I can now watch Utube again.

I quote from it. "the Omnifuel boils water incredibly quickly"
I agree, you can also use it for light foundry work and Blacksmithing. What you can't do is simmer. Which means stews/curries etc are impossible. If you turn it down it will quickly get too cold for the piddly heat exchanger to gasify the fuel. It stands more chance of working with gas but performs abysmally when compared to my £10 gas stove (including gas cartridge)
takes an order of magnitued in time to deploy. To the extent I did not bother to do abrew up on teh road for teh whole of my trip into Poland and back. I cant see any use for it, becaus ealthough it will boil faster than my little gas stove, the gas stove is considerably quicker to go from kit bag to drinking tea/coffee. Plus you have the same amount of extra bother to repack the Omnifuel. It might be possible to use it for cooking by having a shet of steel between the flame and pan in order to waste most of the heat.
I can't see me using the Omnifuel again so it is for sale and I will stick with my gas stove. Make me an offer , One Omnifuel used about 8 times.

If you have space for the trangia, I would suggest the old fashioned type of paraffin primus stove made by monitor. they also come with a 'heat ball' which glows red hot and makes a nice 'campfire' to sit around after you have finished cooking.

regards

Thanks for this! I'm gona start memorising all of these and cook them at hostels

Thanks Matt.
There's probably a million ways to make an omelette but I'd tend to put the cut up veg in the frying pan first on a lower heat to soften up a bit. Then whilst that is cooking, mix the eggs then pour them in, still on a lower heat. Stir around a little bit and then cover it and leave it for a couple of minutes.

Another thought is put all the ingredients in a clean zip loc type bag and place it in the water for your tea. Bring to the boil and leave it boiling for a few minutes to set. Then you can have your tea and food at the same time. The advantage is if you have a stove that wont simmer you wont burn it no matter how high the stove is.

@oldbmw - you're quite right! I like the idea of doing horse shoes on the stove, I think you could do quite heavy blacksmithing. The new MSR dragonfly with simmer control is actually very good, I find I can get the heat right down and just tickle things along. Compared with a £10 gas stove I can see the same performance, I am happy to have the flexibility to cook with whatever fuel I have to hand and not worry about finding the right gas cartridge.

Brewing on the road is a slightly different matter, we found our trangia excellent, but as you say a right pain in the butt to set up for a quick brew, however, Stace had the gas attachment for his Ominfuel burner with a canister which was super fast to set up (perhaps we should get you two to race at the next meet?) - now that doesn't have a simmer setting and by-God could you do some foundry work with it! Importantly however, it didn't half boil a kettle of water quickly.

Heatball sounds interesting, will look into that.

@PocketHead - excellent idea - when Catherine and I did the Great Ocean Road in Australia we cooked each night on the trangia in our motel rooms

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3433/...59f37fc1_z.jpg

This meal was clams that had been grabbed that afternoon from the fishermans co-op with a cup-a-soup (potato I think) sauce and a mushroom risotto. All washed down with a bottle of the local plonk.

@onlyMark - that's a good thought on the veg front, didn't think of that, will try it next time. Love the boil-in-the bag idea, wonder what else you could do like that?

@Ni3ous - fab fab fab! Yes I'll give that a go in the next series of videos and will post it back here.

basically anything you like can be got in a tin these days, so go shopping.

but...

if you push me for a recipe which is cheap, filling and easy, try this-
1x tin heinz spaghetti+sausages, or +bolognese
1x 25g bag doritos
2x pepperoni hot or normal.

heat up the spag with finely sliced pepperoni in, scrunch up the doritos in the bag and pour em in. eat. sounds vile, goes down great with a cold beer.

go for stuff that just needs reheating, not cooking, save on fuel and time.

i used to spend hours making up my own dehydrated packets and vac sealing them so all i had to do was snip open and pour into boiling water. they were great, using dried shrimp, dried veg and noodles from the chinese supermarket etc and i still do it occasionally when i go for a hike and weight is important. but i figured out, on a bike, weight and size are not issues. and where i go on mine, im not usually far from a whole deli rotisserie chicken and a bottle of wine.

Wokkered Noodles
 

@DAVSATO I've never tried freeze drying stuff, how do you do it? Your recipe doesn't sound too bad, I actually love the tinned Spag Bol, perfect comfort food - I'll give that one a go, would make a very short video, and as far as being too far away from the deli and a bottle of wine.... my dear boy! There's no excuse for eating crap on the road, there's always good places to buy good local food, whether that's on the side of the road or at a fancy shop in the high street - and as far as wine goes - well, that's easily supplanted by the local tipple - even if that means the local tipple is paint stripper!

Right... so the second in the latest series of videos is now live - this one is Wokkered Noodles - the recipe supplied by our very own GSPeter :-)



I've also just finished editing a longer video about camp kitchens and what Stace and I carry in ours.... I'll upload that later this week, followed by the last in this series - Simple Noodles.

Great video's as usual Matt. It looked like you were really enjoying those noodles.

See ya at Ripley.

Thanks dude, one more video to go in this series, and then one more on camp kitchens. Those noodles were properly delicious!

Matt, why dont you show the good folks your video of that powdered wine? didnt enjoy that muck quite as much as the noodles did you :rofl:

as for freeze drying, i have no idea how to do that at home, you can get packets of dried shrimp, mushrooms, and mixed veg from a local chinese supermarket, mixed with some jerky, chilli flakes, curry powder, noodles, rice, stock cube, dried soup, whatever. basically a very expensive but much healthier and tastier pot noodle! vac seal it and dont worry about anything going off, snip the bag and pour it into a pan of hot water. its good fun but easier to use a tin opener and corkscrew (or even easier, buy ringpull cans and screwtop wine!)

you can dry meat and stuff in the oven, or make your own dehydrator, lots of info online. its popular in the states with that lot that bury food in the ground because armageddon is coming, but i cant be bothered.

@Dave - oh god yes that wine was horrible! I wasn't doing videos then but the review is over at the blog.

I'll get onto Google on the dehydrating stuff thing. Thanks for the heads up on the expensive pot noodles too ;-) I always enjoy an excuse to potch around a Chinese supermarket.

Simple Noodles
 

and so to the final of the last three videos - Simple Noodles



I've added the last video to the blog with full recipe details here

cooking on thelondonbiker

Matt, hope you will put some more recipes in video for us.
I really enjoy watching them.
Afterall we have to get well prepared for the next season :mchappy:

of course!

New series of three videos in planning now - there's a camp kitchen video to come this weekend too.

m

Great! Looking forward to see them.

Camp Kitchen
 

Well this is the last one we have 'in the bag'.

Camp Kitchen



Traveling with your cooking gear can be a real pain in the neck. What should you take? What should you leave? What can you get away with when preparing a feast for expedition, or a snack whilst sitting on a mountain top.

This video explores the gear Stace and I take on our bike trips around the world. What we consider essential, useless and what luxuries we simply can't do without.

Share your own must have items with us - what can you not do without when cooking on the road?