Anyone use a pie iron?

Over the years ive gotten fairly proficient at baking in a dutch oven, and it sure is nice to have a fresh baked bread product in camp. someone got me a pie iron a couple christmas' ago, and it seems like a good alternative to a dutch oven. its cast aluminum, so its fairly light as compared to cast iron, and ive been thinking of ways i could shorten and modify the handles to use with an alcohol stove.

in searching the forum, i havent found any pie iron recipies, so heres a couple i came up with:

pie iron pizza balls: take a tube of the smaller pillsbury style biscuits and roll each out individually. cut a string cheese into 3/4" or so pieces and place one in the center of each rolled out biscuit, along with diced veggies or pepperoni, and pinch the edges together at the top. pack the dough balls tightly into the pie iron and cook til golden brown. dip cooked balls in spaghetti or marinara sauce.

monkey balls: cut tube biscuits into quarters and roll in cinnamon sugar. pack into pie iron with a pad of butter or some oil in the center and cook til golden brown.

I guess I can imagine BP with a dutch oven if you really like to have baked items in camp...but packing in pilsbury biscuits? Sounds like a mess waiting to happen

Sounds a lot tastier than Pilot biscuits. But I am not willing to haul that much weight around much any more.

This sounds very tasty, but it seems very much oriented to the heavier-pack-but-more-comfortable-camp end of the spectrum. Most of us have drifted over to the opposite end of this spectrum.

If we arrive at your campsite, will you cook for us, please?

I used a pie iron for many years. It all started in Boy Scouts, when we realized we never had to clean any pots/pans dishes if everything we ate was a "pocket". We cooked everything in those pie irons.

I still have one, mine is cast aluminum so it is quite a bit lighter than the cast iron. A bit more finicky too. I take it on canoe trips, or backpacking trips with low miles and when I know I will have a good fire and time to cook some good grub.

Wife and I have two pie irons in our Aspen mini pop up. We pull this behind the Harley! We enjoy the treats around the fire at night. Apple pies, peanut butter, marshmellow fluff and chocolate! Good eats.
My pie iorns are cast iron I wont backpack with em. However aluiminum with chopped handles! Depending, on weight, and I talkin light. Wow could have my grilled cheese! Food for thought here!

thats kind of what i was thinking, i tested it without the handles with my alcohol stove today. im going to get a couple 4" or so bolts that are threaded the same as the handles to replace them and put some kind of latch on there.



for sure!

Hmm But let me know how much it weighs when your done! I think it will still be a bit on the heavy side?

You pack it in and out; we'll eat the results!

Here's three things I found: Outback Oven, Bakepacker, and Fry-Bake:

http://www.wildernessdining.com/bakingkits.html

I never used pie irons or any of the products above, so other than remembering that they exist(ed) and doing a simple Google search, I'm of no real help.

thanks glenn! any help is good help, at least i have some ideas of their weights.

i went by the hardware store today to find some replacement handles, i was hoping to find some bolts that were threaded the same so i could either use them or the original handles. they seemed to be metric #6 size, but with a coarser thread than the standard 1mm pitch. after looking for 5 or so minutes on my own, then another couple minutes with one of the Ace employees, we decided that theyre either a proprietary thread that the Taiwanese company that made the pie iron uses, or an obscure coarser pitch. i ended up going with 1/4 self tapping screws and cutting new threads. this is the final product with the coat hanger clasp and the coffee can setup i use with my alcohol stove.

the total weight was approx 10 ounces. dont laugh, but i say "approximate" because i only have a bathroom scale at home, so weighed it in the produce scale at the safeway near the hardware store, and the sticker on the scale says "for estimating purposes only"

heres a batch of the pizza balls i made during the test. 5 biscuits and two string cheese sticks for a total weight of 5.25 ounces.

try steam baking in a produce bag, in a Heini pot over an alcohol stove as shown by Tinny. Packable and reliable.