The potatoes were still raw when the propane ran out. We were three days into a boondocking trip outside Sedona, the sun was setting, and we had six people waiting for dinner. Our built-in RV stove had been acting weird all week — one burner barely lit, the other cycled between roaring flame and pathetic flicker. We limped through that meal using a backup butane burner we had shoved in a cabinet two years earlier and forgotten about. That night, we started researching portable options. By the time we got home to Florida, we had ordered our first real camping stove for RV use, and we have not turned on the built-in unit since.
We have been RVing since 2018, towing our Grand Design Reflection fifth wheel all over the country. We have cooked in desert heat, mountain cold, and Gulf Coast humidity. And we have learned the hard way that the stove that came with your rig is almost never the best tool for off-grid cooking. Whether you are boondocking for a weekend or living full-time on the road like we do, having a reliable portable cooking setup changes everything about meal planning and camp comfort.
Why We Ditched Our Built-In RV Stove (And Never Looked Back)
The built-in stove in our fifth wheel looked great in the showroom. Three burners, sleek glass cover, plenty of counter space around it. But the first time we tried to boil water for pasta at 8,000 feet outside Durango, it took twenty minutes. Twenty minutes for water that should have been rolling in six.
The problem was not the altitude. The problem was that RV stoves are designed to look nice and fit in tight spaces, not to put out serious heat. Most built-in units max out around 9,000 BTUs per burner. That is fine for reheating soup or scrambling eggs, but try to sear a steak or bring a big pot to boil and you are waiting forever. We started planning meals around what the stove could actually handle, which is a terrible way to cook.
Then there was the propane dependency. Our built-in stove only runs on the RV’s main propane system, which means if we are running the furnace, the water heater, and trying to cook dinner all at once, something is getting starved. We have had the stove flame drop to almost nothing mid-cook because the furnace kicked on. And if you are boondocking in winter and trying to conserve propane, you are constantly doing math in your head about whether it is worth firing up a burner or eating a sandwich.
The space issue hit us hardest when we were camped in Big Bend for a week with another couple. Four adults, one tiny RV kitchen, and a stove that required us to stand in one specific spot to use it. We ended up setting up a folding table outside and cooking most meals on a portable two-burner we borrowed from our friends. It was faster, hotter, and we could actually move around each other.
We realized that night that we were hauling around a built-in stove we barely used, while the gear that actually worked lived in a storage bin. That made no sense. The built-in unit is still there — we have not ripped it out — but it has become a very expensive pot storage shelf.
What Three Years of Boondocking Taught Us About Fuel Types
We have settled on propane. Not the little green one-pound canisters, but the refillable bottles that connect to a proper two-burner stove. The reason is simple: we already carry propane for the RV, so adding a five-pound propane bottle for cooking does not introduce a new fuel type to manage. And propane works in cold weather, which butane absolutely does not.
We tried butane for about six months because the canisters are compact and the stoves are dirt cheap. It worked great in Florida and Texas during spring. Then we took a trip to the Rockies in October and the butane canister would not light below 40 degrees. We were stuck making coffee on a campfire like pioneers while a perfectly good stove sat useless on the picnic table.
Dual-fuel stoves sound like a smart compromise, but they add complexity we do not need. You are carrying two fuel types, dealing with two sets of adapters, and paying extra for a feature we have never actually used in the field. If you are flying to a campsite and need maximum flexibility, sure. But if you are towing an RV with a propane system already onboard, stick with propane and keep it simple. Proper fuel management and equipment maintenance are essential for safe outdoor cooking, which is another reason we prefer the simplicity of a single fuel source.
The Two Camping Stoves for RV Use We Actually Reach For (And Why Everything Else Disappointed Us)
The Camp Chef Everest has lived on our picnic table for the last year and a half. We bought it after a frustrating week in Moab where our old Coleman could not get a cast iron skillet hot enough to sear anything. The Everest has 20,000 BTU burners, and the difference is not subtle. Water boils in under four minutes. We can cook on both burners at full blast without one stealing heat from the other. It weighs twelve pounds, which is heavy for a portable camping stove, but we are not backpacking. We are setting it on a table ten feet from the RV. The weight does not matter, and the power does.
For quick trips or car camping without the fifth wheel, we bring the Gas One single burner. It is tiny, runs on either propane or butane, and cost us thirty bucks. We have used it for everything from boiling water for French press coffee to cooking scrambled eggs in a Walmart parking lot at 6 AM. The simmer control is shockingly good for such a cheap stove. It is not replacing the Everest for serious cooking, but for a weekend where we need to heat things up, it is perfect.
We have tried the Coleman Classic, the Jetboil Genesis, and a Cascade model we cannot even remember the name of. They are fine. The Coleman is reliable and cheap, but it is slow and the burners are uneven. The Jetboil boils water fast if you use their proprietary pot, but with a regular pan it is okay, and it costs $450. The Cascade had sticky control knobs that drove us crazy within two weeks. None of them solved a problem the Everest did not already handle better.
How We Match a Stove to What We’re Actually Doing That Weekend
When we are heading out for a full week of boondocking, the Everest goes in the truck bed before we even hitch up the fifth wheel. We know we will be cooking real meals, probably for more than the two of us, and we need the power and the two-burner flexibility. Last month we were camped outside Taos with friends, and we cooked breakfast for six people on that stove without any drama. Bacon on one burner, eggs and hash browns on the other, everything hot at the same time.
If we are doing a quick overnight or testing out a new spot, the Gas One comes with us. We are not setting up a full outdoor kitchen for one dinner and one breakfast. We need something that lights fast and does not take up half the picnic table. Two weeks ago we pulled into a Corps of Engineers campground late, made quesadillas on the Gas One in ten minutes, and packed it back up before we even unfolded the awning.
For family gatherings or group trips where we know someone else is bringing a stove, we leave ours at home. There is no point hauling extra gear when three other rigs are showing up with their own cooking setups. We bring our cast iron skillet and a good cooler and use whatever is already on the table. If you are new to RV life and looking for more tips on setting up your rig for extended trips, we have covered a lot of boondocking essentials and gear recommendations that go beyond cooking equipment.
The Mistakes That Cost Us Time, Money, and One Ruined Dinner
We bought our first portable propane stove and then realized we had no way to connect it to a propane bottle. The RV uses the big tanks, the stove needed a small bottle, and we did not have an adapter or a five-pound bottle to connect. We were sitting in a Cabela’s parking lot in Oklahoma trying to figure out why the stove would not light before we realized we were missing the entire fuel delivery system. We drove to Walmart, bought a five-pound propane cylinder and a hose, and finally got the thing running two hours later. Now we keep a full five-pound bottle in the truck at all times, and we check it before we leave the driveway.
The butane disaster in Colorado taught us that fuel type matters more than specs when choosing your camping stove for RV trips. We had read that butane stoves were compact and efficient, and we got excited about saving space. But nobody mentioned that butane stops vaporizing below 32 degrees, which means it is useless for half the year in half the country. We were camped at 9,000 feet in October, temperatures were dropping into the 30s at night, and the butane canister sat there like a paperweight. We ended up borrowing a propane stove from the campsite host and giving away the butane canisters to someone heading back to Phoenix. That was an eighty-dollar lesson.
The worst mistake was assuming a high-end stove would solve problems we did not actually have. We almost bought the Jetboil Genesis because the marketing made it sound like the ultimate RV camping stove. Fast boil times, compact storage, integrated cookware. But we already had cookware we liked, and we did not need to boil water in two minutes instead of four. What we needed was a stove that could handle two big pans at once without choking. We bought the Camp Chef Everest instead for half the price, and it has done everything the Jetboil promised without requiring us to use proprietary pots.
What’s Actually Living in Our RV Kitchen Right Now
The Camp Chef Everest is bungee-corded to a shelf in the back of the truck bed, next to a five-pound propane bottle and a twenty-foot hose. The Gas One single burner lives in a cabinet inside the RV with a four-pack of butane canisters, because even though we prefer propane, butane is easier to store as a backup. We keep a small fire extinguisher within arm’s reach of wherever we are cooking, which is a lesson we learned from someone else’s mistake at a campground in New Mexico.
Here is what to do this week: pull out whatever camping stove for RV trips you currently own, set it up in your driveway, and actually cook something on it. Not boil water. Cook a real meal. See how long it takes, whether the flame stays consistent, whether the controls are easy to adjust while you are holding a spatula. If it frustrates you in the driveway, it will be worse in the wind at 7,000 feet with Maggie barking at a squirrel and your spouse asking when dinner will be ready. Test your camping stove for RV use now, before you are three days into a boondocking trip with no backup plan and a cooler full of food that needs to get cooked tonight.
