I Tried Cooking Outside to Beat the Heat — Here’s My Honest Verdict

The lasagna was the breaking point. Between steam from boiling noodles, heat emanating from the cast-iron skillet, and an outflow of warmth from the oven, the temperature in our surrounding living space rose to an uncomfortable level.

We do have air conditioning, but only a window unit and rolling portable floor model. Our cooling options are sparse because we rarely need them. Our home in Colorado sits at 7,500 feet, and typically stays cool with simple fans and window shades. But, this summer was different. The heat was relentless (can you still call it a heat wave, when it lasts for months?).

After dinner, the ACs chugged along noisily for hours. As they slowly neutralized the heat from the kitchen, my partner suggested we swear off cooking indoors until the heat wave passed (aka, the rest of the summer). I agreed to give it a shot.

Here’s how we set up our makeshift outdoor kitchen, how it affected our indoor living space, and what I wish I’d known before moving the galley outside for the summer.

The Logistics of a Makeshift Outdoor Kitchen

Our outdoor kitchen is pretty simple. It consists of a trusty two-burner propane camp stove, a barbecue grill, and a portable camping table that serves as the staging/prep area.

Our outdoor space came with a few built-in advantages: a comfortable wooden deck, a climate with very little rain, a lack of sugar ants, and a wooden wind barrier.

But we had a few obstacles as well, including a power line overhead (frequented by perching doves and swallows), occasional dust devils, and my love of abundant ingredients and spices.

The Experience of Cooking Outdoors

Cooking outside our house closely resembles how we cook at a campsite, but with the added benefits of a full-size fridge, cupboards full of spices, and a dishwasher. (Yes, we do often bring our Magma portable grill camping!)

And, just like camping, I found cooking outside to be a mostly pleasant experience. Instead of being confined inside the house, I can instead watch finches and clouds, and feel a bit of sunshine on my arms. Even though it’s hot outside, it’s not too annoying. Maybe because it is temporary, and doesn’t follow me inside for the rest of the night.

But, there are a few hassles. Before cooking, I try to bring everything I’ll need outside, but I inevitably end up running inside frequently for forgotten ingredients and utensils. This could be remedied by storing everything in an outside cupboard, but since I live amongst black widows, bird droppings, and an abundance of dust, I bring everything inside at night.

Having just two burners and no oven was also inconvenient at first. But it’s been easy to simplify recipes, plus I bring the toaster oven outside as needed. The weather is also not always cooperative. One time, a dust devil came over the fence and gave a stack of crepes a crunchy coating.

But cooking outside also has upsides. Some meals turn out better. For example, I can flash-fry tofu in soy sauce without smoking up the house, and sear hot peppers without making everyone’s eyes water. I also tend to use lids more, to keep out undesirable elements, which has the side bonus of heating food and water more efficiently.

Outdoor Kitchen Gear: Basics

Cooktop: We’ve been using our camp stove, but if you’re buying equipment for an outdoor kitchen, I’d recommend induction burners. It’s hard to fine-tune heat on camp stove burners, their flames don’t usually allow for low simmering (our Primus Alika is an expensive exception), and they don’t fit two full-size pans at the same time.

Barbecue grill: A propane grill is great for more than just cooking meat. It doubles as an oven for heating up bread and a staging area for keeping side dishes warm (I recommend cast iron or stainless-steel cookware for this). As an alternative, we also really enjoy our Kenyon G2 electric grill.

Prepping station: We’ve been using a roll-up mental camping table made by Mountain Summit Gear, which has a prep surface of 47 inches by 28 inches. It’s ample for most everything, though we also have a couple of folding side tables from GCI that we break out for more complicated meals. All of these tables are metal, which I like, as they’re more durable than folding plastic tables (though you still want to use a pot holder underneath, lest hot pans may blemish the paint).

Accessories: I don’t often advocate for plastic in the kitchen, but accessories we’ve found to be useful are these collapsable marinade dishes from Drip EZ, and these collapsable dish bins from Adventure Ready. They’re easy to stow away and great for everything from food prep and storage, to carting out ingredients from the kitchen, holding dirty dishes and veggie scraps, and even keeping sensitive items on ice. The Drip EZ bins also have lids, which are useful for keeping out creatures and dust.

Outdoor Kitchen Gear: Extras

Inside, I’m dedicated to my Instapot multi-cooker. It’s also perfect for outdoor cooking, as it keeps out undesirable elements. Using it outside comes with a bonus, too: when venting it, the residue doesn’t get all over the counter.

As I mentioned, a toaster oven is another helpful outdoor kitchen tool. I’m particularly fond of my Cuisinart 10-in-1 digital combo air fryer toaster oven.

We have the added bonus of owning a Solo Stove Pi Prime propane-fired pizza oven. It’s intended for making pies, but more often we fire it up to crisp up chicken wings, steaks, and cauliflower.

If you have the financial wherewithal, you can also up the luxury, with more aesthetically pleasing outdoor kitchen infrastructure, like these stands from Keter. We also like their indoor-outdoor combo ice-cooler cocktail tables.

The Verdict on Cooking Outdoors

Ultimately, cooking outdoors is a bit of a hassle, but it hasn’t been a chore. I still haven’t perfected camp-kitchen lasagna, but I have grown to appreciate the greater connection that cooking outside gives me to the outdoors.

Cooking outdoors has also changed the way I appreciate my food. Because I can’t just be on autopilot, I’m more engaged with my vegetables as I chop them, and I find myself enjoying small moments, like watching garlic sizzling in the skillet.

Ultimately, the whole process has shifted my perspective and made me less rigid about how I approach not just meals, but other everyday tasks. Mixing up routines has been good exercise for my brain. Yes, it takes some patience. But, as summers of extreme heat become the norm, finding creative solutions for dealing with them — like cooking outside — will be increasingly vital.

So, did we actually accomplish our initial goal of keeping the house cooler? Yeah, you bet. Not adding heat to the house three times a day has allowed the air conditioners to effectively keep up, and even turn off here and there. In turn, that has kept us in better spirits, helped us get a better night’s sleep, and reduced the time and money required to run the ACs. We have a relatively small hose, however, so I’m not sure if it would make such a dramatic difference in a bigger home.

Am I also going to enjoy bringing the kitchen back inside once the summer’s heat loosens it grip? For sure. It’s been a fun experiment, and one that I will undoubtedly repeat next summer. But, it is easier to cook indoors. And now I will more fully appreciate that luxury.

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