Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner - Three Days of Solar Cooking

 

We had to go to L.A. unexpectedly on Monday and before hitting the road I made breakfast to go. Oatmeal for myself and, because I was feeling generous, and egg sandwich for Martin. There was plenty of time to cook both while we showered and loaded up the car. I also took a few Sun Oven muffins out of the freezer for a midmorning snack. A solar cooked breakfast is at least a million times petter than drive thru.

I guess my failed chicken and rice at the Bisbee cook-off last weekend left me with a craving because that's all I could think of making today. We were both quite tired today, the L.A. trip was all work, so a one pot meal was perfect. I took a cup of brown rice, a cup of water, chopped vegetables that I had on hand - leek, carrot, cabbage and butternut squash - put the chicken thighs seasoned with salt and pepper on top and put it in the Sun Oven for about two hours. It made a complete meal with leftovers. I only wish it had come out this good for the cook-off.

And on a final note, for anyone keeping score, I did cook something last Sunday, the day after the solar cook-off in Bisbee. Once again I was pretty tired, exhausted would be a better word for it. I spent the better part of the day on the couch and it wasn't until late afternoon that I dragged myself into the kitchen to see what I could throw together. The fridge was pretty bare and time was running out. It would have to be breakfast for dinner, bacon and eggs, one of Martin's favorites.

Saturday Lentils and Rice

This is my basic method for most legumes, in this case lentils. I put the lentils, water and a bay leaf in one pot, and in the other olive oil, chopped onions, carrot, celery, and a can of diced tomatoes. Cover both and let simmer in the Sun Oven until the lentils are soft. Drain the lentils and combine everything in one pot, replace the cover, and continue to simmer. Now there is room to make some rice. When the rice is ready so is dinner.

Coming Home to a Solar Dinner

We were both out all day today and I wanted to come home to a complete solar cooked meal. I didn't want to have to steam any vegetable, or cook some pasta, or even toss a salad. I wanted something that would go straight from the Sun Oven to my plate. Here's what I came with. Turkey legs with rice and vegetables.

I did all the prep work the night before. I chopped a lot of vegetables. I'll try to remember all of them: one leek, half a small head of savoy cabbage, a carrot, a stalk of celery, about a half cup of butternut squash, a small zucchini and a turnip. I also soaked half a cup of cranberry beans. I washed the turkey legs and removed any excess fat. In the morning I combined all the vegetables and the drained beans with a cup of arborio rice and a cup of liquid - half vegetable broth and half white wine - in a large cast iron dutch oven. I place three turkey legs on top, put the lid on, put it in the Sun Oven, and left for the day. When I got home around four I turned the Sun Oven towards the sun to and left it in until dinnertime. The well insulated Sun Oven, combined with the heat retaining cast iron pot, kept the food warm and at a safe temperature.

When we were ready to eat, around 7:00, I took the turkey out and removed the meat from the bones; I'll save myself this step next time by using chicken thighs. I stirred some olive oil, grated parmesan cheese, and freshly chopped basil into the rice. A little salt and pepper and dinner was served. It was very good. We both had seconds.

Solar Vegetarian Delights

O.k., delights might be a little bit of an exaggeration but with very little work and a nice sunny day I was able to put together a pretty good vegetarian dinner. I was craving roasted vegetables, especially butternut squash and rutabagas. Luckily I had both in the fridge so I peeled them, sliced them up, seasoned them with olive oil and kosher salt, and spread them out on two baking trays that I could fit in the Sun Oven by stacking one on the other. On a whim I tossed a leek in too. After about an hour in the Sun Oven the veggies were looking pretty good. It was still early in the day, about two to be exact, and there was plenty of remaining hours of sunshine. I got to thinking that as tasty as the roasted vegetable looked, I'd probably be hungry for a little more than that come dinnertime. So I got out my two, trusty, red pots for some brown rice and lentils. After the lentils had softened I flavored them with some leftover tomato pasta sauce I had in the fridge. It was a simple meal, but satisfying nonetheless.

Two Days of Solar Cooking - One Blog Entry.

Once again I was too tired post an update yesterday. I had a very busy day. I taught my first two, yes two, solar cooking classes in one day. I was very nervous beforehand, in fact, when Brent (the owner of the store where the classes were held) considered canceling it due to rain forecast, I was almost relieved. Luckily he didn't. The weather cleared up and both classes went very well. We had two Sun Ovens set up, one with rice and beans and the other with the most amazing 16 grain bread made by Kristi. If you live in the Phoenix metro area, I highly recommend you check out Brent and Kristi's store, FoodWise. It's located at 395 E. Warner in Chandler. Kristi holds weekly cooking and bread baking classes that are free. I will definitely be attending some of them in the near future. Unfortunately I forgot to bring my camera so I don't have any pictures of my big day. Also, despite spending the entire afternoon solar baking bread and solar cooking beans and rice, I had nothing prepared for dinner. Matin and I went to one of our favorite local spots, Joe's Farm Grill in Gilbert. By the time we got home I was exhausted.

Today I wasn't feeling very creative. We got up early to go to yard sales and by mid morning I still hadn't decided what to put in the Sun Oven. For inspiration we stopped at Trader Joe's on our way home. I found a ready to cook turkey breast with cranberry stuffing. Perfect, all I had to do was take it out of the packaging a stick in the Sun Oven, in a pot of course.

The instructions said to bake in a 350ºF oven for 20 - 30 minutes per pound. The thing about solar cooking times is that they depend a lot on the type of pot used, the quality of the sun, and how often you refocus the Sun Oven. The other thing is cooking times don't really matter. Since the food won't overcook or burn it's almost impossible to ruin it. But since I'd done nothing more than take the turkey out of the package I figured the least I could do was pay attention to the cooking time. It weighed 2.5lb. I put it in the Sun Oven at 11:45. I remembered to use my probe thermometer and at 1:15 it had reached 180ºF. It was ready.

I'm generally not very fond of these types of convenience foods. Somehow the flavors are never quite right and this was no exception. The stuffing was just so so and the meat was a little dry. I actually think it might have been better if I'd have cooked it at a lower heat with some kind of liquid, like white wine, for additional flavor. In any case, I was starving so I was happy to have it for lunch.

Sun Oven Chicken, Rice, and Turnip

Yesterday's corned beef was a big success. It was noticeably moister than the non solar cooked one my cousin made. I'm almost sorry there weren't any leftovers for Reuben Sandwiches.

Today's solar cooking project couldn't have been easier. I made chicken thighs on a bed of brown rice and turnips. Martin prefers chicken cooked on its own, but he wasn't home for dinner tonight and I like the convenience of a one pot meal. I didn't even make anything green to go with it.

Here's the recipe.

1 cup brown rice
1 cup water
1 turnip, peeled and cut into cubes
6 chicken thighs
Salt
Pepper

Put rice, water, and turnip into the pot. Trim excess fat from the chicken thighs and place on top of rice. Season with salt and pepper. Cover and place pot in the preheated Sun Oven. Cooking time will vary depending on the quality of the sun, how often you refocus the Sun Oven, and the type of pot used. Mine was ready in just under two hours.

Root Vegetables, Chicken Thighs, and Rice. All in One Sun Oven

 It was supposed to be cloudy and rainy again today, but when I heard the wind storm last night I knew it would blow the clouds away. Sure enough, I woke up to a clear blue sky. A perfect day for solar cooking.

 To make the most of the Sun Oven I stacked a pyrex baking dish with a mixture of root vegetables on top of a enamel roasting pan with chicken thighs and brown rice. Since I could use the lid, I covered the roasting pan with aluminum foil and parchment paper. For some reason I took everything out around 2:30 even though the oven chamber was still hot and it was no where near dinner time.

 The chicken thighs were done, but it wouldn't have hurt to leave everything else in a little longer. I always forget the more stuff you put in the Sun Oven the longer the cooking times will be. The vegetables and the rice weren't inedible, just a little under cooked. In any case, paired with some greens, it was a perfectly acceptable dinner.

Turkey and Rice Solar Bake

This year I really want to use all the left over turkey. I made the usual sandwiches on Sunday - I was out of town until late last night so we had our Thanksgiving early - and put the rest of the meat in the freezer. I was planning on making a turkey pot pie but every recipe I found used tons of butter or cream or both. It was starting to get late for solar cooking and I was tired of searching the internet for recipes so I decided to improvise.

To get things started I put a pot of brown rice in the Sun Oven. While that was solar cooking I rummaged around in the freezer and the pantry where I found a bag of mixed frozen vegetables and a jar of turkey gravy. I sauteed an onion and two stalks of celery in some butter for about ten minutes, added the frozen vegetables, about two cups of diced turkey meat, a little water, and let it simmer until the vegetables were soft. When the rice was ready I mixed it with the turkey and vegetable, and the jar of gravy, put it in a glass baking dish, covered it with parchment paper and put it back in the Sun Oven.

To be honest my expectations were not very high. Something edible was all I really hoped for. To my surprise it turned out pretty good. It even had a nice crunchy layer on top. We both had seconds.

From Frozen to Sun Roasted in Four Hours

I had a lot of work to do this afternoon so I chose what I thought would be a slow cooked dinner. I took two cornish hens (one fell apart before I could take the picture) straight from the freezer and put them in the pot atop a bed of rice, turnips and rutabaga. I popped everything in the Sun Oven at eight a.m. and went about my morning business. Shortly after noon I noticed that the glass door of the oven was covered in condensation, a telltale sign of doneness. I couldn't believe they could have gone from frozen solid to roasted so quickly, but they did. Since it was lunchtime we went ahead and ate. We'll be going out for dinner.

A Simple Solar Cooked Dinner

After the extensive preparations that went into our two day camping trip, I was too tired to come up with anything exciting for dinner tonight. I followed a recipe for Pasta with Lentil Bolognese from epicurious.com but served it with rice instead of pasta. To modify it for the Sun Oven I used two pots. In the first one I cooked the lentils. I put the rest of the ingredients in the second pot and let them simmer alongside the lentils in the Sun Oven. I have learned from past experience that the acidity of the tomatoes will keep the lentils from softening so I prefer to precook them. When the lentils were almost done I combined everything into one pot and returned it to the Sun Oven. At this point I had enough room to start the rice. I served it just like it was pasta, spooning the lentils over the rice and dusting it with freshly grated romano cheese. It made a simple and satisfying dinner.

Sun Oven Turkey and Rice

I was going to wait until Thanksgiving to make my first turkey in the Sun Oven. I've been told that it can be used to cook a bird as big as 18 lbs. Since it would take us a month to eat that much turkey I opted for thighs only today. After yesterday's overcooked eggs I made an effort to pay more attention to the cooking time. I even used a meat thermometer. The meat took two hours to reach 180ºf. The glass door of the Sun Oven was also starting to steam up which is another sign of doneness.
Normally I prefer white rice but this brown rice that I got from Massa Organics is the best I've every tasted. I brined the thighs overnight and seasoned them with sage, butter, salt and pepper. Even with just two thighs we have plenty of leftovers for another meal.

A Complete Meal from the Sun Oven

I'm not really a casserole kind of person. I like my meal to have at least three separate components, a protein, a starch and at least one vegetable. I find one dish meals to be boring. Today I had a busy afternoon and would not be getting home until dinnertime. I didn't want to fuss with any last minute preparations so I came up with a meal that would be ready to serve straight from the Sun Oven.

I can't tell you how nice it is to be going about your business with the knowledge that a hot, tasty meal is simmering in your back yard. It's almost as good as being waited on, or having your own personal chef. I'll admit that the broccoli was overcooked but being able to sit down to a hot meal as soon as I got home from my busy day was worth it.

It's yet another take on chicken and rice and it was all made in one pot. I started by putting the rice in a dutch oven. I mixed in about half a cup of chopped onion and a medium diced turnip. I used half as much water as stated on the rice package. I used bone in, skin on chicken thighs. I like chicken thighs because they're juicy and it makes portion control easy. I trimmed the excess fat, seasoned them with salt and pepper and put them in the dutch oven on top of the rice. Then I made a pocket with some aluminum foil, put the broccoli in it and placed it on top of the chicken. I put the lid on the dutch oven, put it in the Sun Oven and left it there until dinnertime. Just before serving, I did stir some freshly grated parmesan cheese in with the rice. So I guess I did do one little bit of prep work after I got home. If you're really tired and hungry you could skip the cheese.

Sun Oven Shredded Chicken and Cowboy Beans

When people see a Sun Oven for the first time, especially in Arizona, the first thing they ask is, "Why doesn't everyone use one of these?" They usually come to the assumption that it's a question of price and don't give the matter a second thought. I must admit, I too was guilty of this. But if you think about it, many home cooks are perfectly willing to pay top dollar for a good chef's knife, a food processor, a stand mixer or a slow cooker. All of which, with the exception of the chef's knife, are less useful than a Sun Oven. Just like with any craft, home cooks know that high quality tools make the art of cooking much easier and more rewarding. The Sun Oven is designed to last much longer, again with the exception of the knife, than any of the above mentioned appliances. It's more versatile than a pressure cooker or a crock-pot. And while food processors and stand mixers are incredibly useful, they rarely come out of the cupboard in most home kitchens.

After giving it more thought I now believe the price has little to do with it. It's much more about habit. People don't cook with the power of the sun because they never have. Hopefully my blog will inspire at least some of my readers to change their habits and give solar cooking a try. If they do, they'll be rewarded with some of the best tasting meals they've ever prepared.

Today's dinner couldn't have been easier to make. Just take a couple of boneless skinless chicken breasts and throw them in a pot with a jar of salsa. Put it in the Sun Oven. When it's done shred the chicken with two forks. The beans and rice were made in the Sun Oven too. I didn't use a recipe for the beans. After soaking the beans overnight I seasoned them with chopped onion, minced garlic, some chili powder, chopped red pepper and a bay leaf. It took about an hour to cook them in the Sun Oven.

Solar Cooking, Almost Foolproof

Last night's chicken and rice was so good I wanted more. I had plenty of leftover chicken but no rice, so the question was, how to repeat the delicious rice without cooking another chicken on top of it? I figured a good part of the tastiness of last night's rice was from the chicken fat. It blended in giving the rice a silky, creamy consistency, and the touch of lemon hadn't hurt either. For tonight's rice I decided to try using butter. It's what all the restaurant chef's use to keep us coming back, so why not?

My plan was to cook the rice, then add the leftover chicken once the rice was cooked. It would still be early enough for the oven to heat back up and keep the food warm until 7p.m. I combined the rice, some chopped onion, chopped frozen asparagus and butter in a pot with some chicken broth. I forgot there would be no chicken to provide extra juices and only used 2/4 cup of broth for 1 cup of rice. When I opened the oven about half an hour later the rice had absorbed all the broth and was on the verge of-dare I say-burning. I thought for sure I had a disaster on my hands, but another thing I learned from Paul Munson of Sun Ovens Int. is that solar cooking is very forgiving. I threw in a little more broth, gave the rice a good stir, placed the leftover chicken on top, put the lid back on, closed the oven and hoped for the best.

Was it the best rice I've ever made? No, but it wasn't bad. I could have used more broth to begin with. I also could have used a little lemon juice or maybe some zest. But imagine what would have happened if I'd left a pot of rice unattended on the kitchen stove indoors with an insufficient amount of liquid. At best I'd have ruined a good pot and at worst burned down the house.

Hot Solar Cooked Meals After Sundown

With Paul of Sun Ovens Int. in town doing demonstrations I'm learning a lot of new solar cooking tricks. My favorite is one that will allow us to return to having a warm dinner from the sun oven after sundown. Sun Ovens Int. is strongly committed to promoting solar cooking in nations where the primary fuel sources are wood and coal. Due to the amount of smoke inhalation during cooking, respiratory diseases are all too common among the women and children in these areas, and deforestation for fire wood is an underlying cause of many violent conflicts. Solar cooking could play a vital role in improving the lives of millions of people throughout the world. So what has this got to do with eating later in the day? Well, the people at Sun Ovens Int. realized that to reap the benefits of solar cooking the ovens must actually be used. In most of the world people consume their evening meal much later than we do in the U.S. It does no good to have a perfectly prepared solar cooked meal ready at 5p.m. if it is cold by dinnertime. The people at Sun Ovens Int. knew there was nothing they could do to change the dinning habits of entire countries, they had to find a way to keep the food warm until people were ready to consume it. Enter the Global Sun Oven. Unlike any other solar cooker on the market, the airtight chamber of the Sun Oven will keep food at a safe and desirable temperature for hours after sundown, as long as the glass door is not opened. This was the best news I'd had all week. Since I started my blog we had been having dinner earlier and earlier, to the point that I would get hungry again before bedtime. Now, I am happy to report, we will go back to dining around 7p.m with a hot meal straight out of the Sun Oven and hopefully those late evening snacks will be a thing of the past.

Tonight's dinner is Chicken and Rice. It's my favorite Chicken with Two Lemons but I cooked some brown rice along with it in the same pot. The juices of the chicken flavor the rice. Since the chicken will release so many juices you will need a lot less water. I used 1 cup of rice and 2/3 cup of water.

Solar Risotto with Squash and Sage

I was tempted to just throw a potato in the sun oven and call it a day. I was still pretty tired from yesterday’s yard sale and we were out late last night. We had dinner with my cousin, Liz, and her friends. She lives less than ten miles away and yet we hadn’t seen each other in over ten years. Thanks to Facebook, her sister on the east coast told her about our yard sale so she came over to visit and shop.

Liz invited us round to her house for the evening telling me that her friend who had recently moved here from NYC would be making porchetta. We graciously accepted her invitation but I secretly thought she was making the whole porchetta thing up. This happens to be one of the foods I miss most from Italy and I know you can’t get it anywhere in Arizona.

You can imagine my surprise when her friend showed up and pulled the most beautiful piece of meat I’ve ever laid eyes on out of a bag. I had to know who her source was.

Well, like I said, she just moved here from NYC and she brought the roast with her! Her husband imports Italian foods. Apparently, according to my cousin, I am now one of the lucky few that can get their hands on one of these cuts of meat. When I do I will definitely cook it in the solar oven.

So, back to today’s solar cooking. With a nice chunk of leftover porchetta in the fridge our dinner’s main dish is pretty much covered. I thought it deserved something better than a boring baked potato to go with it.

Making risotto in the solar oven is an idea I’ve been toying around with for quite some time. I decided today was the day to go for it.

When it comes to risotto I’m a bit of a purist. I’ve always made it the traditional way, on the stove, stirring for the entire 20 minutes it takes to cook. I have recipes for pressure cooker risotto, acquaintances claim that it can be made in the microwave, and many insist that using brown rice is perfectly acceptable, but I would have none of it. It took solar cooking to finally find the courage to break from tradition.

The following recipe is a bit of a hybrid, it starts out on the stove and is moved to the solar oven to complete the cooking.

Solar Oven Risotto with Butternut Squash Sweet Potato and Sage

1 medium sweet potato peeled and cut into 2 inch pieces

1 small butternut squash, halved, seeds removed, cut into 2 inch pieces.

2 tbs butter

½ cup chopped onion

3 fresh sage leaves

1 cup Arborio rice

½ cup dry white wine

2 cups chicken broth

½ cup freshly grated parmesan cheese

Put sweet potato and squash into a dark roasting pan with a little water. Cover and place in pre-heated solar oven until soft. About 30 minutes at 350º

Remove squash and sweet potatoes from pan. Peel squash. Put both vegetables in a bowl and mash. Set aside.

Heat broth in a small sauce pan

Melt butter in a dark pot. Add chopped onion and sage and cook until onion is soft. Add rice, stir to coat with butter. Add wine. When wine has evaporated add half the broth, stir and transfer pot to solar oven. Keep broth warm while rice cooks. After ten minutes add the rest of the broth and squash mixture to the rice stirring to incorporate. After ten minutes test rice for doneness. When rice is ‘al dente’ remove from solar oven. Stir in grated cheese. Adjust for salt and serve.

So I proved to myself that it is possible to make a decent risotto in a solar oven. But there is one major drawback. Risotto should be eaten immediately. This means either a very early dinner or having it for lunch. Since I don’t really like to eat early and generally have a light lunch I will most likely go back to the old fashioned way of making risotto and leave the solar cooking to dishes that are enhanced by it.

Solar Cooking Day 13

You would think that when I decided to start this blog I would have got organized. Once again I had no idea what I would put in the solar oven today. My first thought was bread. I haven't baked bread since I joined Weight Watchers five years ago. I'm not even sure if my bread machine still works. Then I realized I didn't have any yeast so that was out of the question. After a bit of foraging in the pantry and fridge I decided on lentils and cabbage. In two separate pots. When they were ready I even had enough time and sunshine to make some brown rice. I used another recipe from Marcella Hazan for the cabbage. To complete the meal I grilled a couple of sausages. Not the most exciting meal I've ever enjoyed but it wasn't bad. With a few minor tweaks the cabbage recipe is a keeper.