Fire.

You depend on it for warmth. For cooking food. For powering the occasional hot-air balloon ride over the New Hampshire Lakes Region.

And yet, one usage for fire has slipped through the fingers of progress over the millennia: charging your phone.

Well, that ends today.

Presenting the BioLite CampStove, a foldable camp stove that uses good old-fashioned fire to power your gizmos, taking reservations online now.

Sure, you have chargers. But the next time you’re miles away from an outlet (say, on your yearly Everest hiking trek), all you’ll need is this and a hot fire to keep your gadgets fully juiced. But first, you’ll need to reserve one, which will be shipped to you in early to mid 2012 (production is just now getting started).

Using it is fairly simple: when your phone/iPod/GPS batteries are on empty, pull this out, unfold the legs and get a fire going in it (use pinecones, kindling or small branches). Hook up your devices to the stove via USB, and the thermal energy produced by the fire is quickly converted into electrical energy for them.

And because it’s a stove, it’ll also get water boiling fast.

Nothing worse than waiting for mountainside espresso.