My plan yesterday was to try a lentil casserole in the solar oven. I stole a simple recipe from The Tightwad Gazette and figured that if I put the dish in at breakfast then I would have food by lunchtime.
No such luck. I went out in the morning and looked up at a completely gray sky. It wasn’t rainy looking, just cloudy. I figured I should try anyway, so I angled the cooker as best I could toward where the sun should be and left. 3 hours later I had the same raw food, only slightly warmer.
I ended up coming inside and trying the recipe again in the crock pot. It was bland mush and I wouldn’t recommend it. The recipe was 3 cups water, 1 cup rice, 1/2 cup lentils, half an onion, and some spices.
Rating: yuck.
In other crazy and ironic news, my conventional oven broke yesterday. It was old and had a good life, so we were not surprised, but it does force us to consider how big a role solar cooking will play for us in the future as we appliance shop. In the meantime, I’m suddenly very glad to have a solar cooker!
solar cooking challenge 