A Dutch Oven can come in quite handy when you only have a grill/open flame to cook over. You can boil, steam (w/steamer basket inside), pop popcorn, even bake!

Get a crock pot! Plenty of good, one pot meals you can make in there, plus the stoneware can be used to store the meal in the fridge.

We do have a crockpot, that's a great suggestion. I should set to work making pre-made bagged, frozen meals for those nights we're too tired from renovation to actually cook!

A dutch oven is another great suggestion! Thanks!

lots of take-out menus?

There is an amazing taco stand a few blocks away and some of the best fried chicken in the city within walking distance... so we're set in case of emergency!

An electric water kettle, especially if you are tea/coffee drinkers. A hot plate takes forever to heat water! And an electric skillet. I lived in a loft for years with just a two burner hot plate and an electric skillet and managed to put on many fabulous dinner parties. Oh, the good old days!

If you are working with limited water (and I'm guessing sinks), I would stock up on disposable plates, lots of foil (maybe foil pans), and crockpot liners. When we redid our kitchen, we had plenty of water, but no sinks (the bathroom sinks are tiny). I could cook just about anything, between the toaster oven, crockpot, and grill (and its side burner), but the cleanup of pans, pots, large ceramic insert, utensils, plates, etc was a huge pain. I had been concerned about how I was going to get things cooked, not how I was going to get things clean afterwards.

We ended up doing a lot of foil packets on the grill (and covering my cutting boards with those flexi-disposable cutting mats), eating out one night and reheating those leftovers the next (either in the microwave or in more foil packets), or just plain eating out. We did have full use of our fridge (except for the water filter part).

We lived like this for just under 6 weeks. When I was able to use the new sink, it was like a dream come true.

A microwave and a freezer full of frozen dinners... On the plus side -- quick, easy and no clean up. On the down side -- massive amounts of sodium.

Induction burners are on the expensive side but handy to have indoors in the future.

Much less expensive propane burners can be found at local asian groceries. Often with storage cases too. These work great along side BBQ grills. Cast iron griddles/grills can be used on both. They work great with a wok too.

I would second a propane/butane burner -- it can double as a camping stove, or an emergency stove in case of a blackout.

My dad bought a fancy cooler a few years ago that could be plugged in (to a wall outlet or a car's cigarette lighter) to keep it cool. It came in handy when the fridge suddenly died and a replacement was a week away.

Peanut Butter!!!!

leanneabe - Good easy clean up suggestions, thanks! The crock pot liners especially. I've been looking at low cost options for disposable plates and silverware... even though cooking might not be that daunting, clean up sure is!

DanaV - We have an electric kettle and an electric griddle, so we'll be set for boiling water... and lots of pancakes!

When my parents were remodeling the kitchen, I remember a lot of meals orchestrated in the living room. I second the crock pot, but the electric skillet is surprisingly versatile! You can use it to make anything from paninis to stir-fry. Good luck!

We are going to be redoing our kitchen very soon so I'm taking notes!

We're thinking of alternating grilling nights with trying to "cook" with raw foods. A friend of ours did that for a few weeks and really enjoyed it. Though I'm pretty sure that chips and salsa played a very big role.

A nice, large toaster oven is worth it's weight in gold.

We remodeled our kitchen last year, doing most of the work ourselves. It took us about six months, and the one thing that got us through it was the large toaster oven we had.

You could broil steaks, make baked sandwiches, roasted veggies, warm up leftovers, even bake rice or other things that you would normally use an oven for - if on a smaller scale. We even used ours to bake a small cake. It was completely indispensable.

Del

My crockpot is stashed on the shelf and Nesco 6 quart roaster is in constant use. It has settings ranging from warm to 400 degrees so it's very versataile and has an easy to clean non-stick insert. I use it a lot at home but when we're camping I use is for all sorts of thing: slow cooker, casseroles, corn on the cob, baked or sweet potatoes, etc. (I've seen recipes for desserts like cakes and cobblers but I've never tried them.)

Add a hot pot for heating water quickly, electric frying pan, and a toaster oven and you have a lot of variety available.

Sounds tough... I just moved out of an apartment and had limited supplies for the past week. After an entire month, I'm afraid I would be turning to take-out. You can only handle so much ramen.

We had no kitchen for about 9 weeks when we renovated ours. We had water but I don't recall what we did about washing up. We must have done it in the bathroom as we certainly didn't use disposible stuff. We had a microwave and a double gas burner and we made a lot of stuff beforehand and put it in the freezer so we could just heat it up. We got so desperate for grilled food (rather than 'wet' food like stews and chilli) that we eventually dragged out the BBQ to roast a chicken. Yum, but you can imagine how hard it was to find BBQ charcoal in February!

Oh and of course we had the usual English things of kettle and toaster. I forgot those aren't standard US fare :-) We ate a lot of rice and pasta since they are easy to cook, easy to store and don't make the house smell (our 'kitchen' was set up at the back of our living room).

The Dutch oven is a great idea - you can take advantage of the steam inside the pot to make sauces with very little water. Look up some Moroccan tagines for inspiration. Also, you should check out Alton Brown's Good Eats episode on using a Dutch oven over open flame:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/good-eats/going-dutch/index.html

To conserve water when making carbs, I'd also look into starches that only need to be rehydrated rather than cooked, like couscous and rice noodles. Small noodles, such as capellini, can be cooked directly in sauce, which you can just make from canned tomatoes - no water required.

We're actually making meals out of our makeshift kitchen now while the kitchen is undergoing renovations. Luckily, we have a large laundry room (which was actually the old kitchen in the former in-law suite), so we're doing dishes in the utility sink and have a small dish rack on the washer. We held on to a few cups, mugs bowls and melamine plates to use; small cutting board, a knife and serving spoons. We also have compostable plates, cups and utensils, just in case.

I'd say the most important thing is making sure you have enough of a work surface to cut, mix, prep, etc. Nothing is more frustrating messy food prep.

Grilling almost every night is amazing and you should enjoy it, especially as the weather warms up. We use the microwave quite a bit - maybe you can borrow one? I know the microwave discussion has been hot on thekitchn for some time now. It REALLY helps when we're making a cup of tea, reheating leftovers or making frozen meals. The toaster is nice to have around, but I'll second the toaster oven idea. Cous cous is the easiest and fastest grain to make. We haven't used our rice cooker yet but probably will.

Oh, and most important of all - our coffeemaker. Can't stress that one enough.

We basically camped out in our house during renovations - which took almost a year, in different iterations. For about 3 1/2 months (and lived out of one room in the house), we didn't have a stove or sink - and for over a year, we only had an old fridge in the garage. We also had a microwave and toaster in the garage.

1. Big pan to wash dishes in outside - if you don't have a sink
2. BBQ - preferably with a little side burner
3. Toaster oven - we only had a regular toaster and regretted it
4. Microwave
5. Basket of utensils for 4, tongs, serving spoons, sharp paring knife, bread knife.
6. Set of dishes, bowls and glasses for 4. Definitely wine glasses for 4 - trust me, you'll need these during a renovation, hehe.
7. Spray olive oil - for the bbq
8. Aluminum foil
9. Glad plastic containers for leftovers
10. Spices - chili flakes, small pepper and sea salt grinders, Cavender's Greek Seasoning, sugar.
11. Coffeemaker. I use a Melitta carafe with a filter holder on top and just boil water to pour over it. Keeps the coffee hot - comes in handy when you're trying to keep the contractors awake.

We bbq'd ALOT - we live in Southern California, so while it does get nippy in the winter at night - bbq'ing is always an option. We ate alot of steak, fish, shrimp and chicken seasoned with Cavender's Greek Seasoning - bbq'd on the grill. We also grilled a ton of asparagus on foil, sprayed with olive oil and seasoned with fresh ground pepper and sea salt.

We'd make a meal of the grilled meat, asparagus, fresh tomatoes and avocados. We seriously ate this at least 3 times a week because it was super easy and created the least amount of dishes. We also entertained quite a bit with that meal - our friends were good about eating at makeshift tables on paper plates. I'd also nuke a bowl of seasoned black beans from the can and grill some tortillas on the grill. We always had a bottle of good red wine on those nights.

Some nights, we were too tired after working full time and renovating that we just nuked Lean Cuisines. Or we'd make pbj sandwiches.

The reno was stressful - but we had some great times grilling and drinking during that time. good luck with the house!

If you are working with limited water (and I'm guessing laundry sink), I would stock up on disposable plates, lots of foil (maybe foil pans), and crockpot liners.