Chili con Cornbread del Sol

The days have been sunny lately and the weather is heating up, so I've decided to do some more solar oven experiments to avoid heating up my kitchen.

9:00am - Preheat oven while mixing up chili (I browned and seasoned the beef last night).

9:20am - Cover the chili and put it in the oven, which has heated to 225 degrees in just twenty minutes.

12:00pm - Turn oven to face sun again.
2:00pm - Turn oven again. Chili smells great.
3:30pm - Add another pot with cornbread batter in it. Pray it turns out well.

4:15pm - Remove cornbread and discover that it looks spongy, but it feels done. Take it inside to cool.
6:45pm - Sun is setting but the oven is still a toasty 175 degrees. Phillip arrives home for dinner, so I bring the chili and oven inside.
7:00pm - Eat dinner. The chili's OK--great texture, but the seasoning is kind of strong. It smelled milder and more tomatoey a few hours earlier, so perhaps I should have simmered it for six hours instead of nine. It's nearly impossible to burn things in a solar oven, but the flavor or texture can still suffer if you cook them too long. Try, try again.

The cornbread was delicious.