Imagine you’re an up-before-dawn camper hosting people who prefer to sleep in, but who’ll no doubt awaken hungry for breakfast. Try perking coffee, frying bacon or doing meal prep with an RV full of sleeping bears best left unpoked.
Enter the outdoor kitchen, the ideal place to cook, serve and entertain friends and family. It’s an idyllic place, especially sipping that first cup of coffee of your own.
Why do people rave about their RV’s outdoor kitchen? Because it’s a camping marvel.
Think about it. In many homes, the kitchen is the place where family and friends gather and celebrate. The host prepares the meal, drinks are served, people hug and laugh and share stories. Why would it be any different while camping?
All that can be tough to do comfortably in a traditional RV‘s indoor kitchen. With quarters tight already, mingling can be lost as the cook jockeys for space along with guests and family.
And that smoke… Who wants that lingering in the camper?
Besides, camping is about the great outdoors, right?
The outdoor kitchen is more than a spacious place to cook. It’s a place to congregate, to bring to life all the love and community that a bustling kitchen hosts. Neighbors stop by, lured by the aroma, curious about the goings-on (late-night grilled cheese after a day of music), intrigued by the ODK itself.
The scene becomes a spectacle, a conversation piece, a living thing that’s more than some camping accessory. On the dawn patrol, the smell of coffee or bacon entices the senses and draws passersby in for a closer look and hopeful mooch. At lunch, it’s a place to chill beside in the shade, with the comforts of home at hand.
Come dinner time, fire up the grill, throw on some protein, pour a drink, light a cigar, and enjoy the evening with family, friends and fellow campers.
What makes an outdoor kitchen shine? Among the countless outdoor kitchen hacks that make being a camp chef (yeh, “cook” really) easier are anything that makes it as functional as a kitchen back home.
We’ve layered a few hacks into our ODK to make it more functional. We…
Laid a cutting board for a snug fit atop the utensil drawer
Affixed Command Strip hooks to hang utensils while cooking
Attached the kitchen knife and holder secured beneath the cabinet
Set a fan to help move air behind the fridge and keep it a bit more efficient
Hung a paper towel holder that tucks away when not in use
Bought a magnetic spice rack for the fridge right beneath the Harbor Freight magnetic LED light and that sign about the great music our neighbors are hearing from our Ryobi Bluetooth speaker.
Other than that, it’s just another ODK…
We asked a few campers out there why they use their ODK. Gary has his own reason for digging his outdoor kitchen. Breakfast his biggest – and potentially messiest – meal of the day. Open the ODK and there’s no grease splattering all around or unreasonable mess is left behind.
Then there’s that morning mood…
“It’s beautiful outside early in the morning,” says the camper whose breakfast endeavors often become a community spectacle. “You get to greet n meet many people coming by that smells your bacon.
Meanwhile, the wife sits there drinking her coffee watching me cook as she relaxes. She says she likes how I move, he says
Not all who camp have the luxury of an RV’s outdoor kitchen. Penny said her outdoor kitchen most often is a grate laid atop stones, with cast-iron pans for cooking and her stainless percolator for her morning joe.
“I’m still quite efficient at cooking over an open fire if I say so myself,” she said with a wink.
The ODK isn’t all about cooking a full-blown meal. Some parents have their own reasons to prefer the space. Kids want a soda? It’s in the outdoor fridge. Their hands are a mess? Wash them in the sink – don’t forget to use soap, you little heathens.
Want to rustle up something simple, like sandwiches for the crew? Keep the fixin’s – meats, PB&J, bread, paper plates and cutlery and utensils – outside and close at hand.
The outdoor kitchen serves many masters and lets cooks serve many mouths, all while enjoying each other’s company in a familiar, welcoming space.
Why do we rave about our outdoor kitchen? Because It’s part of the family.