Ultimate UL cook system (2023 hiking gear list Part 3)

When it comes to preparing food on the trail I like to keep things as simple as possible (with minimal preparation and cleaning). Generally, I prefer to boil water with either an alcohol or gas stove, use that process to sterilise my pot and utensils (saving water and detergent) and the boiling water to rehydrate pre-made meals. I also like to keep my hiking cook kit as compact and light weight as possible, ideally fitting into my pot.
However, flexibility and redundancy are also things I value. For short trips, one method of food preparation is fine. But on longer trips (e.g. thru-hikes) I feel that it might be prudent to be able to employ a range of methods if conditions require it. For example, if fire bans are in place in certain parts of a trail, a particular fuel or certain ingredients are unavailable or you just want a change or to try something different.
In this video I briefly (and very subjectively) look at the pros and cons to different meal preparation methods, including; cold soaking, solid fuel (Esbit), fire or twig stoves, gas canister and alcohol stoves. I run through the components I currently use (including a Vargo BOT, Trail Designs Ti Tri, Toaks burner and BRS gas stove), why I chose them and some changes I am experimenting with in 2023 (including a Qiwiz wind shield and home made soda can alcohol stove).
In addition to being light and compact, can one cook system be flexible enough to switch between multiple fuel types (or no fuel at all) and function in the wide range of conditions hikers typically find themselves in? I don’t know, but it might be fun to find out?
Some additional TH-cam links and channels that may be of interest if you’d like to learn more about stoves and different meal preparation methods for hiking/backpacking are listed below.
Cold soaking 101…
• Stoveless Camping - Co...
Best cold soaking meals…
• The Best Backpacking M...
• Easy Stoveless Backpac...
BEST Budget Stoves - Wood, Alcohol, Solid Fuel, and Gas…
• BEST Budget Stoves - W...
Esbit or solid fuel stoves...
• My Top 5 SOLID FUEL ST...
• The Value of this Stov...
Twig (wood burning) stoves…
• TWIG STOVES: Practica...
Camping Stove Efficiency: Alcohol vs. LPG - for Backpacking…
• Camping Stove Efficien...
Comparative gas consumption of stoves...
www.notion.so/...
Best alcohol stove fuel…
• What is the BEST Alcoh...
How to make the soda can stove I am trialling in 2023...
• Simplest Alcohol Stove...
Toaks stove review (my current favourite stove)...
• Toaks Titanium SIPHON ...
Other common alcohol stove designs, pros and cons (e.g. cat can (fancy feast), etc)...
• The BEST Alcohol Stove...
• The Ultimate 3oz Cook ...
• A New Design of Alcoho...
• What is my favorite al...
• How to Make a Cat Can ...
• Capillary Hoop Stove -...
• Alcohol stove designs ...
• Better than DIY Stoves...
• Awesome Alcohol Burner...

[@MrJacobmetcalf]

Thank you I was just thinking about this today now I don't have to test everything

[@whatsimonsaysabout...6447]

No worries. I've completed one of the tests I wanted to do so far (comparing different stove and shield combinations) and hope to get the other done soon (looking at performance in different wind strengths). So far, I've found the Toaks and Ti Tri combo uses the least fuel. Interestingly though, the home made soda can stove uses about the same fuel regardless of whether in the Ti Tri, QiWiz or no wind shield. I'm interested to see what the wind strength experiment shows.