Honey Stove: The Bees Knees of Backpacking Stoves

About a year ago, I heard about an interesting modular backpacking stove from the UK that could not only burn wood, but utilize alcohol stoves and serve as a windscreen as well.

The immediate benefits I noticed with The Honey Stove were that it could be packed flat and would hardly take up any room. The modularity of The Honey Stove also allows for different configurations based on need. For instance, by simply using four of the nine pieces the kit comes with, you’d have everything you need to still get the job done.

There’s certainly more benefits that The Honey Stove provides and I’ll attempt to show them all to you in this detailed written and video review.

Purpose

As mentioned, The Honey Stove is a wood burning, multi-fuel and multi-configuration stove that works fantastic for backpacking. What I feel is a key benefit of the assembled pieces, is their double duty as not only a pot stand, but also as a windscreen.

The versatility of The Honey Stove is another amazing feat. Whether your fuel of choice is wood, fuel tabs (like Fast Fire, Esbit, Hexamine or Trioxane), or nearly any type of Alcohol Stove, you’ll truly find this product exceeds it’s value. I’ve personally had success with the following Alcohol Stoves: Vargo Triad XE Titanium, Trangia 28-T Backpacking Stove and a homemade Coke Can Penny Stove or DIY Alcohol Stove.

There’s even an expansion kit called The Hive, that will increase the size of The Honey Stove to accommodate cooking of oversize meat or fish either on the top grill or on a stand-alone foldable grill.

Essentially with nothing more than a cup, three side panels and the fire door (square configuration) of The Honey Stove, you’ll always be able gather some tinder and boil water for meals; even in windy conditions.

Configuration

The Honey Stove consists of five side panels, fire door, base grill, mid grill (to hold Trangia) and a top grill. All grills are also interchangeable in any of the seven side slots.

Rather than get into the many configurations that The Honey Stove is capable of, I’ll direct you to the following video where I go into not only those configurations, but run a boil test with both wood burning and utilizing denatured alcohol in the Trangia.

Notes

As mentioned in the video, the entire weight of The Honey Stove (with the case) is just 13 oz. With just four sides, you’re only looking 5 oz.; again this is all in a flat package that’s easy to toss into a backpack or keep in your vehicle. Since the video a few months ago, I’ve gotten to where I can assemble The Honey Stove in under a minute as well.

A couple of quick lessons learned and tips: ensure that when lighting wood or your Alcohol Stove, put the top grill on soon after it’s lit. Large flames make it difficult to put it on without burning yourself… Don’t ask. The individual pieces of this kit are all manufactured in .7mm Stainless Steel and will slightly warp after exposing them to heat. This isn’t an issue really, as you can just bend them back. That’s the beauty of Stainless Steel.

Of course, never use this indoors or in a tent, but I shouldn’t have to mention that to anyone here! You can currently only get The Honey Stove from backpackinglight.co.uk which as you can imagine will cost everyone here in the US a bit more. With the current currency conversion it works out to around $50 for the kit and another $20 or so for shipping.

Have you ever heard of The Honey Stove? If you own one, what have you found to be the best use for it?

Check out all our detailed photos of The Honey Stove on Flickr!