What an EXCELLENT REVIEW and COMPARISON! We can tell you're a PRO when it comes to Camping and cooking outdoors. THANKS so much! We got ourselves a CAMP CHEF! Oh boy, do we love it! 💖
This is a fantastic, objective and fair review. I've owned several Blackstone"s and have finally settled on the 28" Adventure Ready at work and the 28" Range with fry pot / side burner for home. Neither are used as portable griddles. I also have a three burner Camp Chef camp stove that I feel is too big to be practical for portability. After seeing your review, I'd go with the X30 for a portable camp stove.
Excellent comparison review. Just finished a week at Ludington using our Blackstone Adventurer. Love it. Breakfast and dinners were cooked on it. The biggest surprise is how well our Perogi came out on it.
Excellent video! Well thought out, very fair and good editing. I've had and used several Blackstone griddles over the years. I have the explorer 2 burner stove and love it for the versatility that you described with the additional modular components. One thing I found with the 30K burners is that sometimes they get too hot even on low. Like when I'm cooking on a cast iron skillet. To solve that, I put a piece of expanded steel over the top of the burner grid and use a lodge folding steel dutch oven trivit to move the pan up from the flame. Also, a steel diffuser plate come in handy (if you can find one). Again, very well done! New sub here. Thanks and best to you.
Love my 22” Blackstone. The surface temps reach 635°-640° and has dual burners. I find the grease trap necessary for bacon/sausage type breakfasts. I use the Blackstone at home as well as on the road the the RV. I have a Weber gas grille that hasn’t been taken out of the RV since I got the Blackstone. Glad I didn’t purchase the 17”. Thanks again for the review.
I don't have the 22" Blackstone so I cannot comment on the temperatures. But to get a really good seared steak, 350deg isn't going to do it. If the 22" Blackstone can do 600deg, then I would recommend it over the 17". I didn't review the 22" as the 17" was closer in size and cost to the Camp Chef.
I have a pro60x is the double 30k burner with the double griddle, pizza oven, does everything even enough power to deep fry or steam lobsters perfect on the RV
My 17” easily reaches in the 570’s with a 10 minute preheat. The coolest area of the griddle at that point is in the 360’s. The hottest area easily accommodates 2 nice size ribeyes. Also, can’t imagine cooking without a grease trap. Yuck! Lastly, I just can’t understand needing 30k btu’s on a 14” griddle, especially when I see what 12k btu’s does on the 17” Blackstone. Wouldn’t 30k btu’s just burn propane twice as fast? Interesting to see all the contraptions available for the little 14” though. Thanks!
Great review. I believe it was very fair and totally accurate. First review of camp chef I’ve seen. I have the Blackstone 22” and never use a cover as it stores on the slide out tray in my fifth wheel. I have a pellet smoker. I have been using it much more than the blackstone grill. Use the smoker for meats and griddle for breakfast, veggies, etc. Do you have plans to do a review on smokers? Unfortunately Buying a couple of them will set you back 😢
The closest I have come to smoking is a smoke box in the Camp Chef BBQ grille. Do you have any knowledge of a small compact pellet smoker suitable for RV use?
There are many ways to beat the wind with the camp chef.i just make a wind screen out of town foil. The camp chef is a way better unit it's more use full . You can cook anything on it .the black stone is not bad but it's kind of a one trick pony.I just use it for breakfast. I can use my camp chef for everything even deep frying and sea food boils too
You can go to the dollar tree and get pastry cutters for a dollar apiece, put two on each side of the Blackstone and two in the back of the 17 inch and for six dollars you have a good wind deflector. I don’t think you can do that with the camp chef.
The Bayou Classics cast iron Discada (7488) works on the Camp Chef burners. It is 17" in diameter, and while the bowl might be a bit shallow for a true wok, we have sauteed veggies for fajitas in it. Lodge does make a cast iron Wok that might work. I have the small 9inch one, but have not tried it. Lodge also makes a larger 14in cast iron Wok, but again, I have not tried to see if it fits the Camp Chef burner.
The video series manifested itself by my original purchase of the Pro30x. However, I had some viewers ask for a review of the Blackstone 17". So I did that as well. Naturally, having two systems, I came up with a comparison video. I guess at some point I should do a Versatop video to make the series complete. However, I cannot find any in stock right now. Some retailers have indicated the Versatop has been discontinued. If so, its probably due to the $88 WalMart deal on the Blackstone.
Your theory about searing steaks are not correct. Saying that searing a steak locks all the juices because it has no where for the juices to go. Searing develops flavor. Period. Cooking the steak to the desired temp and doneness, that's what keeps steaks "Juicy".
Depends on the top. The griddle has a front drip that you can put something under it for contents to drip into. This is similar to the larger grease collection method the larger (36") Blackstone grills have. The Camp Chef grille has no grease collection as I mentioned in the video. The issue I have with the rear grease collection on the Blackstone is some people like to install the Blackstone 17" semi permanently in a drawer if they have an outside kitchen in their RV. I see no way a rear drip collector would not make a huge mess. The front grease drawer in the original one would not have that issue. But on the other hand, putting a grille in an outside kitchen is going to make a mess regardless.
@@RVProject Both of my griddles ( 1 burner & 2 burner) came with folding hangers that hold most any regular size food cans...hang it under hole in left side of the grease trough.
Not really. That is why I established a baseline and outfitted each grille with the same options to have two equivalent units. The Camp Chef base unit costs $99. So if you want to compare minimums, it would be $88 vs. $99.
