My wife was thrilled to review the 10″ Hard Anodized Dutch Oven from GSI Outdoors. She loves dutch oven cooking, but not the weight of cast iron. So I gave her this dutch oven, and asked her to cook some meals (in a non-sexist way). As expected, the results were delicious.
GSI Outdoors uses cast aluminum, rather than cast iron, for their lightweight dutch ovens. This brings the weight down to 1/3 of the iron versions. That’s 3 pounds, 11 ounces for the 10 inch oven. While still not something I would take backpacking, it’s much more handy to lug around. This makes it an ideal choice for car camping, fire pits, or even cooking at home. We found the 10 inch size was perfect for the three of us. If you’re cooking for larger groups, there is a 12 inch one available.
Like most dutch ovens, it has a tall wire handle. This is not just for carrying, but for lifting in and out of fires and ovens. Around the lid is a lip, which keeps coals in place. Before you cook your first meal, it helps to know how many coals you’ll need. There are some handy calculators for determining how many coals go on top and underneath, for proper cooking. For indoor cooking, you just throw the whole thing in the oven. That also highlights the versatility of the dutch oven. It’s just as home in a campfire as it is in your kitchen. Hard anodizing makes it easier to clean up than the regular aluminum model.
Dutch ovens can be used for single items, like breads or desserts, or full casserole-style dinners. Hearty meals, like meat and potatoes, are well suited to the dutch oven. Showing off her skill with old favorites and some new recipes, my wife made us a variety of meals in the dutch oven. These included corn bread, chicken with rice and broccoli, and even chicken pot pie. There is no shortage or recipes, from simple to downright fancy.
Each meal that she cooked came out perfect. I’d even go so far as to say this aluminum dutch oven has a few advantages over iron. First, it doesn’t need seasoning. Of course, it’s rust-proof as well. Clean-up is super easy too. So on the maintenance side, it excels. And really, if you’re a dedicated dutch oven cooker and backpacker, you could make this work. If there is a down side, it’s that it could be deeper. That would increase the amount of food you can cook. But it would also make it more stable when you pick it up. We didn’t make any soup, and I would be wary of spilling if we did. It also doesn’t retain heat as well as iron, but that’s easy to adjust for. Other than that, it’s all the joy. GSIOutdoors.com
Brian
We’d like to thank GSI Outdoors for providing their dutch oven for this review. Once my wife got into a routine of using it, she made at least one meal per week in it. I bought her the handy carry case, but it doesn’t go unused long enough to warrant stowing it away just yet. We’ll do a follow up once we’ve got a few outdoor meals out of it as well.