Hot Box Cooker

I just read a great article and interview on Wretha's blog.
http://wretha.blogspot.com/2009/07/new-old-way-to-cook-book-review-video.html

The premise is simple. Heat your food to boiling temps for a few minutes, then turn the heat off and take the food and place in a very insulated box so it can slow cook for the next 3 plus hours. I know it is a simple concept but I am totally amazed by how much power or fuel you can save this way. Not to mention the facts that you can't burn the food, it tastes better, food keeps it's shape and yet is fully cooked, and doesn't heat up the kitchen.

With my limited wind and solar system I wouldn't want to waste power for cooking. But if I ran the stove top for 20 minutes and used 1500 watts, then that would be 500 watt hours or 42 amp hours. That is only 10 % of my golf cart batteries or about 6 % of my forklift batteries. But, if I tried to slow cook something all day on the stove, it would drain my batteries. This is huge, people!!! Another thing you could do is to take the black pot and put it in the sun so it preheats. If you have a solar oven you can just cook in that. But in the winter time, you could just place the pot of water in the sun to preheat it. This will save some more energy.

This simple concepts of hot box cooking and solar ovens will help us tremendously in the near future. So, check out the post and watch the video. Thanks, Wretha, for a great article.

Richard