How we Pick the Best Camping Cookware for Overlanding

Whether you're a camper that cooks on an open fire or only needs a couple of pans and pots to help you boil water quickly and maybe fry an egg on a camping stove —there's camping cookware out there to meet your needs.

Our Top Camping Cookware Picks

Image of Stanley Adventure Camp Cook Set - 24oz Kettle ► Most Durable Camping Cookware Set Stanley Adventure Camp Cook Set - 24oz Kettle
Image of AIRE 16 Pcs Camping Cookware Set ► Best Overall Nonstick Cookware Set AIRE 16 Pcs Camping Cookware Set
Image of MalloMe 10 Piece Mess Kit Gear ► Best Value Camping Cookware Set MalloMe 10 Piece Mess Kit Gear
Image of Odoland 10pcs Camping Cookware Mess Kit ► Best Camping Cookware Set for Couples Odoland 10pcs Camping Cookware Mess Kit
Image of Odoland Camping Cookware Stove Kit ► Best Camping Cookware Set with Stove Odoland Camping Cookware Stove Kit
Overland.Reviews is visitor supported, and we may earn a commission if you purchase through one of our links.

If you like to go on a camping trip or backpacking, at a certain point, you need a way to boil water for tea and cook food while you eat in the wonderful outdoors. Whether you’re a camper that cooks on an open fire or only needs a couple of pans and pots to help you boil water quickly and maybe fry an egg on a camping stove —there’s camping cookware out there to meet your needs.

To get your mind off the tons of options available, we’ve compiled a list of some of the best car camping cookware for your Overland Kitchen in 2021. Cookware sets that are lightweight, durable, offer solid cooking performance, included features, and without a strain to your wallet. Uncomplicated yet great cookware—compact, portable for solo camper or three groups of people to cook delicious meals on the next camping holiday.

How we Pick the Best Camping Cookware for Overlanding

To help you navigate your way towards the best camping cookware set, we consider the following:

  • Price: You’ll find a significant price gap between them. As you would expect, the price is defined by other factors, but all our recommended cook sets are relatively cheap.
  • Size and number of pots: This is determined by the type of cooking you intended to do. If you’re cooking dehydrated foods for one to two people, one pot will suffice.
  • Weight: Consider a pan that can retain heat well, cool down quickly enough, and lightweight enough to carry in a backpack and tote them around. However, if you go in your car, you won’t be bothered by its weight because you’ll have plenty of room in the trunk.
  • Material and Durability: The most common camping cookware sets today are made from aluminum. The material all have their ups and downs, but anodized aluminum is cheap, weighs almost nothing, conducts heat very well. It is not particularly strong, though our recommended cookware serves for years to come.
  • Additionally, most people who purchase an anodized aluminum camp cooking kit do so because it is safe, no aluminum transfers from the cookware to food, and it’s nonstick coating. Meaning it’s effortless to cook on and requires no scrubbing or scraping.
  • Lids: Lids cut down on cooking time, save petrol, and make it easier to drain water. Some lids may also be used as plates or fry pans, reducing the weight.
  • Grippers: Make sure you have a safe method of picking up your pots and pans. The majority of the cookware we review has foldable handles. They’re also heat resistant and have the most comfortable grip to protect your fingers.
  • Other considerations: Some cookware sets come complete with utensils, mugs, pots, pans, kettles, and even towels. These are useful if you’re starting from scratch, but it’s probably unnecessary if you’re not.

Our Favorite Camping Cookware of 2024!

Stanley Adventure Camp Cook Set - 24oz Kettle Image

Stanley Adventure Camp Cook Set - 24oz Kettle

★★★★★ (4.7)

  • MSRP: $14.97
  • Serves: One or two people
  • Weight: With loaded 13 9oz and empty is 7 8oz
  • Material: Stainless Steel
  • Warranty: Lifetime

We can’t believe we’ve never come across this Stanley Adventure Cookset before now, and we’re glad we did. The set is absolutely perfect for a minimalist expedition at such an unbelievably low cost. It’s listed as 24oz, but it’s more like a 32oz container, which is more than enough for one or two people for coffee or to boil water for a dehydrated meal. It not as heavies as expected, and it can be your backpacking set. However, the two mugs that come with it do, almost doubling the weight. So, leave the mugs at home (or add them to your car-camping kit) and, if you need a cup, bring a lightweight silicone folding cup instead.

The handle flips open and closed quickly with just a light squeeze to release. The lid has holes that let steam escape or drain water if you need to. It also comes with a silicone handle on the lid that offers a cool place for easy grabbing, even on an open flame fire without burning your fingers.

This super beast excels in durability, lightweight materials, and high-quality workmanship that lends itself to some great organizing options. Stanley Adventure is one of the most valuable pieces of camping gear you can own. It earns a Best Buy Award for its price, durability, and be incredibly versatile.

Pros:

  • Affordable, rugged, and modular
  • Everything cleans up easily.
  • It’s designed for both hot and cold beverages.
  • An excellent option for the frugal car camper

Cons:

  • It’s not the lightest solution
  • Nothing really anything to note
AIRE 16 Pcs Camping Cookware Set Image

AIRE 16 Pcs Camping Cookware Set

★★★★★ (4.7)

  • MSRP: $29.99
  • Serves: Two or three people
  • Weight: With loaded 13 9oz and empty is 7 8oz
  • Material: Anodized aluminum alloy
  • Compatible with any 7/16 thread fuel canisters

Are you car camping with a small group of people, or are you an ultralight backpacker on the AT or PCT? This set of pot-frying pan and bowls with foldable utensils, including a folding stove with a push-button ignitor is perfect, for 99% of what you are doing. It came with everything needed down to forks.

This set is super Superlight, durable, and ultimately breaks down to a small compact size that goes into the ripstop nylon drawstring bag—making it easy to carry around. The pot and pan themselves are nonstick, so clean-up are effortless. It’s straightforward and cooks well on a little “pocket rocket-style” stove using a butane canister. The stove is very lightweight and has a flame adjustment like the higher-end stoves.

It’s a high-quality and rugged complete kitchen for car camping or hiking into the woods if you don’t want to lug extra weight around. They feel pretty good, affordable, and are easy to use.

Pros:

  • Great lid, great value for the set
  • Very lightweight and small
  • Easy to pack and clean
  • It comes with an igniter that heats nicely

Cons:

  • There isn’t anything we don’t like about this cooking set.
MalloMe 10 Piece Mess Kit Gear Image

MalloMe 10 Piece Mess Kit Gear

★★★★★ (4.8)

  • MSRP: $19.99
  • Serves: One or two light eaters
  • Weight: lightest in our entire test
  • Material: Non-Toxic Anodized Aluminum
  • All-in-one Cookware Mega Bundle

This MalloMe product is among the best camping cookware sets in the market today since it’s loaded with versatile features & utility that you will surely come to like. “My suggestion would be to add a pocketknife and cutting board for solo cooking of all kinds.” The set is lightweight, compact, and hence highly mobile for solo dining in the wild.

The MalloMe kit is small enough to fit in a backpack yet large enough to make coffee, noodles, and scrambled eggs for two light eaters with just one more spoon or fork. The pots and pans have solid collapsible handles that don’t heat up and stacks neatly inside the lid and pots/pans. It can fit a 4 oz butane/propane canister like the AOTU Portable Lightweight Camping Stove in the pot if you leave out the bowls as well. And they’re compact and affordable, which was a quality that made it appealing.

For a solo traveler, this set camp cookware set is a popular budget mess kit option that you should consider. For most campers, though, the Editors’ Choice Stanley Adventure Cookset is a good kit.

Pros:

  • Great low cost
  • Each piece is easy to clean and use.
  • Lightweight aluminum mess kit
  • Lids fit comfortably for easy cooking.

Cons:

  • Too small for a few meals/users
  • Fairly mediocre in cooking performance
Odoland 10pcs Camping Cookware Mess Kit Image

Odoland 10pcs Camping Cookware Mess Kit

★★★★★ (4.5)

  • MSRP: $31.99
  • Serves: Two or three people
  • Material: Non-toxic anodized aluminum
  • Cookware kit includes 1 kettle, 2 cups, carabiner and 1 carry bag

There’s nothing like waking up in nature watching the beautiful sunrise with a hot cup of delicious coffee. That’s what this camping cookware set for two can provide. It consists of a nonstick aluminum pan and pot and a tea kettle, utensils, and two stainless steel cups, including a carrying bag. The pans worked great, boiled very fast, but weren’t as nonstick as we would have liked. We also did not like that it comes with only one spoon, fork, and knife when the set can feed two. However, it’s pretty good quality, especially for the price.

The Odoland 10pcs comes with much of what you need, provides easy clean-up, plus an excellent cooking material that conducts heat evenly. It was able to cook spaghetti, bacon, chicken breast on the pot, and eggs in the pan and boil water for ramen without any issue. We particularly like this kit for its small footprint and teapot. You can easily make two cups of fresh ground hot delicious coffee. The components are all excellent, and it cools quickly to touch, even when set over an open flame and on a Coleman camping grill.

Though it’s not titanium camping cookware, it’s still well-design that it can cater to the needs of solo or two campers or hikers. It’s a great product if you want something budget-friendly, a lighter, and packs away a neater! And it also makes the PERFECT gift ideal for that car-camping or hiking enthusiast in your life!

Pros:

  • Cheap and durable.
  • Incredibly easy to cook
  • Compact for easy storage and transport
  • sturdy stay-cool heat-resistant handles

Cons:

  • Only one cutlery set.
  • Utensils are a bit flimsy.
Odoland Camping Cookware Stove Kit Image

Odoland Camping Cookware Stove Kit

★★★★★ (4.9)

  • MSRP: $32.99
  • Serves: One or two people
  • Material: Non-toxic anodized aluminum
  • Fuel Type: Butane/propane mix liquid fuel canister.
  • All-in-one Cookware Mega Bundle

Compact, foldable, and stacking…Campers love it! It’s a simple car camping cookware set that excels in features, cooking performance, durability, and value. With an 800 ml pot, a 300 ml – 400 ml pot, stove, a cup, foldable spoon, fork, and knife, it’s best overland cookware for simply boiling water and rehydrating meals, like pasta, rice, or quinoa for solo camper on the go. The tiny little camping stove and pots are the real stars of this kit. There are really impressive!

The stainless-steel cup is primarily redundant, and the folding utensils are useless. Leave them at home and get some food-grade plastic utensils instead because they might scrape the coating of the pots or add to the weight of the set. The pot can serve as a cup or a plate, giving you more room to fit the entire camp kitchen in the pot, including the camp stove and base. Though it’s not titanium light, the construction is entirely reliable, lightweight, and folds up to keep everything in place.

If you’ve been looking for a compact light well thought out kit, and downright reliable option that’ll do nicely on your next adventure, this is a top recommendation. We also love that you can use the pot directly over a fire!

Pros:

  • It uses very little fuel
  • Straightforward and quick setup
  • The stove works well and heats super-fast
  • Nice, compact, and nothing complicated

Cons:

  • Folding cutlery was probably unnecessary
  • The cup is big but fits within the container

Our Camping Cookware Recommendation

For this guide, we looked at the best camping cookware currently available on the market. We researched manufacturer websites and went through sites like Amazon. After eliminating numerous kits during our research. We selected the remaining five top-performing cookware: Stanley Adventure, AIRE, MalloMe, Odoland 10pcs, and 9pcs Camping Cookware. These sets are optimal size and shape, comfortable weight, resistant to high heat, and easy to clean.

We focused our review on an excellent nonstick set that adds a smooth coating to make delicate food preparation in the far-flung easier. A nonstick pan is also ideal for beginner cooks or anyone looking for simple to use and clean cookware. You can cook with less oil and lower temperature because of the smooth coating without worrying about food sticking to the pots and pans.

If your looking to complete your overland kitchen, checkout a few of our favorite camping stoves.

Frequently Asked Questions About Camping Cookware

Can I use cookware set over an open fire?

Cooking over an open fire is possible, but it would take longer to heat the pans evenly. Furthermore, more giant flames might overwhelm small pans. With these cookware kits, a wood-burning or gas camping stove will work just fine.

When to Throw Away Nonstick Pans?

It’s a brilliant idea to upgrade them every four to five years as a general rule. Examine the pans regularly. Avoid using them as the nonstick coating loses its slickness, begins to be distorted, discolored, or scratched. “But before you throw your pan in the trash, check your local recycling program to see if it accepts cookware.”

Are nonstick pots and pans toxic?

There is no confirmed danger from cooking with them. However, Nonstick pans hold a negligible amount of PFAS. According to the American Cancer Society, PFOA has affected the health of people who live near the plants and those who deal with the compound. As a result, the EPA collaborated with many large corporations to successfully phase out PFOA use by 2015.

Related Gear Reviews