I would also like to add that for beans and rice that would take a lot more energy to cook, the op might want to think about a thermal cooker. [link to www.google.com]
Basically, you heat up everything to boiling (or cook about 1/3 of the time required) and then put it into the insulated tub and let it keep cooking for 4-6 hrs (without using fuel).
Excellent point.

However, I have been using a somewhat similar system for a lot of cooking recently (not that I have to, it's just more fun to do so), and that is dutch oven cookware.

Since the dutch oven is cast iron, it has a tremendous "thermal mass coefficient"; best of all, you can adjust the heat (just by the number and location of the charcoal briquettes) quite accurately.

The downside, of course, is that you can never NEVER NEVER cook indoors, or else you will die, because charcoal produces a lot of CO in addition to heat.

I have three Lodge DOs and I think that four 25-pound bags of Kingsford charcoal will provide enough energy to cook food for a family of four for two or three months.

And, of course, charcoal has a pretty good shelf life, too, as long as you don't let it get rained on or anything like that.

The Dutch Oven is the Official Cookware of the State of Utah.

CTR!

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