cooking in a larger pot, for, say, 4 people.

This would probably be too large for backpacking etc., but I have no doubt that there’s an empty market niche for it, and treading into a new niche isn’t common.

If you’re looking for a serious project, this can be it, and it can become a business opportunity.
Price? – Once you have a proven working model, I’m willing to buy 2, for $120~140 each…
Stainless steel, non-rusting type.

The main problem you’ll have to solve is the internal air flow, from underneath, into the center of the twigs, and from the holes at the top, so the flow reaches the center (so all the wood-gas, smoke & particles burn).

There’s more to it. In case you’d like to discuss it further, feel free to send me a PM.

Mountain Man Tim

Might I recommend you just get a cast iron dutch oven to throw on some hot wood coals? as long as you have twigs and sticks to burn on some rocks to get hot with said wood fire a dutch oven will do its job, stews/bbq/baked anything including cakes and pies. and none of those pesky modern conveniences like usb.

GJeep

The OP is looking for a project, not for ideas how to cook.

As for the Dutch oven, it's heavy cast iron, and it's also very different in concept.
The Dutch oven uses open fire. Open fire loses most of the heat, and emits smoke.
A wood-gas stove gets you about double the heat energy from the same mass of wood. In other words, it uses about half the amount of fuel.
The wood-gas stove is also much lighter and more compact, uses stainless steel, Titanium or Aluminum pots, and not heavy iron pots, and emits nearly no smoke once the secondary burning "catches" - which happens pretty quickly.
By burning both the wood and the materials that remain unburned in regular fire (gases, particles & smoke), all that's left is a little bit of greyish powder = minerals, which are natural fertilizer, so, instead of leaving a mark on the environment, you leave a bit of natural fertilizer next to a tree or bush.

Rob 12B1P

I have two setups depending on the type of trip.

1. For hard trails where all the gear gets wheeled in the Jeep I have a Jet Boil and take Mountain House meals for breakfast and dinner and junk food for lunch. Use plastic spoons and eat right out of the bag so there are no dishes, cookware or silverware that have to be washed.

2. If its an easy trail where the weight in the Jeep doesn't matter or we are wheeling from a base camp I take a Coleman stove and a gas grill and eat real canned/refrigerated food.

I really like the Biolite stoves (I don't have one but have friends that do) but with all the fire restrictions we've been strapped with here in the west I don't know if they would be currently legal.

Vladimer

I suppose it all depends on your mode of transportation and where you are going.

The guy with the dutch stove is probably not carrying it 15km and the guy with the bio stove is probably not sleeping on a glacier.

My stove of choice is the MSR Whisperlite. Solid design and it collapses very nicely into average size titanium cup with a lid on top. You can fill the empty void in it the cup with a ziplock filled with teabags/sugar/etc.. Then you have your bottle for fuel with a aluminum wind jammer wrapped around it. Super small setup you can carry to the top of any peak.

DLor1

You guys are the best, We're taking all the comments into account and trying to make the best kit we can. If you come back here every now and the we'll post our updates and try to add some pictures, hopefully in six weeks time we'll have a real prototype to show off!