Solar Cooking Archive Discussion Forums

coconino · Joined: 21 Nov 2006 Posts: 77 Location: Sunny Brixton

It was a fabulously sunny day in London today so I took two cookers to the park, the Parvati and the Heaven's Flame. I tried cooking several simple things, though I admit that I'm still a way off getting the hang of this. Anyway, here's what I cooked and the graphs and pictures are below.

In the Parvati:

(top section) mess of pottage
(base section) rice

In the Heaven's Flame:

(glass jar) 300g potato, no water
(glass jar) 3 unbroken eggs, no water
(black painted glass jar) 500ml water
(glass jar) tomato sauce with peas

I can't account for the dip at 11:50. The cookers were moved at about 12:20 which seems to have had a small effect.

The first reading is high due to the pot standing around for a few minutes while I was setting-up the other cooker. The dip at 12:40 was due to people standing chatting in front of the Parvati.

Parallel readings. Both cookers reached boiling point within 50 minutes, which is the best result so far in this series of tests.

The test begins.

Potatoes in jar with green top, eggs in gold-topped jar.

The tomato and split-pea sauce was simmering nicely when this was taken.

This dandelion was in the Heaven's Flame for just a few minutes.

Rice was probably over-done, or had a little too much water.

Esau's mess of pottage was probably more soup-like than this.

The presentation leaves something to be desired, but it tasted good.

Kids are not so sure!

coconino · Joined: 21 Nov 2006 Posts: 77 Location: Sunny Brixton

The potatoes were well done but a little dry on the outside. Next time I'll try adding a little water in the bottom just to keep them moist. The lentils and rice were perfect. One result of this sort of cooking is that food doesn't get mashed up with stirring so the lentils remained whole although they were well cooked and soft. The split peas were still slightly underdone after three-and-a-half hours but palatable nonetheless.