Does cooking with solar cookers preserve the nutrients in food?

Does cooking with solar cookers preserve the nutrients in food? - Spice Bottles on Shelf

Reading on google I found that cooking with solar cookers preserves nutrients. But if the solar cooker reaches high temperatures, I don't know if that's true.

Also does solar cooking make the food more nutritious?



Best Answer

Also does it modify or make the food more nutritious with solar cooker.

Not more than any other kind of similar cooking by radiant heat, like baking. There is simply no mechanism by which that could happen. Let's examine some claims I found from Google:

from http://www.greenbuild.org/uncategorized/3-reasons-solar-cooking-is-good-for-you-and-the-environment/

Solar cooking doesn’t use smoke that can contain carcinogens or microwaves that expose your food to potentially dangerous radio waves.

An electric stove produces no smoke (if you don't burn the food), and natural gas produces very little smoke. Were there smoke emitted by the stove, the area around it would be covered in soot, and the flame would be yellow from the carbon (the main component of soot and smoke) heated to incandescence in the flame. Further, the biggest cancer risk from smoked foods is not the smoke, but the nitrates frequently used to cure them.

If microwaves emit dangerous radio waves, the sun emits far more. That's why it's so bright, and so hot. I suppose you could be harmed by the microwave's radio waves if you manage to turn it on without shutting the door. Then again, you can cook your hand in a solar cooker, too. Or a stove. Come to think of it, cooking involves potentially dangerous heat. Huh.

Also: Does microwaving destroy nutrients in food? (summary: no more than any other cooking)

Plus, when you cook in a solar appliance, the nutrients stay in the food and don’t leach out. That’s because you don’t use water in solar cooking. And, the temperatures in a solar oven are moderate – around 325 F – so nutrients aren’t destroyed during cooking at a high temperature like on a grill or over an open flame.

This is also true of many other methods of preparing foods: baking, grilling, microwaving, frying and, don't involve water. 325 F is not an unusual temperature for baking, and most other methods can be performed gently, if desired.


To summarize: there may be benefits of solar cooking (a big one: it requires no fuel), but nutrition is not one of them. There's no way sunlight can add more nutrition to food that wasn't there to begin. Any nutritional benefits are not as much from solar cooking specifically as they are from not cooking by some less nutritional method. For example, any cooking method that is not boiling will not have the possibility of dissolving some of the food's nutrition.




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Does cooking with solar cookers preserve the nutrients in food? - Cooked Food in Bowl



Quick Answer about "Does cooking with solar cookers preserve the nutrients in food?"

Health and nutrition Moderate cooking temperatures in simple solar cookers help preserve nutrients. Those who otherwise could not afford the fuel to do so can cook nutritious foods—such as legumes and many whole grains—that require hours of cooking.

Is food cooked in solar cooker is healthy?

Food cooked with a solar cooker is healthy. When cooking food with low heat, vitamins and other nutrients don't break down. Furthermore solar cooked foods are free of mutagens and carcinogens produced by high-heat methods.

What are the benefits of using a solar cooker?

Advantages of a solar cooker
  • No requirement of cooking gas or kerosene, electricity, coal or wood.
  • No need to spend on fuel, as solar energy is available free.
  • Food cooked in solar cooker is nutritious. ...
  • Solar cooking is pollution free and safe.
  • Solar cookers come in various sizes.


What is one downside of cooking with solar ovens?

Disadvantages of solar cooker The solar cooker cannot be used at night and during cloudy weather. It takes more time to cook food. The direction of the solar cooker is to be changed continuously towards the direction of the Sun. Solar energy is not available uniformly all the time and at all places.

What are the advantages and disadvantages of using a solar cooker any 3?

Answer: Advantages of a solar cooker : (1) There is no cost of fuel....Disadvantages of solar cooker:
  • It is slow.
  • It can not be used in rainy or cloudey days.
  • you can not cook all kind of foods usin solar cooker.
  • it can not be used every where on the earth.




Cooking with the Solar Cooker




Sources: Stack Exchange - This article follows the attribution requirements of Stack Exchange and is licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

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