cooking with tea lights

[terranaught]

here ia a way to cook rice, lentils, and barley with a single tea light.
 I cut an old coffee can so that a 1 quart revere-ware  pot would sit inside then cover the outside of the can with several layers of paper towels (and aluminum foil if worried about fire) then set the unit on a cake rack with the tea light under the pan.
you can cook the foods mentioned in about 2 hours, hard red beans don't do so well.
the aluminum bottom pans work much better than copper clad unless you red rtv a silver dollar or similar heat sink to the bottom.

bbq lentils and barley: 1/2 cup each, 2 cups water, garlic, cook for 2 hours.
ad ketchup and sugar to taste, mix well.

compete protein and cheap, don't taste to bad either.

 

[Dingfelder]

I'd be worried about an open flame that could get jostled around accidentally, but I'm glad you've made it work for you.

 

[MrNoodly]

Use bigger candles, cook faster.

 

[John61CT]

Soak hard beans first.

Get stuff boiling, then put in a well-insulated thermos - type closed pot, let sit for hours.

 

[terranaught]

I've tried the thermos method, it only works for wheat, oatmeal and peas soup

 

[John61CT]

I've tried the thermos method, it only works for wheat, oatmeal and peas soup

As I said, soak first, at least overnight.

Also cook longer first, or multiple times.

Not saying better, just additional suggestions.

 

[wasanah2]

I'm having a hard time visualizing this.  I want to try it.  I take it you use the large coffee can.  Would a #10 empty can work?  I have one of those.  Do you cut off both the bottom and top of the can?  How long does the tea light stay lit?  Will it last the whole 2 hours?  A pic would probably be worth a thousand words if you have one handy.

 

[lenny flank]

I've tried the thermos method, it only works for wheat, oatmeal and peas soup

It works for hot dogs, ramen, and instant rice too. (Except you don't need hours to cook it.)

Great for carrying a hot lunch around on a winter's day.

 

[highdesertranger]

I use tea lights in a lantern for ambiance in camp I don't cook with them. the better ones will last about 6 hours. highdesertranger

 

[RVTravel]

My alcohol stove that I tried for backpacking was made out of a tea candle. It worked just fine.

 

[lenny flank]

Hah, my alcohol stove is made from an empty soda can.

 

[wasanah2]

I use tea lights in a lantern for ambiance in camp I don't cook with them.  the better ones will last about 6 hours.  highdesertranger

Wow, 6 hours.  By better ones, where do you get the better ones?  I've seen them at Dollar Tree and at Wally.  I was reading in an old Outing Magazine, a camping magazine from the 19teens, 20s and 30s about a candle lantern that had mica windows and it folded and had reflective areas where the windows weren't mica.   I wish I could find one.  It was called Stonebridge or something like that.  I don't think they make them any more but they had them in the 19teens as common camp equipment.

I agree that candles give kind of an old fashioned ambiance in camp.  I've camped some places that they don't allow campfires and candles really helped the disappointment factor in camping without a campfire.  

One time I took my then young daughter to a Chinese restaurant where they had the Pupu platter, which is a variety of finger food and food on skewers.  They generally have a tiny flaming hibachi (liquid sterno inside) in the middle.  When they brought the platter to the table, my daughter instinctly took the food on skewers and heated them over the hibachi.  LOL  I told her the food was already cooked.  I said the hibachi was for ambiance.  She couldn't understand what that meant.  So she thought for a second and then took the metal hot teapot for our tea and set it on top.  It was funny....but you had to be there.  You could tell she was a camping kid.

 

[highdesertranger]

I have been using these,

https://www.amazon.com/Stonebriar-T...1529107755&sr=1-5&keywords=tea+lights+candles

highdesertranger

 

[wasanah2]

I have been using these,

https://www.amazon.com/Stonebriar-T...1529107755&sr=1-5&keywords=tea+lights+candles

highdesertranger

Awesome.  That's a game changer if it'll last 6 hours.  Before I order though, I'm going to see how long a Dollar Tree tealight lasts.  I'll be curious, so I'll pick some up and check it out.

Thanks!

 

[Deb_A]

Hah, my alcohol stove is made from an empty soda can.  

I've been studying about survivalism a long time, and have been looking at alcohol stoves made out of soda cans and coffee cans, plus rocket stoves made with cans. I like both, because they save money on propane, since you can usually find wood to burn in the rocket stove.

 

[wasanah2]

I've been studying about survivalism a long time, and have been looking at alcohol stoves made out of soda cans and coffee cans, plus rocket stoves made with cans. I like both, because they save money on propane, since you can usually find wood to burn in the rocket stove.

I think the key is to be as adaptable to your surroundings as possible.  If wood is plentiful, you'll save a lot on fuel if you use it.  Some slow cooking stuff though might be tedious to tend to with wood and too expensive for propane.  That's kind of what I like about using tea lights.  It's slow to cook, I think, but the idea is if it works for a situation and it's cheap, it might be advantageous to try it.  So I'd like to try it anyway.  I still don't understand the OP's directions for making it.  I asked, so maybe we'll get the answer soon.

 

[John61CT]

I think the key is to be as adaptable to your surroundings as possible.  If wood is plentiful, you'll save a lot on fuel if you use it.  Some slow cooking stuff though might be tedious to tend to with wood and too expensive for propane. .

Wood is getting less and less feasible in most areas. Solar cooking works in some contexts.

With bought fuels, the insulated pot method helps with the slow cooking items, not just pulses and grains but chilli, stews, spaghetti sauces, soups etc

 

[LathrenJames]

I have a JetBoil, which was pricey. It works well but I also like a little wood burning stove I use. It is s-steel and takes really just twigs. It was very inexpensive. Tea lights sound intriguing, though.

 

[wasanah2]

Wood is getting less and less feasible in most areas. Solar cooking works in some contexts.

With bought fuels, the insulated pot method helps with the slow cooking items, not just pulses and grains but chilli, stews, spaghetti sauces, soups etc

Solar doesn't work well here.  Rain pops up quickly from the sea breezes and it's cloudy a lot.  That's kind of what I like about the slow cooking candle idea.  I have also (and I'm going to install this in my pop up camper that I recently got) a fireless cooker.  It's a contraption from the early 1900s.  Mine's an antique I guess, but the technology goes further back.  It's called a "haybox" in the old time literature.

The fireless cooker does one other thing besides insulate.  It has a couple of soapstones that you heat up and put in the container.  If you use one stone, you can heat that up and place the food on it to cook all day.  If you put one soapstone in the bottom and a pie on top of that (using a spacer so it's not sitting directly on the stone) and then a spacer on top of the pie and another soapstone on top, you can actually bake a pie or bread or anything like that.  I have only tried the one stone method, and if you put a boiling pot on the stone and close it up, it's still boiling many hours later as the soapstone holds the heat.

I got to thinking that this would be great for camping because the food and stones can be heated in several ways.  Also the box is highly insulated so it won't heat things up.  When I tried it, I was amazed at how tender the food was.  There is a fireless cooker cookbook free on Google Books Advanced that I downloaded. 

Yet for smaller portions, the idea of cooking with tea lights really interests me.  I hope OP answers my questions as to how to construct it.

 

[Deb_A]

I'm wondering if you could devise a small clay pot heater, and use that for slow cooking with candles. It seems feasible, but it would have to be used outside because of how dangerous they are.  READ MORE ABOUT DANGERS