Coleman Camp Stove Oven & Testing

I've wanted to try this camping stove oven for a while now. I thought it would make a good addition to being prepared for a grid shut-down especially since my neighborhood is 100% electric. I like the idea of being able to bake biscuits, buns, corn bread, casseroles, meatloaf or bread anytime under any emergency situation.

I purchased the oven online at Amazon for $38 with free shipping. That was $10 less than at the Wal-Mart here.

Coleman has had this Camp Oven on the market for many years, I think since the 50’s and little has changed.

It is a compact, fold-up design and when collapsed it’s about 12x12x2 inches. When open it can handle a single 8x8 pan with ease or full size bread pan. It is surprisingly well made!

The first thing I did was test the actual temperature vs the temperature indicator that’s located in the door. The test was conducted inside my garage so not to be influenced by wind. It was also in the 50’s.

I wasn’t surprised; there is a large difference between the two. My old oven thermometer I know is accurate and with it reading a touch over 300 degrees the oven door indicated 220 degrees.

I did discover that my very old propane camp stove barely has enough btu’s to get the oven to 300 degrees. I believe my burners are 9,000 or 10,000 btu’s. Today’s camp stoves generally have 12,000 or more btu burners, so they would produce enough heat to get the oven to 350 degrees.

Well it’s now time to try and bake some bread. With the 300 degree oven temp it will take a little longer than the normal 27-30 minutes. But that’s why I use stick type cooking and baking thermometers, when the breads internal temperature gets to 195 degrees it’s finished regardless of how long it has been in the oven.

The bread baking test was with filling the oven to the max with two loaves. The dough was divided unequal and part of the reason the loaf on the right is higher. Also notice the ceramic tiles under the pans. This is to prevent burning the bread at the bottom of the pans. The tiles deflect the high heat directly under the pans and up the side walls of the oven giving a more even heat throughout the oven.

Here the bread is fully baked. The picture is correct; the top of the bread did not brown. The reason is the two bread pans filled the oven and blocked the free flowing heat from reaching the top of the oven. The breads internal temp was 198 degrees.

Here’s the bread out of the pans and you can see the side were browned but the tops were barely beginning to brown.

For the second test the next day, I baked a single loaf and as you can see it browned the top here because the heat was free to circulate around the bread.

Here’s the loaf out of the pan. It was baked to 195 degrees internal temperature but it was 15 degrees colder in the garage this time so the best I could get from my camp stove was 270 degrees and just didn’t have the heat to brown properly.

Summary:

• The oven works.
• You will need an oven thermometer because the door indicator is not at all accurate and would tend to keep the oven much hotter than needed which will lead to burnt or heavily browned foods.
• An 8x8 ceramic tile or 4, 4x4’s help prevent burning food at the bottom of the pans.
• A camp stove with 12,000 btu burners would be best.
• Winds and cold temperatures will affect temperature but it would be manageable. You just can’t set it and forget it like the home oven.
• As a back-up oven this is worth owning.

I will be baking other foods in the coming weeks and will post the results, good or bad!