What size of cooking pot do you use? Solo or group? Does it change by season? Do you do all kinds of cooking or just freezer bag cooking? Do you fry food?

In the past I had a 700mL pot, then I went to a 600mL pot, and now I am using a 550mL pot (The BPL Firelite 550). It is for solo freezer bag style cooking where I normally boil 12oz of water. I use this year round, but live in a location where I never need to melt snow for water.

When I take my daughter I bring a 750 ml titanium pot. When alone I cook in my titanium mug. Mainly I boil water, cook noodles etc but last time we were running low of trail food on the way back and I fried slices of some hard bread with my ever present olive oil, and we melted cheese on it. A nice treat on a chilly day.

For solo trips I use the 750ml Caldera Keg or AGG 3 cup pot. I tend to cook very simple meals when I'm alone. For two, meals are more elaborate and my partner drinks a lot more hot drinks than me, so we take the 2 litre AGG pot.

I like my gear to be the lightest and most compact that will fit my needs.

I do only solo cooking and my 'cooking' involves only boiling water to rehydrate my meals. As such, I have two cookpots:

1. Alcohol stove setup - I use a Firelite 550 -- just the right size to boil the 2 cups of water that I need.

2. Canister stove setup - I use the slightly bigger Snow Peak 600 with a home-made lid -- just big enough to house my SP Gigapower stove, fuel canister, spare lighter and small towel.

For most hikes I use a FireLite SUL 550, and a Caldera cone, which is just the amount of water I need for the freeze dried supper meal. For breakfast, the oatmeal (or whatever) uses half the water and leaves me almost 10oz for a cup of coffee (usually VIA).

I also have a FireLite SUL 900 for when I'm either not going with the freeze-dried, or for use in combination with my Bush Buddy Ultra.

Edited by Quoddy on 12/16/2009 11:25:07 MST.

0.9L MSR Titan Kettle

I use it for solo trips and with the family for three of us.

For solo, it is huge/overkill, but I like the wide opening & bottom, which makes it easy to cook in for stiring and it happens to fit my fuel canister for storage.

-Tony

FireLite 550 for solo and Snowpeak 700 for. Both are primarily used to boil water for freezer bag meals.

+1 on the MSR Titan Kettle. I like heating a little more water than necessary so I have some left over for cleanup.

Summer-> 1 liter

Winter-> 1.5 liter JetBoil (for melting snow more efficiently)

It depends on how many and what I am making. For minimal solo it is either a GSI Soloist or one of 2 tea kettles (either a GSI or a Primus). All 3 are around a liter. I prefer boiling about 4 cups water as I like to drink tea with my dinner (I use around 1 1/2 cups water for FBC meals) and that also leaves me with a little extra water for washing my face/hands/brushing teeth.

If I am with the family we use a 2L or 3L pot for volume. It depends on where and what on which pot I use (I have a couple different ones to choose from).

Tibetan titanium 900. I wanted the Firelite 900, but I can never find it in stock.

For solo trips I use the BPL Firelite SUL900, with Ti spoke bail handle. BPL Firelite SUL1100, with Ti spoke bail handle, when Susan's along.

I use either by Firelite 500 for some trips but, have started using the .9L evernew, it holds more water obviously and is just easier to use i think

I just doing FBC so I use a 600ml pot all yr long.

I use the older Firelite 500 for solo use. I find that I am always happy with slightly less than the recommended amount of water for rehydrating, and don't typically need anything larger.

MLD 850 Ti pot. Solo. Freezer bag cooking.

There are always 2 or 3 of us with one stove so we use a 2 liter AGG pot and cook simple meals, now mostly on a Bruton Crux stove.

Like Doug, I too use the MLD 850 pot. Great product.

700 ml, perfect for me and the dog. 600 solo. Could go smaller if FBC only. I like a honking big cup of coffee.