A solar oven uses reflected sunlight, concentrated by mirrored panels and trapped by an insulated cooking chamber, to generate enough heat to cook food without electricity or gas. This guide covers ten practical tips for getting consistent results from a solar oven: choosing the right dark cookware, pre-heating, using lids, cooking meat safely, managing moisture, and even using your solar oven as a food dehydrator. Based on fifteen years of firsthand experience, these tips work whether you’re cooking off-grid by choice or by necessity.
I’ve had a solar oven for about fifteen years and have used it for just about everything from a batch of brownies to macaroni and cheese. In the summer, it keeps the kitchen cool while dinner cooks outside. After a hurricane, it means a hot meal if the power goes down or your kitchen is under two feet of water — and using only the sun for fuel, you don’t need to worry about stocking up on fuels. These tips will help you start cooking using a solar cooking method and get great results every time.
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Table of contents
Tips for Making Great Solar Cooked Meals
- Solar Cooking Experimentation: Solar cooking is not an exact science, so be prepared for some trial and error. It’s a learning process, and you’ll need to adapt to varying weather conditions and solar oven designs. My best tip is to keep a notebook with the dish you’re cooking, the length of cooking time, the inside temperature of your oven, and anything unusual about the weather, e.g. partly cloudy, 110 degrees outside. This will help you gauge how much time any specific dish will take, since it will always be longer than your kitchen oven.
- Use Dark Cookware: Always opt for dark pots and pans when using a solar cooker. Dark-colored cookware absorbs more sunlight and converts it into heat efficiently. Granite Ware pots, which are both basic and affordable, are excellent choices because they are dark and made of a thin metal, which allows for faster cooking. If you must use light or shiny cookware, cover it with a dark hand towel to improve heat absorption.
- Thin Metal Baking Dishes: Thin metal baking dishes are ideal for solar cooking. They heat up quickly and reduce the cooking time needed. Once again, Granite Ware is a recommended brand for these types of cookware.
- Thermometer: A thermometer is an indispensable tool for solar cooking. It helps you monitor the internal temperature of your solar cooker, ensuring that your food is cooked safely and predictably. Some solar cookers come with a thermometer, but if yours doesn’t have that feature, this is something to add.
- Pre-Heating: Pre-heating your solar cooker for 15-20 minutes is crucial. This shortens the overall cooking time and improves the cooking process. However, remember that the interior of your cooker will be hot, so always use pot-holders when handling it. Not all solar cookers will heat up to a safe cooking time in the same amount of time, which is another reason to keep notes, especially as you first start using yours.
- Lidded Baking Dishes: Always use baking dishes with lids when solar cooking. Lids help retain heat and moisture, making your dishes cook more evenly and efficiently. However, baked goods like pies, brownies, cookies, cakes, and bread don’t typically require a lid.
- Safe Meat Cooking: When cooking meat, ensure that the interior temperature of the oven reaches at least 180 degrees Fahrenheit — check using the thermometer. This is essential for food safety. A small and inexpensive thermometer can help you achieve this.
- Slow-Cooker Method: There are two ways to cook using a solar oven. The first is to place the oven so it directly faces the sun and then shift it every 30 minutes or so as the sun moves. This ensures the oven always gets the full force of sunlight. But, if you plan to be away all day, adopt the “slow-cooker” method. Position your solar oven so that it faces directly south to maximize sun exposure. Place your baking dish inside, close the lid, and by dinner time, you’ll return to a hot and delicious meal. This is slower than the direct-sun method but won’t require any turning during the cook time.
- Managing Moisture: During the cooking process, moisture is likely to accumulate inside the solar cooker. Before storing it, make sure to wipe the interior dry to prevent any issues with mold or rust.
- Food Dehydration: You can also use your solar cooker as a food dehydrator. To do this, prop open the oven door by about half an inch. This allows excess moisture to escape while retaining the interior heat, making it perfect for drying fruits, vegetables, or herbs.
Related Solar Cooking Resources
- Getting Started with Solar Cooking
- Cook Off-Grid Without Power: How Many Methods Do You Have?
- 12 Reasons Your Off-Grid Plan Needs a Solar Cooker
Get Your FREE Family Power Outage Handbook!
Final Thoughts
Solar cooking has a learning curve. The first few times you’ll probably check on it more than necessary and second-guess the timing. That’s normal. Stick with it, keep notes with the food, interior temperature, and length of cooking time, and it soon becomes second nature. Fifteen years in, my solar oven is still one of my most-used off-grid tools, and I’d rather have it and not need it than need it and not have it.
Frequently Asked Questions
Hard boiled eggs are very easy for beginners. Preheat the oven outdoors for at least 15-20 minutes and aim for an interior temperature of at least 275 degrees. Place the eggs in a dark baking dish or pan, no water needed. After 30 minutes, check one egg and see if it’s at the level of “hard boiled” that you like. Another simple way to start is making a box of brownies or cornbread. Both are inexpensive and easy to know when they’re fully baked.
Look for a box-style solar cooker with reflective panels, a dark interior, and a glass or acrylic lid. The Sun Oven, no longer in production, is the one I use most often and has that design. However, you can look for that style on Amazon
Yes, but be sure there’s enough sunlight for the oven to cast a shadow. If there’s no shadow, it’s unlikely there will be enough sunlight to cook your food at a safe temperature.
A good solar oven can reach temperatures between 250°F and 400°F depending on the model, the angle of the sun, and the time of day. Most foods cook well at 250°F–300°F, which is comparable to a slow cooker on high. Reaching a safe cooking temperature is vital, otherwise you’re just placing a dish of food in a lukewarm temperature, not hot enough to actually cook and warm enough to potentially breed bacteria. Use a thermometer every time until you know your solar oven well enough to trust it.
Yes, and there are plenty of how-to videos on YouTube. The trick is making an oven that will actually reach safe cooking temperatures. My own experimentation using a solar windshield reflector was not successful in doing this. So do your research for different solar oven designs and look for one with actual proof that it gets hot enough to cook food safely.
I thought maybe there would be links to several solar cookers, even the one in the picture that would seem to be inexpensive. Most solar cookers are way too expensive.