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I dont cook inside, with kids and dogs its a disaster waiting to happen, cook outside or get a utility tent to cook in

no idea about your flaps sorry

Have cooked inside, and felt safe doing so, but...our baby's not crawling yet. He will, be very mobile by next summer, so we will be getting a canopy for our montana and will put windbreak around to create cooking area. Did the same but with a gazebo, but got wet nipping between the tent and cooking area.

Flaps...we have none now, but on our Tri-Space we pegged them down if it was windy. Sewn in groundsheets rule...!!! 

Hi rodders, glad you are gettingthe camping bug big style! Those 2 questions are hardy perennials on here and if you do a search you will find loads of debate. My own responses are;

Cooking inside tent - yes I do this sometimes if the weather is not good but we do not have children or dogs running about, we NEVER leave the stove unattended, and I have a fire extinguisher within arm's reach. Tent fabric may be labelled as fire retardant but it burns in seconds. You will find that some folks on here will never cook inside the tent, and others have gone down the route of getting a separate utility or day tent for setting up the kitchen in. I now have an Outdoor Revolution Outhouse (bought from here UKCS) and it is great for when we take our smaller tent. We have just used it for a group camping weekend and it was the Biz!

Draught flaps- we have these on our Vango Quest and they have to go outwards as there are pegging loops on their inside edge for holding the flysheet down. If there is nothing like this to indicate which way to put your tents flaps then either is fine. Lots of folks tuck them under the groundsheet and find it really snug. We find that pegging ours outwards means that heavy rain is effectively deflected away from the bottom edge of the tent so it does not seep under. Do remember that synthetic tents are prone to condensation so it is not a good idea to block ALL gaps, you do need air circulation whatever the weather.

Your other point about tents being only 4 feet away is also important. For fire safety the gap should be 6 m (20 ft) but lots of site ignore this and cram em in for max profit. You would have been in your rights to complain and to threaten to report them to the local council who will have given them their license in the first place. I would not go back to a site like that personally. When booking it is worth checking what their practice is on this; and do remember that the official sites of the Camping and Caravanning Club always observe this rule strictly.

have cooked inside and out i prefer outside especially if its nice but if the weather isnt ideal then go indoors or get a utility type tent

on our last tent you tucked the flaps under the groundsheet

hope this helps glad you enjoyed your holiday and camping

Foggers

I was thinking of getting the Outdoor Revolution Outhouse to use as a kitchen tent. We use our tent for weekends so need something that packs away small and goes up quickly.

Does it take long to put up and would it stay up if it gets windy?

Would you say it would be wide enough for one of the longer camp kitchens?  Ours is the type with the side extension/hanging larder.  The outhouse looks to be fairly tapered so I was concerned it would be a bit narrow at stove height.

Steve

Hiya Steve - its foot print is 2m x 1.5m and it does taper in. I just have a narrow cooker-width kitchen stand which i put down on one of the short sides, cos I wanted to fit my new shower ( yes..shower...will be posting about this elsewhere) on the other side. I think you would need to measure your camp kitchen and then allow for some tapering in order to work out if it would fit along the 2m wall.

As for stability, it was fine, but I will replace the thin wire pegs with something decent including a pair of Deltas I reckon.