thermos cooking a la heidi

heidi just did a post over at vansteaders on thermos cooking. i haven't done it in some time, and with the cold weather approaching, will welcome hot food with little effort or fuel consumption. one of my biggest complaints was poor results in cooking brown rice. heidi's blog shows success with that, here

you can read my old blog post on making a reflectix cover for my thermos here.

thermos dimensions: 4" diameter and 7"tall
                    circumference of thermos alone 12.5"
                    circumference with cozy 17.25"
                    20 oz. (0.59 liters)

some photos of my thermos:

thermos cozy

i recently picked up a double-walled stainless steel thermos to try out for thermos cooking. initial attempts with brown rice and steel cut oats and wheatberries brought mixed results, which i will chronicle in a later post. one thing i decided was to try to make a cozy that would increase heat retention and inprove cooking.

so i have this friend. really. and when he's not out slummin', sometimes he talks to me on the phone and we solve the worlds problems. or even my thermos cooking ones. so the other night ron starts, in the way he is so talented for doing, to throw out all these ideas on how to improve on the cozy i am dreaming up, and then to top it off, he leads me to believe that i am even thinking them up on my own! how sweet is that?

so anyhow, my Stanley Thermos Food Jar is 7" high, and 4" in diameter. i am telling you this because i don't have the can of coconut milk handy that is my universal item for size reference. eh. the jar holds 20 oz., which is a perfect size to cook a meal for me, and not have to worry about refrigerating leftovers. this jar is also unique in that it's mouth is wider than any others i've seen, making clean-up easier. i started out by cutting a sheet of reflectix 16" by 8 1/2 ". this was easy using a 16" wide roll of reflectix that tara left here last year.
i taped it around the jar securely, but not too snugly, using that silver foil tape backed with paper that laren told me was perfect for joining reflectix together. it did this very well, and quite sturdily, considering it is the flimsiest feeling stuff...like sticky tinfoil.

ask michael about the time i sent him out in the dark along a highway with just inches of shoulder to park on, to try to to tape my headlight back on with this stuff, after smacking a deer and bringing a new level of excitement to his vacation. he may have repressed the memory :-)

i cut two discs of reflectix to make a double layer base for the first cylinder

and taped them in place.

i made a second cylinder of reflectix just slightly larger than the first, and put a double thickness base on it.

the larger cylinder slides over the top of the smaller cylinder, efeectively and quickly giving you a double walled cozy surrounding the whole jar. it is light and compact and will work for keeping heat in, for cooking.....or out, for an iced drink.

the project, once ron had inspired it, was simple, and took about 15 minutes to complete. now i can begin, in earnest, my thermos cooking experiments.......