However, because of this stove’s single large cooking surface, you can cook for far more people far more quickly than you normally could with a smaller, cast-iron pan. The high walls of the FireDisc enable you to more easily make stews, fry-ups, and casseroles than you can with any piece of camp-cooking equipment we’ve ever tested. Where the Cascade shines is in the finer control it allows throughout the range of temperatures.
You can’t go wrong with any of our top picks, but the Camp Chef Everest 2X stands out for peak cooking performance and durability. The Coleman Classic Camp Stove, on the other hand, stands out for budget-friendly, simple, and durable use. Both are durable options that should last for years of family gatherings.
Camp Chef VersaTop ($190) has a nonstick cooking surface with a wide 18,000-BTU burner underneath, plus a grill accessory. Coleman 3-in-1 (a two-burner stove, grill top, and griddle) weighs less than the only other camp griddle we tested, the Camp Chef Versatop, which you can read about below. When cooking one pancake in the center of our skillet, everything was perfect. But using the edges of a larger pan showed that little burners struggle with heating larger cookware evenly.
For clean-up, I simply removed the grate and easily wiped everything down. The griddle is great for cooking that big morning breakfast and fits perfectly onto the stove. The case is purely just a convenient way to store and travel with your Coleman stove.
Despite just 10,000 per burner, the compact design packs a little punch. If speed is a priority for your boiling needs, however, one option is to pair the Classic with a rapid-boiling backpacking model like the JetBoil MiniMo. Not only will this mean you get your morning coffee faster, but it frees up a burner to make extra pancakes. If you have a space where you can safely store a propane tank, you could also consider refillable alternatives.
We found the top coleman camp stove camping and family camping tents for every budget and use. I always opt for a camp stove that has an integrated igniter — as long as the igniter works consistently, this is the best option. However, for those wanting something different, there are now many single-burner (and even a few three-burner) options on the market. Profile is an all-around performer with no frills, and would work well for anyone who wants a little extra cooking space in a classic design. Explorer 14 at a family-style Dungeness crab boil, and this is exactly the type of stove for an event that aims to feed many.
The is the upgraded version of this stove, and may replace it completely at some point. If money is less of an object, we recommend checking out the Kovea Twin Slim. It performed admirably across all metrics and is one of the most portable stoves in our review.
The Coleman propane stove has turn-knobs to control the burner. With a 10-inch and 12-inch pan, this camp stove has plenty of space to make cooking faster. The PerfectFlow mechanism ensures a steady propane stream for consistent and controlled performance even on low fuel.
We would also like to examine single-burner butane designs—similar to what you’d find at some Korean restaurants—such as the Kovea Cube and the Iwatani 35FW Butane Stove. While cooking, the Cascade can hold a 12-inch pan and a 10-inch pan side by side, same as the Classic. With 22,000 Btu , it produces a touch more heat than our top pick—not all that much for a stove that costs twice the price. If that’s all the Cascade could do, we probably wouldn’t recommend it.
Backpacking stoves are very small single-burner units that can fit in a backpack . Camping stoves, however, are used at “base camp” when you are car camping, truck camping, visiting National Parks, or traveling between. We did a whole test on simmer control because, as we’ve mentioned, boiling water isn’t everything. In order to enjoy a good chef-quality camp meal, you want to be able to boil, but also bake, sauté, fry, simmer, grill, and more. We measured the simmering range on the flame of each burner/stove to see how they stacked up. While the foldability isn’t necessary for the average car camper, it’s truly one of the most versatile setups we’ve tested.