After a busy month that included out of town company, a graduation, and vacation, I finally found time to test my newest solar cooker, the Solar Flare Parabolic Cooker.  This little gem comes with a reflector,a cooking jar, a cooking bag, a bucket, and a small plastic bowl.  The reflector is easily rolled and stored.  When time to use, the opened reflector is set inside the bucket.  The bowl is placed in the bottom the bucket. And finally the cooking jar, filled with dinner,  is placed inside the cooking bag, and set on top of the small bowl to lift it up off of the floor of the bucket.  (Ok, this is really easier to do than it is to write about).

I decided to make an easy pasta with spaghetti sauce.  A spaghetti recipe comes with the system, and I decided to start with that and adjust to my own liking.

Easy Solar Pasta with Spaghetti Sauce

• pasta ( macaroni, spaghetti, spiral noodles, etc)
• 2 cans (8 oz) tomato sauce
• 3 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp basil
• 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 2 TB dried onion

These were the ingredients in their recipe, but we like it a little spicier, so I also added the following:

• 1/4 tsp red pepper
• 1/4 tsp oregano
• 1 tsp chili powder
• salt to taste

So add as much or as little as you like.  Add all ingredients together and stir to blend.

The original recipe called for cooking the pasta and the sauce separately, but when solar cooking, I don’t like the extra steps involved. I want to cook everything in one pot.  In the case of uncooked pasta, it needs extra water to absorb and make the pasta tender.

SO–

I put 1 1/3 cups of spiral spaghetti into the jar (the package said 2/3 cup dry was one serving), then covered the spaghetti with water.  Then I added the sauce mixture above and stirred it well.  This cooked for 2 hours in the Solar Flare.  I don’t know how hot the oven got, but the internal temperature of the food was 190° when we took it out.  The pasta had cooked perfectly.   All of the extra water had absorbed into the pasta, making it tender, but not mushy.  Some of the sauce had been absorbed into the pasta as well, giving it a great flavor all of the way through.  On top, I added a sprinkle of Parmesan cheese. Delicious. It made a great lunch.  Next time, I think I’ll add some ground beef!

If you would like a Solar Flare Parabolic Cooker of your own, use my discount code    ADVSLRCK  to receive a 10% discount off of any solar kit – single or double – plus free shipping in the USA.