Arizona Solar Center - Your Guide to Solar and Other Renewable Energy Sources in Arizona

The delicious way to save energy and money

As many as 500 people gather each year for an annual potluck near Tucson. They eat vegetables, bread, pie and lasagna – typical foods at many such gatherings. This potluck, however, is vastly different from most because all the food, even the pizza, is cooked on-location by the sun

The group Citizens for Solar sponsors this cookoff each year to focus attention on one device: the solar cooker. These cookers use no electricity or natural gas, consume no firewood, and produce no smoke or pollutants. In the meantime, they gently cook almost any food to tasty, juicy perfection.

Some solar chefs setout their cookers in the morning and return in the evening to a well-cooked meal. Tiny “backpack” solar cookers have been provided Himalayan mountain climbers with hot food among the snowdrifts – it’s the amount of sunshine that counts, not the outside temperature.

To some people in developing nations, Solar cookers have become important to their very survival. Solar energy cooks food where firewood is scarce, and purifies water where bacteria and dangerous diseases are rampant. Solar cookers are used in Bolivia, Guatemala, South Africa, West Africa, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and many other developing countries. 

In Arizona’s abundant sunshine, solar cookers cook meals year-round without heating up the kitchen or the cook.