Small wood cookstoves review – What can your small cook stove actually cook!

Are you thinking of installing a small wood cookstove in your cabin or tiny home? Which small wood cookstove best suits your needs? First is to check that the wood cookstove is independently tested. How else will you know how much heat output it provides. How close it can go to combustibles etc. Check that the maker has not just made up figures to set themselves up against their competition. Ask them to show you the paperwork! Ask to see pictures of what the cook stove is capable of producing. Will it roast a chicken, for example.

cooking on a small wood cookstove

There are several small wood cookstoves that have top ovens but this in my mind is just style over substance. Having a top oven means that you lose the main cooking area which is the hotplate. Most top oven small wood cookstoves are too small to place a kettle inside but how else can you perform this simplest of tasks, i.e. such as making a brew of tea or coffee, without a hotplate? Basically, how can you still boil a kettle???  How can you steam vegetables and fish etc. without the ability to boil water? Making an improvised top oven by using a cast iron dutch oven cooking pot and retaining your hotplate is a much more practical solution than a square box which just sits on the top of the stove and actually hinders rather than helps with your wood stove cooking potential.

cooking on a small wood cookstove

Ideally then if not a top oven, as this is fairly pointless unless you want to live on a diet of reheated pasties, you need a side oven. This retains the hotplate as well as giving the ability to roast and bake in your small wood cookstove. For this reason I have designed a small wood cookstove that has both an 880 square inches of hotplate but also a 221 cubic volume oven. The best of both small wood cookstove worlds! In fact because the stove will also be keeping you warm it a triple bonus. Indeed I have designed my small wood cookstove to provide you with all of the off-grid heating, cooking and hot water you will need. To give you an idea of the foundation on which my small wood cookstove has been built you can see my little stove with a stainless cook top option in action in a tiny home in the Netherlands. Read more

My new small wood cookstove has been born from this development of my little stove and having used it for cooking on for the past 8 years. The whole top of the new cookstove has the stainless steel inset top. You can therefore use the whole top for cooking on without scuffing off the paint etc. I have also enamelled the outer edge of the top which retains the stainless steel hotplate to make cleaning my small wood cookstove even more straight forward.

small wood cook stove

I have called my small wood cookstove ‘The Salamander Range’ because it is actually just that, a small cooking range like an Aga or Rayburn. Designed and built with an eye on those lovely old American cook stoves which were built with beauty in mind as well as functionality. I do however like to keep things simple so have tried to keep the level of bling under control.

small wood cook stove

The main focus was on making a cook stove that actually you could do some real wood stove cooking on! I started the design thinking that as others were offering a top oven that this must be the way to go. However, I soon realised that the top oven arrangement whilst saving space was actually hopeless at cooking anything. The small nature of my stove meant that the oven on top could also only be small. Tiny stoves just are not right for this arrangement. Indeed, stoves claiming to be cookstoves must at least channel the flue gases around the oven and have a working hotplate to be given this title, otherwise you could call any flat topped stove with box plonked on the top, a ‘cookstove’. Small Stove

Yes the stove opposite is a good looking beast but you do need to ask the question…………… How much cooking can you actually do on this type of stove?

I think probably not much, and certainly no more than you could cook on a normal wood stove. I have used my little Hobbit stove for cooking a wide variety of things.cooking on a small wood cookstove

Visit a blog I made all about cooking on my little stove

or take a look at my new vimeo channel where you can see my prototype small wood cooking stove in action.

Small wood cook stoves in action. 

small wood burning stove in a converted removals lorry campervan

 

 

Small Stove Review 9

Our Hobbit Stove Has Been Fitted!

"We had a Hobbit stove fitted this week by Alex Reay from Flues and Fires, and I just wanted to get in touch to say it is AMAZING and we love it! We have a lovely cast iron tiled fireplace which I was desperate not to lose when we installed a small wood burning stove, but until I found the Hobbit on Google, everyone told me it would be impossible to keep the fire surround. The Hobbit is perfect - not only does it fit very snugly, but it looks fantastic and the blue door complements the tiles very nicely. We are sitting enjoying a fire now and absolutely loving it! Thanks for creating such an amazing product."

Nicola Williams

Small Stove Review 10

The Best Stove Ever!

"It’s the best stove ever! It’s easy to light, very efficient, burns anthracite and stays in overnight (ours has been in for three weeks now). It even keeps a kettle of water at the ready for a cuppa! What more can I say, we love it! Just the thing to make our Yorkshire home cosy, and the cat loves it too!"

Lynn and Andrew, West Yorkshire

small stove review 16

First Small Stove Installation

Was looking for a small stove for my first self-install. Found Mark very helpful. Knowledgeable, friendly service. Stove burns well and generates lots more heat than the previous open fire. What is not to like?

Sam

Small Stove Review 15

A Huge Thank You!

"Dear Mark and Gill, a huge thank you for designing and making the Hobbit stove! We had two different London-based fireplace companies tell us that we simply had to knock out the old cast iron and tile fireplace to fit in a woodburning stove, and that there was no other option! Then we found you online. We are delighted with our little Hobbit, which swallows up logs and kicks out a good amount of heat. Perfect for the winter! I will also be writing to the London-based fireplace companies to put the Hobbit on their radar. Best wishes."

Nat

Small Stove Review 14

Delighted With Our Hobbit Stove!

"Mark, Gill, thank you for your assistance, we are delighted with our Hobbit! I fired it up this evening after taking all afternoon making a register plate to fit the opening."

Alan

Small Stove Review 5

It's Brilliant!

"Hi Mark, here's a photo of the Hobbit installed in my Yorkist grate. It’s brilliant! It also throws out a lot more heat than the grate did."

Roger T

Small Stove Review 3

Just to Say Thank You!

"I just had a chat with Gill saying how delighted we are with our little Hobbit stove, and to also thank you both for your attention to detail and excellent customer service!"

Derrick

Small Stove Review 4

The Little Hobbit Has Stepped Up To The Challenge!

"We just wanted to say how impressed and how much of a life saver our little Hobbit has been! It was fitted a few months ago in our holiday home in Rhu, Scotland, which is a large open plan conversion in a Victorian house. This weekend our boiler decided it was not going to play ball. The little Hobbit has stepped up to the challenge, providing heat to a very large area, about twenty eight foot by twenty four foot with a high ceiling of about eighteen foot, keeping the room reasonably warm, warm enough for us not to use cardigans!”

Alan W

Small Stove Review 8

Very Pleased With Our Hobbit!

"We are very pleased with the stove and think it looks great! We restored our fireplace (it was hidden under plaster!) and the whole look is better than we hoped!"

Neil

Small Stove Review 2

Absolutely Delighted!

"Just had our Hobbit SE installed in our Victorian fireplace and we are absolutely delighted with the end result. We felt passionate about preserving our lovely fireplace!"

Andy

Small Stove Review 13

Our Pride And Joy!

"What a fantastic fireplace with the beautiful Hobbit stove. It fits perfectly into the small space and throws out a lot of heat. Here's a photo of our little stove, now our pride and joy and much admired by all who see and feel the warmth."

Chris and C

Small Stove Review 11

Fantastic!

"Just to bid you all a Happy New Year and to say how much we’re enjoying having our Hobbit stove! It was easy to fit with the help of your excellent ‘how to’ videos and we’re just awaiting our inspection by building control for the certification. The Hobbit has fitted neatly into the hearth vacated by the old gas back boiler (with a little cosmetic rendering) and never ceases to surprise us how much heat it can deliver to the point that the new condenser boiler is having an easy life, thereby saving us on gas bills too! Everyone loves having a ‘real fire’ in the living room."

Philip Baird

Small Stove Review 6

A Brilliant Little Wood Burner!

"The stove we bought from you is really starting to come into its own as the weather cools down. Here is a photo showing how much one of our dogs is enjoying it!"

Small Stove Review 1

Brilliant Product!

"Just wanted to share a picture of our newly installed Hobbit. Absolutely delighted with it, and so pleased we were able to retain our existing fireplace as well. Brilliant product, thank you!"

Marion

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