Solar Cooking: Solar Pasta with Meat Sauce

Thought it would be fun to experiment with a 'put it out and leave it' recipe that would require little maintenance other than aiming to solar cooker.  To real lesson to learn is how much liquid based on the absorption of the pasta.  Changes are annotated after cooking by the *

Recipe:

1 box pasta (preferably a penne, ect)
1 lb ground beef - if you live in the San Antonio area, you need to check out Bandera Grassland for your meat.  You won't regret it!

1 can tomato sauce

1/2 can tomato paste

3 tbsp sugar (*Change to 4 tbsp*)

2 tbsp salt

1 1/2 tbsp oregano (*Change to 1/2*)

2 tbsp basil

2 tbsp dry onion

2 tsp garlic powder
2 cans water (from empty tomato can)(*Change to 1 3/4 cans water*)

1.  Crumble the ground beef in the container.

2.  Mix the rest of ingredients with the meat and stir well.
3.  Stir in the pasta (all I had was fettuccine so I broke it up).  I put it all together the night before so we'll see how much water is soaked up over night.  My guess is it will help the speed of the cooking bu it also could have been a bad move.  We'll see tomorrow.

3.  Preheat the oven and place dish in oven around 1:30 pm due to the cloudy weather today.  (This is for south Texas)

4.  Adjust the solar oven aim every 30 min.  Cloudy today so this is going to cook at a much lower temp so I had to adjust more.  If it were sunny would only aim for first 1.5 hours.  225 - 275 degrees instead of 340-360 degrees that I would see on a clear day.  Good to test in a worst case scenario.

5.  Let sit until you are ready for dinner.

Note:  Oven will slowly cool to a warming temperature when not directly aimed.

Results:

1. It turned out really good, noodles were cooked well with soaking.  
2. A little too much oregano but the sugar / salt contrast was pretty close.
3. Meat sauce came out really good.

Lessons Learned:

The weather affected the cooking temperature a lot more than I thought it would.  Good test though.
Next time, I'll add the pasta at the start of cooking.  I'll try it again like this to see the difference.

Other than that, thought I'd share our salad tonight.  Completely out of the garden.  Roasted beets, lettuce, tomato, radish, and cucumber.

Solar Cooking: Chicken with New Potatoes and Asparagus

I'm getting addicted to cooking like this.  It's so easy, and any meat is so juicy because it's not loosing its liquid.  Tonight for dinner we are having Chicken, cooked with new potatoes and some asparagus.  The timing on this seems to be the biggest risk.

Recipe:

2 Chicken Breasts

4-5 New Potatoes (from our garden!)

1 bunch Asparagus

1/2 slice Onion

4 Baby Bella Mushrooms

1/4 cup Orange Juice

1 tbsp Herbs to Provence

1 tsp salt

1 tsp fresh cracked Pepper

4-5 Sprigs Fresh Rosemary

Pre-heat the solar oven.  *by noon the oven was at 350 degrees.  

1.  Put the chicken breasts and potatoes in the cookware and add sprigs of rosemary.

2.  Pours in the orange juice and add the herbs, salt, and pepper to the chicken.

3.  1/2 the baby bella's and place in the cookware.  1/2 the onion slice and place on the chicken.

4.  Place in oven 1.5 hours before dinner and re-aim the oven every 30 minutes also checking the moisture level in the cookware.  It shouldn't lose much.  More than likely, you'll have more than you want.

5.  After an hour, place the asparagus over the chicken for the last 30 minutes.

The result: 

The asparagus was just to the point of still being crunchy which is the way we liked it.

I wanted to show you how much liquid stayed in the container with only 1/4 cup OJ added.

Lastly, everything on a platter.  Once you slice the chicken, place it back in the juice, it will retain moisture as it cools.

The chicken was moist, the mushrooms and the potatoes were perfect and the asparagus was just the way we liked it.

Lessons learned:

1. Totally clear day all day, clouds came out 15 minutes after I put the chicken in.  Went from 360 degrees to 225 degrees!  Would put it in earlier and let the oven cool to a warm by not aiming it.  Likewise, if the sun isn't cooperating, you can cook longer at a lower temp and not miss dinner.
2. Lastly, not as much a LL, but cooking outside kept the oven from heating the house, in turn forcing the a/c to come on, saving us money.

Solar Chuck Roast: Cooking with the All American Solar Oven

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Thought it would be great to detail using a solar oven for cooking and what I am learning from it.  I've already cooked bread, chili, and a whole chicken.  Great flavor and exceeded my expectations.  If anybody wants me to experiment cooking something and posting about it, just let me know.

I bought this one from Honeyville Grains during their 20% sale.  Love this place, ships to your door for $4.99 regardless of weight.  Check it out, you won't be disappointed.  This model is an upgrade to the global sun oven with a bigger chamber, aim sights, 2 granite pots, 2 bread pans, 3 dehydrating racks and a water pasteurization indicator.

Today, I decided to do a chuck roast with vegtables.  A two pound chuck, mixed veggies, some spices, and cornstarch.



2 pound chuck roast in a granite pot



Mix of veggies, spices, and cornstarch

I rough cut the veggies and put them around the roast.  Spread the mix of spices and cornstarch on top, added about 1/4 cup of white wine (normally would be red, but the white was open), and 1/4 cup of water.  It doesn't take alot of liquid cooking solar.  Use alot less than you think you need.



Let the oven pre-heat.  I put it out this morning and anticipated the sun's path and we went to the store.  When we got home, the oven was at 340 degrees.

I placed the roast in the oven, sealed the doors, and check it every 30 minutes to adjust the aim to maximize the design.  You can see the concept for aiming in the second picture below.

The roast sits on a rack that rotates depending upon the angle you set it at to keep whatever you are cooking level and also to allow the heat to circulate the dish like a convection oven.

I kept this in for 3 hours of direct sunlight and then allowed it to cool to warming until we were ready for dinner.

There are multiple advantages to cooking this way living in a very warm region.  First, you are consuming no electricity or gas.  Second, you don't raise the temp in your home which in turn doesn't force your AC to run.  The trickle down effect to saving you some money is fantastic.

Ok, time to eat!  Hope you all enjoy.

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