Cardboard pizza box in oven

Get cookin'-with the sun! Use these warm, sunny summer days to learn how you can trap the sun's natural heat to make a homemade oven. And make a tastey treat to test it!
George Retseck

Key concepts
Energy
Solar power Cooking
Recycling
Introduction
Have you ever eaten food that was cooked outside, such as for a BBQ or while camping? During the summer it can be a lot of fun to be outdoors and enjoy eating the fruits—or burgers—of your cooking labors. But you don't always need to burn wood, charcoal or gas to cook outdoors. Did you know that you can directly use solar power to cook food? This can be done using a solar oven, which is a low-cost, ecologically friendly technology. In this activity you will build your very own simple solar oven out of a pizza box to gather the sun's rays and—cook a tasty treat for you!
Background
Solar ovens use solar energy—light and heat emitted from the sun—to cook food. They can also be used to pasteurize water or even sterilize instruments. How does a solar oven work? The simple answer is that it is designed to absorb more heat than it releases.
The solar oven you will build in this activity is a relatively simple one made out of a pizza box, aluminum foil, plastic wrap and a sheet of black paper. You will cut a flap out of the pizza box's lid and line this flap with aluminum foil. This will reflect sunlight into the box. You'll also seal the opening with plastic wrap. This plastic "window" works like a greenhouse roof, allowing (direct and reflected) sunlight to pass into the box, while also retaining heat. At the bottom of the box, you will place black paper. This will act as a heat sink that absorbs direct and reflected sunlight to warm it, which will heat food placed on top of it. This activity also includes instructions for making a tasty s'mores treat that you can heat up in your own solar oven!

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