You are here: Home / 2019 / June / 19 / Cooler Corn & Cardboard Cookin’ / Let’s Play Redneck

Cooler Corn & Cardboard Cookin’ / Let’s Play Redneck

Published on by

Originally published June 17, 2012; Reformatted

Two great ideas for when the lights go out, or when you just want to play like a Redneck. 

The first, Cooler Corn, comes via an email from Mr. Big Food’s Dad who I think gets more emails each day than Mr. Big Food (who gets a lot). The second, Cardboard Box Solar Oven, comes from Anita Evangelista’s Backwoods Home Magazine article, “How do you live without electricity?” (issue 73: Jan/Feb 2002).

According to the story, it takes two kettles of boiling water and 30 minutes in a closed cooler to arrive at perfect corn, and it stays perfect for a couple of hours.

The solar oven is a bit more complex, but still pretty simple.

From Evalgelista‘s article:

Solar cooking is another option, if you have plenty of unobstructed sunlight and someone who is willing to adjust the cooker to face the sun every half hour or so. A solar oven need be no more fancy than a set of nested cardboard boxes painted flat black on the inside with tempura colors, a sheet of window glass, and some aluminum foil glued to cardboard panels. Total cost for this, if you can scrounge leftover glass and cardboard, is about $1.

A solar oven design made with cardboard boxes, aluminum foil, and a piece of window glass. Interior of the box is flat black paint. Place your food in a covered lightweight pan inside the box, prop it so the entire interior is exposed to the sunlight (about a 45-degree angle), cover with the sheet of glass (and tape the glass so it won’t slide), then prop the aluminum foil panels so that they reflect more sunlight down into the box. Move the box every 30 minutes so it maintains an even temperature. It will get hot fast, easily up to 325 degrees, and hold the heat as long as it faces the sun. Remember to use potholders when removing your foods! Our first solar oven had a black plastic trash bag as a heat-absorbing inner surface; it worked superbly until the plastic actually melted.

Bon appétit, y’all!

13 Responses

  1. I LIKE this idea. Not that I’m likely to have much need for it – I think my cooking for many days are about done, but you never know.

    Usually what we do for BBQ corn is to shuck and de-silk, then wrap in aluminum foil with a pat of butter on the corn as you wrap. Next step is to hand it over to hubby who puts it on the grill for some time – which I don’t know. If we need to keep it hot, it gets set to the side of the grill to stay warm.

    It was quite a process when we were doing family picnics, usually attended by 25-35. I used to do the family picnic annually, but don’t anymore – it got to be a grand gathering for one sibling’s family and very few of ours. I’ve offered my help to anyone who wanted to take it over, but have had no requests so far.

    One of our employees who also does event planning as a second job tells me that “Oh yeah…all the caterers do corn that way”…

    Guess I’m one of the last to know! Ah well. Better late than never!

    1. Okay. When asparagus is the least favorite, I call BS. Either the “survey” is bogus or people are full of it. Asparagus? Asparagus is delicious. And cucumbers are liquid sunshine. What is wrong with people these days?

  5. If asparagus is so unpopular, how come it’s so expensive??? You’d think they’d practically give it away!

  6. I have 4 sons. Mixed eating habits. One, however, has never been a vegetable eater. It was always an “eat your vegetables or no dessert” kind of thing. When he moved out, I’d still mention it…his answer was “Don’t worry Mom…McD puts lettuce and tomatoes on their hamburgers”. Yeah. Right.
    So….who does he marry???? A Seventh Day Adventist!!! Well, she’s not religious, but she was raised as a vegetarian (father is a minister in the church), and she remains a vegetarian. She will serve meat to guests – and my son – but doesn’t eat meat herself. Her son from a previous marriage – now 12 – is also vegetarian by preference.
    Family gatherings at their house are interesting. Her Mom is now also vegan. So…she has to provide a menu that includes food for vegan, vegetarian and meat eating guests.

    I don’t envy her trying to keep everybody happy. However…everybody brings stuff, which makes for a nice choice!

    1. No GF? B/C when all the kids are here, we have it all. Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten-free, meat lovers. CO-EXIST!

  7. No GF in the immediate crowd. My daughter has to go GF. Her aunt (hubby’s sister) had problems which were _finally_ diagnosed as gluten intolerance. Daughter had some similar symptoms so she tried it for a week. She thought maybe it was bogus…then she ate one slice of pizza and went into contortions with pain. She’s been GF since. One DIL decided to go GF plus she has many other restrictions she’s decided on. I don’t even try to keep up with her preferences.
    But yeah…CO-EXIST! What else can you do!

Comments are closed.