Most of the readers of RVtravel.com are avid RVers who use their RVs a lot, unlike the new Millennial or Gen-X RVers who only use theirs on average about 15 days a year. More than half our readers who travel with fifth wheel trailers, for example, travel more than three months a year. Thirty percent are on the road six months or longer, with many of those being full-timers.
In a poll of RVtravel.com readers last April, we asked “How often do you cook dinner from scratch?” Approximately half of the more than 4,200 readers responded “Every night or almost every night.” Another 31.3 percent answered “a few times a week.” Only 12 percent answered “never or hardly ever.”
Most of our readers are in roomy rigs. We’re not in short camping trailers or truck campers, where kitchen space is typically very limited. No, our crowd is most often in larger RVs with spacious kitchens with all the amenities of those in a traditional home. Many fifth wheels and high-end motorhomes even have residential refrigerators; a growing number have dishwashers. No, we’re not “roughing it” by any definition.
So our question today is about how different is preparing a meal in your RV kitchen compared to in a traditional home? Do you keep things simple, or do you prepare meals pretty much as you would in your home, or the last sticks-and-bricks home you owned?
Your comments are welcome.
The wife and I are full timers and cook most meals in our 25’ 5th wheeler. Recently we solved the oven debacle and are pretty much able to cook our regular menu now.
The only problem we really have is room and storage. I have put in a few more shelves and that seems to help. But for the most part we cook the same meals as we used to in our old house.
Happy RVing and see you down the road!
But you failed to reveal how you solved the oven debacle! C’mon, inquiring minds…. 😉
What’s an oven debacle?
The oven in most RVs is a poorly functioning gas oven notorious for uneven heating. A pizza stone placed in the bottom above the flame helps even out the heat. A wise cook keeps a thermometer handy. I like to bake with cast iron over charcoal, too.
I agree. We’ve never experienced an “oven debacle”. Our oven works fine. We (or I should say my wife) cooks the same whether we’re home or in our trailer.
I was a fan of the Instapot before we began full timing, but became a much bigger fan in the RV. Most cooking is between it and the grill to keep meal prep as simple as possible.
I use my NuWave oven and induction plate wherever I cook, house or RV, and we grill frequently both places so there is virtually no difference in the way I cook. I have done so for the past 4 or more years. Was there a learning curve? Yes! But it is so long ago now that it seems insignificant.
We’ve always enjoyed grilling and smoking foods and we like simple meals. And that hasn’t changed now that we are FT. At new campsites not only do we look for level site but also for space for the outdoor kitchen (flattop grill, pellet smoker, collapsible table). We are now experimenting with baking using the pellet smoker. Although we have an induction cook top and instant pot, most meals are cooked outdoors.
My wife and I are senior couples rvers and travel in our trailer. Basically we share the cooking duties, her inside me outside, normally we eat outside weather permitting. When rving cooking for two has some challenges but with good meal planning whether for a weekend or a full blown vacation the menu varies. Yours in rving, Ray and Joy
Just got back from 7 weeks on the road in a small camper. This was our once in a lifetime adventure and eating out was our first choice. I never used the Instant Pot I took, never used the stove/oven once. When we cooked it was on a small pellet grill outside or rewarming food in the microwave. We love eating at local restaurants, not chains and we had some excellent meals.
We combine eating out and cooking in RV. Just too hard to pass up local foods, especially when we are in Louisiana. We love Cajun. In Florida, we love fresh fish, what we can’t get in CA, and Cuban. We pretty much avoid any food or restaurant available in CA. Although we occasionally will get a craving for Chik Fil A, which we now have in CA. We try to shop local grocery stores where we can buy food that is native to area we’re in. Found some great sausages in Piggly Wiggly in Breaux Bridge, LA. Bought extra to freeze and take home.
I cooked crab mornay thundering down the highway in AZ one year. Certainly could never do that at home!
We have a 20 foot trailer so our kitchen space is small compared to home. I try to keep meals very similar, though. Meal prep before we leave is the secret. I pre-cook and freeze lots of meat bases, package things like meat patties, chicken breast, chops, fish and shrimp in one day portions (extra meat patties and chicken breasts cooked for lunch enhance evening salads). (Yeah, I am a menu planner). I found this past winter, I could pack 32 days of meal bases in our little freezer. We pick up fresh fruits and veggies where we can. I rely on the canned varieties a lot. I travel with a slow cooker, toaster, blender, electric kettle, campfire coffee pot, and cast iron cookware. I have a butane burner and my husband has a small Blackstone. I do not have to rely on electric to cook. We eat very well.
We travel in 22ft Class B Roadtrek.
My bride loves the propane stove. We also use the convection/microwave oven, a small Instapot, or a collapsible charcoal grill. We leave home with a packed fridge and pantry, and eat most all meals home cooked. Our system is that the cook relaxes while the dishes get done. She an awesome cook. I’m mainly breakfast or the grilled. YMMV
We eat in mostly. We took a cross country trip in 2017 and I packed the freezer before we left with meals and extra meats. We have room for plenty of canned vegetables, etc. Gone for 5 weeks and came home with meals to spare! We were not towing behind our motorhome then, and we limited our shopping to occasional bread and milk. Now I have a mid-sized air fryer that I hope will make things even easier and tastier. Getting ready for this season and 3 weeks at the beach after last year was a bust!
Cooking on the stove top is easy enough, I like the propane better than the electric at home. But the oven is horrible, getting it to any particular temperature is an experiment every time. I do miss the dishwasher.
My breadmaker lives in the Fiver all the time because I don’t enjoy loading and unloading stuff. All my bread, even at home, is solar powered now.
We are full time, and I’m a former caterer and bbq pitmaster so I don’t know how to do “basic” as much as I try. It always seems to get out of control.
We cook almost everything outside, regardless of the weather. We use a canopy most times. We don’t want goo, caused by grease, dirt, and cathair collecting on every surface of our rig. We use a combination of propane camp chef stove, electric induction cook top, electric toaster oven, charcoal hibachi (which doubles as a smoker) and live campfire, which also doubles as a smoker. We buy the induction cook tops and toaster ovens at thrift stores. When they die, we buy new ones. They stay outside covered up when not in use. I don’t bother even cleaning them. I just buy another. We pretty much just boil water inside. The rig’s oven is used for storage of cookware. The microwave is just for reheating. Works for us full timers and I can still make fried chicken! I just wish we had a bigger freezer.
I don’t like eating prepared foods so I keep my meals basic and pretty healthy. I also cook burgers,chicken, veggies outside on a charcoal grill, even throwing a griddle on it to make eggs or pancakes. I like to enjoy doing everything.
I cook 90% from scratch due to food sensitivities. Don’t have an oven- took the microwave/convection out. Do amazing things in my InstantPot Duo Air Crisproaster/fryer/pressure cooker. Since it works so fast I don’t have to run generator long to roast or bake.
We eat out fairly often and did before we were fulltimers. Cooking is the same as before except using the convection oven instead of gas. Only difference is not being able to cook multiple things in the oven at the same.
The ONLY way my wife would even want to go in our really nice Class A Newmar, is we eat out 90% of the time. She is going to relax, and that allows her to enjoy each trip more. Breakfast can be simple eating in, but lunch or dinner we go out or Order to go! Fine with me, if she is willing to RV with me, then I want her to be happy. We help the local economy as much as possible:))
And then I take what I don’t eat and put it in the microwave the next day 😀 In the warmer months I enjoy cooking small meals outside- it’s more fun.
One of the reasons we like our Class A Newmar is because it has a great kitchen and it is easy to prepare and cook our meals. We like to bake in the convection microwave.
We live full time in 36′ DP. The range top is propane and there is no oven. We rely on the convection Microwave and InstantPot with airfryer lid for most cooking that is not done on the grill. I have a small BBQ for travel and a much larger 3 burner Weber grill on our winter home base. My wife loves to cook so meals are as elaborate as she has time for and we seldom eat out. she is vegetarian and we do not care for national chain restaurants. Dining out is reserved for special foods in interesting locales, most food is much better prepared in the coach accompanied with wine which is not a good idea with a 17 mile mountain road to traverse after dinner.
When we are wandering in our PW van we cook as little as possible. It is supposed to be an escape! Breakfast=cereal, Lunch=Flatouts https://www.rvtravel.com/poll994/ (wide variety, don’t go stale quickly) Dinner=appetizer type plate. Soup if weather is cold. When we do a beach week with our daughter’s family it is coleman stove on picnic table, more space for everyone to help. Occasionally we will stop someplace nice for lunch.
We are full-time in our fifth wheel, and we plan one lunch and one dinner out at every location we stay in for a week, so we can sample the local cuisine. Other than that, we use the outdoor grill, instant pot (with airfryer), toaster oven, propane stovetop and convection microwave to cook all of our meals. We use our oven as storage – worthless to cook in. The main difference for me now is having utensils that can serve multiple purposes or collapse. I never worried about that in our house.
We hardly ever eat out, at home or on RV trips. Planning, planning, planning so the meals are simple and I try not to bring too much extra. I try to prep and/or freeze meals before we leave. My 3qt Instant Pot is a joy to bring along. Our rig has a micro/convection oven that I’m learning to use so we can have fresh baked goods when we travel. It can be a challenge!
I make sure I have menus planned and sometimes if the meal is complex I try to make it at home then bring the crockpot to finish the meal in the RV. Or bring the toaster/oven/air fryer with me. I love to eat out but I also love to make meals at home. So it depends on what day it is. Since I will be traveling solo it will get interesting making one meal for me. So who knows what I will do once retired and traveling solo.
Yes, it doesn’t matter for me. Either way I make the same mess.
I use my oven so much in my brick and mortar place, can’t do this in my travel trailer. We will soon have a full size grill though and I will be able to use it for a lot of the things I normally cook in an oven.
As a solo traveler, I use a 3-qt InstantPot, a small propane grill outside, and an electric kettle the most. Rarely use the microwave. And, of course, there’s the morning coffee in a percolator on the stove! Can’t beat that aroma!
We keep it simple at home as well as on the road, eat much the same. We use the portable gas stove and charcoal grill and if we have shore power we use the instantpot.
This is one of those questions that depend on how long I am going to be out. If it is less than a week, then I cook and freeze meals to be warmed up. Or I also prepare, but not cook, meals to be frozen; and then thawed and cooked. If it is longer than a week then I do my cooking in the RV. I will have frozen prepared meals with me, but will also cook fresh meals. My travel trailer is small enough that it is easier to keep meals simpler so I stick to the basics.
The amount of work we do when cooking on the road depends on how long we will be gone, how long we will be staying in a spot and if we have full hook-ups. We tend to eat out at local restaurants when we are on multi-state road trips, but if we are spending a week at a State Park with full hook-ups, I’m making Belgian waffles! That said, we tend to use our InstaPot for spaghetti or pot roast to balance our eating out, and the ease of clean up. If we had an outside kitchen, I’d likely cook more as the oven taxes the AC’s in the summer).
Get yourself a 2 burner hot plate for outside & cook Use a crock pot for outside ,all of this keeps heat out of your RV. thats what I do
Our RV has the same microwave and convection oven as our house, but our power management system seems to send it less power than the one at home gets from the power company. Whether true or not, things take longer to get to the desired point when cooked in the RV vis-a-vis the one in the house. However, we tend to cook the same things. Perhaps the foods chosen to take and prepare on a trip are a bit smaller in number, but are generally the same as when we are home.
a rv website calling out everyone born after 1965 as “not a real RV’er” is a great strategy to ending up in the block list of basically anybody who knows how to use a computer. I’m sure it will go well
I normally cook everything from scratch which is difficult in our RV since I don’t have unlimited counter space or duplicates of basic tools (measuring spoons & cups). Sometimes I prepare and freeze food and/or prep ingredients. We also use an outdoor grill and a Blackstone flat top for meals when the weather is cooperative. I have a combination convection/microwave/oven, a large toaster oven, and an induction burner to use in the RV. I plan menus for our trips so I can bring along pantry ingredients and I have an extensive spice/seasoning assortment always on hand. I wouldn’t want to cook in our RV fulltime since there are too many recipes which are too elaborate to prepare in my RV kitchen.
I use a 8 foot folding table. What a game changer!
I was a professional chef for over 28 years, and I have many tricks that I learned over that time. I cook or bake almost everything from scratch when we are camping. I am lucky enough to have a wife who lets me buy the things that I want to do all the cooking for our family and friends, so I have quite an arsenal of cooking equipment for both inside and outside cooking. I enjoy being able to cook outside whenever I can while camping. One of the best pieces of equipment to have is a 6 or 8 foot folding table to makeup for lost counter space.
One of the best pieces of equipment my wife and I bought for our RV was an induction cooktop
I got the idea after watching my DW waiting for what seems like forever for the pasta water to come to a boil on the typical small burners of RV stoves. What’s nice about the induction cooker is that we will use it inside and outside when the weather is nice.
We also carry two fold-up tables in our basement storage. One 4 foot and one 6 foot which we only use if we are camping with a larger group of campers with several groups using one campsite at a time to prepare group meals. The 4 foot is my go-to on every camp outing giving me space near my Coleman grill besides having to set up by a picnic table.
I was taught to clean as I cooked. I never toss dirty dishes into the sink to clean later. I always clean as I go even at home. Keeps from getting a cluttered kitchen.
There’s very little comparison for cooking in a motorhome versus cooking at home. 1st, there’s literally non existent counter space for prep and all the other duties. Our motorhome doesn’t even have a real oven, it has a convection microwave that does not compared to a real oven.
My wife has learned to prepare many meals in advance in our real kitchen at home and then freeze them and put a couple of them in the refrigerator so that we can have some really great meals when we are travelling. Great cooks require gas, NOT electric stoves. We will never buy an RV with an electric stove.
OK, I’m married to a foodie and I made a big mistake of buying a diesel pusher motor home with a convection microwave and not a real oven as well as sufficient counter space. Lesson learned.