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Solar Oven Cooking

Solar oven cooking is the most advanced totally free cooking method ever devised for camping or remote living. There is no need for electricity, lighters, fire, smoke, fuel, or fire wood. Solar ovens eliminate the risky storage of liquid natural gas or propane fuel for portable stoves in your vehicle which can get very hot inside. In just about every national park and state recreation area they have banned burning campfires or having open flame grills altogether. This necessitates a smarter cooking method when in remote locations or living off the grid; so I offer you the sun oven.

Click to buy a sun oven

Sun
Oven

My solar power oven pages are shown here for those interested in ordering one.

Click loads Sun Oven video on outside website

Solar oven cooking most advanced totally free cooking method ever devised for camping or off grid
Buy solar cooking system make your purchase here after reading our other sun and solar oven pages
Solar cooking more questions answered, how long does it take, how hot does it get, use in the winter?

 

Solar Oven Quality and Advantages: I recommend the GLOBAL SUN OVEN because it is far superior to all the other makes. If you click the advertisement above I can order the oven for you and ship it directly to you at a discount. I use it and it is the only one I have tested that seems to be of commercial quality. It has a built in thermometer, and attached single piece collapsible reflectors. This is very important because they can be adjusted for maximum solar gain. Plus they can be put away so they don't take up much room when you are done cooking. It has a spill-proof levelator.

Basically the inside shelf is hanging on the inside of the oven walls so it swings level regardless of how off the ground is or how unevenly the weight is distributed. You can use any brand off the shelf dark colored enamelware cooking pots or baking sheets. There is a water pasteurization indicator available so you can purify water if you need to.

The GLOBAL SUN OVEN® is heavy duty which is important when out in the wind and elements. It weighs 21 pounds, is about 19'' x 19',' and is about 11'' deep. This is the only negative with this baby. It is big but it does fit under the bed in the van as it should. With proper care it should last a lifetime. This makes it absolutely one of the greatest financial investments you can make. Even if you give up Vanaboding and go back to living out of a house, you can still cook with it for free. It makes an awesome attention getter conversation starter. Your friends will come running to see this solar oven put out.

Solar Oven Cooking: You can cook anything that you can cook in a conventional electric or gas oven in a GLOBAL SUN OVEN®. You can bake, boil and steam using any of your normal favorite recipes. You can even bake hot chocolate chip cookies a few times. It's awesome, sitting by the raging river listening to the geese fly in, 50 miles from a town, eating hot fresh baked cookies. We have already cooked whole chickens, beef roasts, potatoes, rice, carrots, onions, pork tenderloin, butternut squash, pumpkins and more. The last experiment Kelly did was to put a completely frozen 4 pound pork roast in and within 2.5 hours it was completely done with the roast showing an internal temperature of over 160 degrees. They were all delicious and super moist. WARNING: because nearly nothing escapes from the oven while cooking you will not need as much flavoring as with traditional cooking. If your normal recipe calls for a teaspoon of salt, for example, put in much less, only a pinch instead. A little goes a long way with this refreshingly good cooking system.

The GLOBAL SUN OVEN® will reach temperatures of 360 to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. The oven will reach its maximum temperature during preheat. The temperature then drops somewhat when food is placed in the chamber.

The food tastes much better than most traditional cooking methods too! Solar cooking allows most of the natural flavors of food, which get baked out in conventional ovens, to remain. The slow, even temperature rise gives the complex carbohydrates time to break down into simple sugars allowing subtle natural flavors to bubble to the top emerge. Sun baked foods stay moist. The natural juices do not bake out. This results in a superior, moist taste with very little shrinkage.

 

sun oven cooking in the desert picture - copyright Vanabode.com
Specialized Sun oven shown as we are cooking scalloped potatoes in the desert. No need for electricity, fire, smoke or fuel. Photograph is protected by US Copyright law

Cooking times are close to the same as those you would experience with a conventional oven. If the sun is constantly being covered with clouds then of course it will take longer than typical to heat up and cook. Factors affecting cooking time are: the quality of the sunlight at the time you are cooking, the types and quantities of the food being cooked, and how often the oven is being refocused. In any place sunny you can often complete your meal without adjusting the oven at all. Add 15 minutes to your recipes cooking time each time the door is opened.

Dark, thin-walled pots with lids work best. Dark pots change the light from the sun into heat energy. Lids are important because they hold steam in the pot. If a lid is not used the steam will dissipate much of the heat. Shiny aluminum pots and pans cause light to be reflected out thereby reducing the oven's temperature. If you are baking cakes, breads, and cookies, use dark cookie sheets and baking tins.

Do not stir the food when cooking. It is unnecessary when cooking in a high quality solar oven because there are no hot spots. The temperature of the food rises evenly. It is virtually almost impossible to burn food cooking this way.

Solar Oven Usage: Focusing a GLOBAL SUN OVEN® is very easy. Much easier in fact than all the other brands. Simply work off the shadows. When the shadows are even on all sides you are done. The built-in leveling leg allows you to easily get it level, focused and hot. The need to refocus depends on what you are cooking, time of day, and temperature you need. Sometimes, if we want to eat fast, we sit right there and readjust every 30 minutes to maintain maximum heat. Often when we are sure there is little chance someone will steal our oven, we set it outside before we go hiking. We focus for the midday sun, load it up and leave. By the time we get back the food is cooked and still warm from the late afternoon sunlight. Because the chamber is very well insulated, food stays warm for hours.

The noon sun presents some problems as the sun quickly moves past the maximum focus point, creating the need to refocus more often. Later in the day you will not need to refocus as often. The GLOBAL SUN OVEN® is equipped with a built in Levelator, which keeps food level and avoids spills while being refocused. Other ovens don't have this feature and they are a pain to work with. The last thing you need when cooking is extra aggravation.

ham cooked in solar oven picture

Above: Image shows a perfect ham spiked with pineapple and broiled in our solar oven. The oven is best known for retaining the natural juices and not browning, but even here some browning is apparent.

I like the safety issues with using this baby. You need to exercise proper care by using hot pads when opening the door and removing food but it is much safer to have a teenager cook a meatball sub in the solar oven in the yard than it is in the oven or stovetop in the house. At least the only parts heating up are the oven chamber, the cooking pan, and the glass door. The exterior of the oven, including the sun reflectors, is safe to touch.

If you want to cook in the winter remember it is suns brightness, NOT the air temperature that makes it possible. For example a 50 degree, clear, low-humidity environment will allow food to cook much faster than a 100-degree day in sunny Florida with high humidity. The GLOBAL SUN OVEN® has been used successfully at the Mt. Everest base camp where temperatures are well below zero. Keep in mind though that there are more cooking hours available in the summer than in the winter.

The black surfaces of the oven capture and transform the sun's energy into a heat form that cannot escape the chamber. Focus a GLOBAL SUN OVEN® and the interior is heated by the sun's direct energy. Reflected sunlight enters the oven chamber through the glass door. It then turns to heat energy when it is absorbed by the black inner-shell. Have you ever gotten into a hot car that has been in the sun for a few hours? Ever touched the surface of a dark colored car in the sun? It's just free, clean, sunshine being used to cook dinner instead of stinky fire and smoke or dangerous expensive propane or liquid natural gas.


Click to buy a sun oven

Sun
Oven

My solar power oven pages are shown here for those interested in ordering one.

Click loads Sun Oven video on outside website

Solar oven cooking most advanced totally free cooking method ever devised for camping or off grid
Buy solar cooking system make your purchase here after reading our other sun and solar oven pages
Solar cooking more questions answered, how long does it take, how hot does it get, use in the winter?




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