Cook like plants, try sunlight as fuel

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Remember photosynthesis, the cooking mechanism of plants that you learnt in your childhood in biology classes? In an age of galloping LPG prices one can try cooking like plants that repose their faith on sunlight to prepare their daily meals.

Rupa Bose, who is in her sixties and lives in south Kolkata, has been emulating the plants since 2008, when she purchased a solar cooker out of sheer curiosity.

That year she visited an industrial trade fair in Kolkata with her husband and met a man who ran a small unit that made solar cookers. She was fascinated by the idea of cooking with the help of sunlight and bought one. She still uses the contraption that did not need any repair in the past so many years.

The most tangible benefit is the solar cooker is clear — it dispenses with manmade fuel and, therefore, reduces fuel cost to zero. It is a lucrative thought in any pricing regime.

But other benefits, though equally compelling, are not that tangible. The most significant collateral benefit of the solar cooker is perhaps the healthy style of cooking that it promotes.

Since there is no flame, the pace of cooking is slow leading to the preservation of all the flavours of the food and spices. Meat is cooked to perfection that melts in the mouth. Prepared in these contraptions rice feels like the rice in biryani, appropriately cooked but the grains don’t get sticky.

Solar cooker manufacturer Anupam Baral, who has been manufacturing these devices for quarter of a century in his company Geetanjali Solar Enterprise, says in conventional ovens we often turn up the flame, raising the temperature that destroys nutrition. But in a solar cooker, nutrition in preserved.

A standard cooker can prepare a wholesome meal for four to five family members. You can cook rice, dal, vegetable curry and meat at one go.

The device seems to suit working people the most. One can easily stuff the bowls in a cooker with rice, pulses and vegetables and leave it in the sun and go to work. The process takes about a couple of hours in summer and about three-four hours in winter. The food stays in proper condition even at night when one can return from work to a healthy meal without taking the trouble of standing before a flame and cook.

The cooker is insulated, and therefore, the meal remains hot.

Frying is one process that is not possible in a solar cooker. Nor can you make chapatis in this device. Almost everything else that one consumes on a regular basis is possible.

Manufacturers of solar cooker say that there is no push from the government that is otherwise eager to promote the use of solar power. Had there been a drive from the government, the product would have been far more popular. It’s a pity how we waste sunlight in a tropical country like ours.

Yet, there has been a rise in demand after the price rise of LPG cylinders over the past few months. Earlier Baral used to make about 100 per month. Now the figure is around 250.

Enough of hard-nosed reasoning. Now let’s turn to history and religion. The ultimate source of all energy on earth is the sun that has a special place in Hindu religion – of the navagrahas, or nine celestial bodies, the sun is the most prominent. Many old civilisations from the Incas to the Greeks had a special place for the sun in their civilisation.

Let’s harness the power of the sun in our kitchen too.