Boondocking with my Instant Pot?

[Glenn Baglo]

Haven't tried that one. Please report. 🍞

[Lynn Eberhardt]

We make our camping toast in a non-stick frying pan. Melt some butter, toss in the bread, slide it around to pick up all the butter, flip it over briefly. Toast - already buttered.

[TracyG]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eberhardt

We make our camping toast in a non-stick frying pan. Melt some butter, toss in the bread, slide it around to pick up all the butter, flip it over briefly. Toast - already buttered.

I sometimes use coconut oil in cast iron, but I thought the toaster might be faster and more fun. Thanks for the input!

[John in Santa Cruz]

we mostly toast rolls and such, and do that in the oven

[Lynn Eberhardt]

For us, the fun of cooking in the camper is finding new, or old, ways of doing things. People were serving tasty food and good coffee long before we had all these new appliances. The stove top pressure cooker and the percolator are just two examples of how it can be done.

[Glenn Baglo]

Originally Posted by Lynn Eberhardt

The stove top pressure cooker and the percolator are just two examples of how it can be done.

Those are too complex for me. I use a BBQ for most meals. Can grill, or roast (indirect) and coffee is Melita filter pour over, into a thermos.

[Raspy]

Originally Posted by Glenn Baglo

Those are too complex for me. I use a BBQ for most meals. Can grill, or roast (indirect) and coffee is Melita filter pour over, into a thermos.

That sounds way too yuppie. Is it a digital Melita?

If you're gonna shun modern stuff, do a camp fire and cowboy coffee!

I never leave home without my percolator! It cooks, it makes hot water for tea and it perks coffee.

[Glenn Baglo]

Not digital. It's a filter holder that sits atop the thermos. Water is heated in a tea kettle on a propane or butane stove.
Had cowboy coffee once, made by a real cowboy. It was the worst ever. Coffee pot was sitting on the fire in total darkness. All you could see was the glare of the fire itself. When he dumped the coffee in from the can, a lot of it went into the pot. Nobody will ever know how much.

Those toothpicks they chew aren't a pose. They are picking coffee grounds out of their teeth.

[Raspy]

Originally Posted by Glenn Baglo

Had cowboy coffee once, made by a real cowboy. It was the worst ever. Coffee pot was sitting on the fire in total darkness. All you could see was the glare of the fire itself. When he dumped the coffee in from the can, a lot of it went into the pot. Nobody will ever know how much.

I've had Melita cones for many years. Simple and works pretty well. Just have to keep filters in stock.

The thing you don't want to do with cowboy coffee is make it in the worst, most clumsy way possible, and then use that as a judge of flavor or texture. Make it the right way and it's excellent. And the process could not be simpler, with no fancy parts. I'm having a cup right now.

Two schools of thought: Boil the coffee grounds, or add them after removing the pot from the fire. I don't know which is best.

[RogerDat]

I mounted a 1500 watt continuous and 2000 watt peak full sine wave inverter under the front couch/bed in my scamp on the street side. When I did I set it up pretty much as an earlier poster suggested with external outlets that can be plugged into the inverter.

The inverter has a remote on/off switch so I can shut it off when not in use and avoid "vampire" load drawing on battery.

No diagram but I'll give it a try...

Shore power ends in a duplex outlet box in the same under couch compartment. An outlet in the front of the couch and an external weather proof under the floor are wired with electrical cord and a male plug end.

The couch and external outlet can be left plugged into the duplex box to get shore power. Or I can unplug either one and plug directly into the inverter. Napping in a rest area I would plug the couch front outlet into the inverter so I can have a small fan on me.

The other option is to plug the external outlet into the inverter, then plug the shore power cable into the external outlet. Whole trailer then uses the inverter as shore power.

I have heavy wire from battery to inverter, then heavy gauge of wire for the plug that feeds the external outlet. I only had to drill a small hole in the floor under the couch. Just the extension cord type wire has to come through the back knockout of the external outlet box. I would suggest something like that and then cook up by the tongue, or run pot cord down to internal outlet that can be plugged into the inverter.

Surprised no one has pointed out the obvious. You need to convert the cooking pot draw into amps. Then use that to figure out how many amp hours it will draw off of your battery per given run time.

Watts = Amp x Volts You have 700w = ? x 120v I make that to be just short of 6 amps. Now from a battery one is really drawing on 12 volt to get the amp so it may be about 10 times the amps used. 6 x 120 is the same as 60 x 12 so rough and possibly I missed something but it looks to me like your 700 watt pot would draw 60 amp hours from battery in 1 hour. A typical RV battery is 100 to 120 amp hours and you can only use 1/2 of that without damaging the battery.

Looks like you would flatten one 120 amp hour battery after no more than an hours cooking. A pair would yield approx. 2 hrs. There are other factors at work. High draw on a battery depletes it differently than low steady draw. The inverter is not 100% efficient. Some inverters have cooling fans that are going to draw some power.

Now if you can cook the meal in 1/2 an hour and only use it once a day.... that would buy you a little wiggle room.

[Rzrbrn]

Well crap. I was hoping someone would come up with a genius solution to the OP’s original Q.

I have an IP and use it when at a CG w elec hook up. I prob will try running my generator in the evenings to power the IP too see if that is viable. Gen will also replenish the battery charge.

I have a propane gen. For me, a gas gen would be easier to keep fueled, so think about how you may use a gen before deciding on gas or propane; really was hoping for a solar/battery solution though.

[Jon Vermilye]

Originally Posted by Rzrbrn

Well crap. I was hoping someone would come up with a genius solution to the OP’s original Q.

I have an IP and use it when at a CG w elec hook up. I prob will try running my generator in the evenings to power the IP too see if that is viable. Gen will also replenish the battery charge.

I have a propane gen. For me, a gas gen would be easier to keep fueled, so think about how you may use a gen before deciding on gas or propane; really was hoping for a solar/battery solution though.

If you have enough batteries & solar panel area, it can be done, but not with the combination she quoted.

It would not be too much of a hit (as long as there was good sun) on my system - a pair of 100 amp hour lithium batteries & 480 watts of solar. An hour run of a 600 watt Instant Pot would be under 50 amp hours if it was on full the entire run. In most cases, the Instant Pot would not be at full for most of the run so the total hit would be less. Even if it was the full 50 amp hours, on a good day I can put that back in around 2 hours.

[TracyG]

Ya'll are crushing it! Still enjoying all the ideas and comments. :-)

Might get one of those power usage monitors -- might be worth testing to see how much power I really need for my usual dishes....

[Mike in WIS]

Originally Posted by TracyG

Yes, I know there are lots of threads about solar power and battery banks, but they make my head spin, and I have a very specific question.

I want to run my 3 qt (700W) Instant Pot off-grid using solar panels and batteries. I do not have an inverter inside my 13' Scamp -- I usually set up an outdoor kitchen and would likely have a portable solar panel with batteries and inverter set up outside.

I'd like a recommendation. Would a 100W solar panel set up with 2 12V deep cycle batteries and a 1500w inverter do it? If not, what do you recommend. Thanks much!

Have you considered trying a thermal pot, instead?

All you have to do is bring the dish Up to temperature on your propane stove, then put it inside the special insulated container, where it will finish cooking in its own heat.
Ours also includes a 12-volt accessory cord that can be used to keep the dish from cooling down too far, if you’re not yet ready to serve it.

Much less power and expense required and particularly suitable for boon docking.

Research it on YouTube and see if that’s something that you might consider trying out?

[Renae in MN]

I have a 6 qt ip, and use it for 30 percent of my meals. I can't say for sure if that will work, but it sounds well worth a try. We run mine off a champion 2000 w generator. We have 4 batteries and 400 watts of solar, bUT only a 1000 watt inverter. Someday we plan to up grade the inverter, but at the moment that is all we use the generator for.

Something others may not know is how an ip works. It doesn't run continously at that high wattage after it comes to pressure.

[Ttocs M]

At bit late with this info.

I use a butane chef stove with my Seth NcGinn's CanCooker. The CanCooker can be used on any type of heat, incl. campfire. The CanCooker is available on-line, Amazon. Free recipies on-line.

[TracyG]

Originally Posted by M Scott

At bit late with this info.

I use a butane chef stove with my Seth NcGinn's CanCooker. The CanCooker can be used on any type of heat, incl. campfire. The CanCooker is available on-line, Amazon. Free recipies on-line.

Interesting. I use a butane stove outside too -- have done for years and I love it. Have never tried the CanCooker, which looks pretty cool. But I did try a couple of options when I camped without power last weekend. I used my solar cooker for a roast, which wasn't as tender as I would have liked due to a partly cloudy day, but it did work. I also used a stove-top pressure cooker, which worked well. So well, that I came home and bought a small Fissler pressure cooker and look forward to trying that out as well.

What do you make in your CanCooker, and how do you think it compares to a pressure cooker for speed and intensity of cooking?

[Ttocs M]

I just stuff the cancooker with meat, veggies, required amt of liquid (usually cheap beer or awful wine), herbs, done in about 20 minutes...follow recipies on-line. It is a type of pressure cooker.
Use on my Scamp stove or butane chef or coleman camp stoves. Haven't tried using on a campfire as I don't want to spend time soaping outside of pot then cleaning off black smoke afterward. Would rather go play.

[k corbin]

brings back memories, not of camping but of cooking lessons. I was the kid who was always hanging around helping in the kitchen with food prep and cooking. I remember my mother giving me instructions on how to use the pressure cooker. It had to have been when I was 9 or 10 because after that age we were in a different house. I suppose it stuck in my mind as a pretty firm memory because I knew I had to do things exactly right and safety was stressed. But I could be relied on to follow instructions even at that age. But not so much now as have reached the absent minded age

[Ttocs M]

Pressure cookers of old....as kids, we crept gently past Mom's pressure cooker, afraid it might explode...damn thing kept whistling, throwing off steam. I vowed never to have one of those frightning monsters.