I can't imagine a good bivuac without cooking or at least good coffee in the morning. That's why the kitchen is one of the most important elements of my luggage. As with everything regarding a gear, I look at kitchens with a gist of minimalist attitude and with a strict eye. I'm still looking for the best option, and I must admit that it is a very interesting activity
Today I would like to talk about pots. Just like that. Yes, it seems to be easy - You buy the lightest pot or cup You can find and this is it. Well, not exactly. Titanium pots are very interesting, but I haven't found one yet that would have a heat exchanger, a thick bottom and no protruding elements. This is simply a must, no radiator and lots of gas is wasted. This is also an absolute achievement not to burn what you are cooking in titanium pot, and this is due to the extremely thin walls. Thinking about the sweet spot between the weight of the pot, the weight of the gas cartridge, the joy of cooking and the size of the entire set, I decided to perform a simple experiment - boil 500 ml of water in each of them, under the same conditions, measuring exactly how much gas I used and the exact time to boil.
For my little experiment I choose to test:
- Lixada Titanium 650ml, ultra light and tiny pot for my weekend trips, inside there is a nice place for a 100g cartridge and a stove, lighter and cloth, basically too small to prepare pasta, but enough for a coffee or a simple letcho, weight is 103g,
- Toaks Titanium 1100ml, a set of a small pan and a pot with a capacity of about 1 litre, so far my basic setup for longer trips. The downside is rather sharp edges near the handle, but also the fact that that a lot of energy is wasted. Weight is 144g,
- Fire Maple XK6, 1000ml, aluminum pot with heat sink and plastic flexible lid, plenty of space inside, weight is 189g,
- Jetboil Zip, 800ml, heat exchanger, dedicated stove and neoprene insulation. I consider it a bit of a bonus in this comparison as I have never used it to cook anything other than water. I'm very curious how it will compare to the rest. Jetboil is a strange creature, integrated, quite heavy, and yet it's impossible not to like it. Weight is 325g including the stove(188g pot only, 114g stove, 23g lid)
Apart from the Jetboil, in the case of all pots I used the BRS-3000T stove with a power of 2700W for all measurements. It's quite a powerful little thing, weighing only 24g. The conditions are exactly the same, no wind, stable water and air temperature. Results:
- Lixada Titanium 650ml, time to boil - 3:39s, gas used - 8.5g,
- Toaks Titanium 1100ml, time to boil - 3:29s, gas used - 7.5g,
- Fire Maple XK6, time to boil - 1:32s 248g, gas consumed - 4.5g,
- Jetboil Zip, time to boil - 2:40s, gas consumed - 5.0g
So nice! Despite my sincere sympathy for titanium, it's probably time to switch to aluminum with a radiators. After a few days of use, the benefits of gas savings will get the better of the slightly increased weight. In addition, cooking is faster and more of a fun, you have greater peace of mind that the fire is not going up in the air, because the efficiency is much higher. For extended weekends I will still leave the small titanium cup, this weight and volume cannot be beaten.
It is worth mentioning the rather poor performance of the Jetboil, but I am pretty sure it is caused by a clogged stove, I will have to clean it and repeat the whole boiling. When boiling water for a longer period of time, more energy is able to escape into the air, even though the Jetboil is the only pot insulated.
And what about the titanium? Perhaps it will be a better choice for a setup that runs on gasoline, and on a longer expeditions, where the reliability and weight is the thing. But I will come back to this another time.
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