COOKING IN SNOW

[Litehiker]

Yep, you are hunting high country and wake up one morning to see over a foot of snow outside your tent! No problem. You have enough warm clothes, knee high gaiters, fleece balaclava, etc.

You were smart enough to leave your butane canister stove at home and take your white gas stove for these cold temperatures.
But now you need to find a stable base in the snow to cook so you stomp down an area and know it will be very solid when you return to cook dinner. (You do have a cold breakfast to save time in the morning, right?)

So you return and realize a hot stove will melt and it will sink into the snow, always unevenly. dumping your pot of food or heating water into the snow. So you place a platform of sticks beneath it and try to get your stove level - and try yet again.

So next time bring a stove platform. You can set it right on compacted snow.
It's made from a circular piece of 1/16" exterior plywood sprayed with a few coats of silver high temp engine paint. Make this circle as small as possible to save weight. Then you attach three* door screen retaining tabs with aluminum bolts, washers and nuts to the base to hold your stove legs in place. (Do not skip this step.)
*Most stoves have 3 legs for stability on uneven ground, like a 3 legged milking stool.

This plywood base is light but fast to set up and effective plus making your stove very stable. If you use silver paint on the platform it will reflect some heat back up and you can also set a foil MSR circular windscreen on it. The windscreen saves fuel, of which every ounce had to be carried in on your back.

Eric B.

 

[cohunt]

Wrap a piece of cardboard in tin foil for your biolite stove base, super light and if push came to shove and you had no dry tinder you can use the cardboard to start the twigs in the stove.

 

[26Reload]

Why not remove the snow........

 

[middleofnowhere]

I've cooked at altitudes to 17K, snow and ice. Never gave it much thought. Always been able to find rock or clear snow. Snow shoes make a geeat platform.

 

[dok7mm]

Why not remove the snow........

Exactly my thoughts. I just kick it out of the way.

 

[dfanonymous]

..my bad luck always happens miles away from the truck...if i just have a little pocket rocket or jetboil...assuming i could get the butane canister to work...i never seem to ever be in a shortage of big rocks to put it on. if no rocks, then im probably in the alpine, and theres plenty of fallen timber.

but yeah, id probably not have a white gas canister on my person.

 

[Litehiker]

Reload,
When I can I do "remove the snow" but with upwards of 3 feet it's often just not practical time wise. And I like the convenience of a snow kitchen if I have a base camp.

Well middle, if you have been lucky with finding a solid footing for your stove that's good. Here's to your continued good luck. But I kinda like to know for sure I have a solid base for my white gas stove so i'll carry my plywood platform in winter.

Eric B.

 

[longrangebob]

I've cooked at altitudes to 17K, snow and ice. Never gave it much thought. Always been able to find rock or clear snow. Snow shoes make a geeat platform.

Being a fellow "Middle of Nowhere" kinda person - & not knowing height of stove legs - if they don't get too hot - X ur backcountry skis or levelled snowshoes with Bark to catch any spills !!!

Now I'm assuming your 17,000 ft. Elevation was a typo 1700 metres OK - 17k feet no so much - Oxyhemoglobin Decrease of more than 50%, pulmonary edema (w/o O2) -- much over 7000 feet without extended altitude acclimation not a good idea & You are well above typical tree line Where will the critters hide ???

Happy New Year !!!

 

[ofbandg]

You can jam your ski poles or walking sticks in deep snow and make a wire hanger for your pots if they have a handle, (mine do because I cook over a fire a lot). You may end up hovering above the stove a bit but the pot won't fall over.

 

[tooOld]

Stomp the snow to hard pack and place a stove base sized piece of half inch+ ensolite pad on the packed snow. Ensolite weights almost nothing and provides excellent insulation. Keep the pad with the stove when in storage.

 

[middleofnowhere]

You can use a canister stove at high altitude or in cold conditions, it's not a big deal. The canister has to be warm. Modern canister stoves like Jetboil and MSR offerings are truly revolutionay in efficiency. The downsides are that the canisters have to be warm and the fuel has to be available (if you fly someplace, you can't bring a canister with you).

Back in the day, I used to climb peaks. Sometimes carrying a snowboard or using rock/iceclimbing gear to get where I was going. The highest I've ever been was 18,500' down in Mexico. A buddy and I climbed El Pico de Orizaba and snowboarded down. Carrying heavy packs, ice climbing gear and snowboards, we decided to make it a two day ascent and camped at about 17,000'. We used an MSR XGK stove because we knew gasoline was our only sure source of fuel (this was before Al Gore invented the internet). The upside of a liquid fuel stove like an XGK is that it works at any temp or altitude. You only have to consider boiling time as water boils at a much lower temperature with altitude. The downside to this type of stove is that you have to cook outside a tent (due to risk of flair-ups) and it needs a surface that will support a pot.

If we knew we were going to have fuel available, we would have used a Bibler hanging stove. They are really easy to make if you do an image search on the net. The advantage of a hanging stove is that you can suspend from inside tent, a tripod of trecking poles or on a tree branch. Because they use gas canisters, there is little risk of a flair-up that could destroy your tent or bag.

Jetboils and MSR's Windburner stoves are ideal to addapt to a hanging configuration. There are commercial kits available or plenty of diy resources on the net. The advantage of a hanging stove is you can use inside a tent and you won't care whats on the ground.

As far as keeping the canister warm, just put it in your jacket or sleeping bag for a bit before use. I've melted tons of snow over the years at very high elevations and cold temps.

Now days I like to carry a rifle when backpacking. It's cool to combine all the other disciplines involved in mountaineering and maybe bring back some meat to share with family and friends.

 

[imyourhuckleberry]

Jerky and cheese is what I eat for a couple of day in high elevations in my younger years I would make coffee, but as I aged you have to make choices, hunt or a hot meal. For me its about the hunt.

 

[Guy M]

middleofnowhere - thanks for the input. Always good to hear from someone who's "been there and done that."

It's funny, I've been using the same little plywood base I cut at home in the 1970's... All these years of winter backpacking, winter hunting. Sometimes I go a year or two without deliberately doing any winter camping, but most years, I'm still out there!

Ya, when the snow is DEEP, can't really just kick it away. A little base keeps the stove from melting right down into the snow. Nice.

Regards, Guy

 

[Litehiker]

Guy,
Good to see there is another stove base user here. They do work when ya need 'em.
*And I've "been there and done that" too. Ten years as a Nordic Ski Patroller and another 6 years as an alpine Ski Patroller as well as 3 years as a US Army ROTC Winter Survival instructor. Then there's decades of winter camping in many types of shelters including t=snow trenches and quinzhee snow huts.

middle,
Yep, there are several of those of the canister-in-winter persuasion campers. Over at Backpacking Light an experienced winter camper, Aussie, Roger Caffin insists that inverted butane canisters work to -10 F.
ME? I play it safe with white gas MSR stoves that have no (sane) lower temperature limit. You can light them at -50 F. - if you are brave enough for -50 F.

Eric B.