Using Prayer Candles To Make A Hurricane Stove

If you don't want to hear my story and just want to learn about the stove, scroll pass the second picture.  Otherwise....

I live in Florida.  I don't know if it is due to global warming, but we are getting more hurricanes.  It is no longer a phenomenon that happens ever twenty or so years.  From June 1 to November 30, we are supposed to be in a state of preparedness.  Indeed, you should be.  Gone are the days when hurricanes were viewed as a blessing--an excuse to get off work, to get off school, and to eat lots of junk food that normally you didn't get to eat.  Sometimes I miss the rather festive mood we used to approach hurricanes with, but I understand why it no longer is the case.  When houses started getting devastated, and it was taking FPL longer to restore power (not their fault--Florida's population is larger than it was when I was a child), hurricanes were no longer fun.  You need to be prepared, because even a week before a storm hits, the stores start running out of supplies.

If you are lucky, you don't lose power--or you have it quickly restored.  If you make plenty of ice and have a good freezer, you can usually keep your food for three days without power (if you don't open the door too often).  One of the things I hate the most about hurricanes is emptying the fridge of spoiled food.  The smell is terrible, doubly so because everyone has spoiled food--and usually our garbage service isn't restored until almost a week later.  If you are ever in Florida, do not mix spoiled food with branches.  Sometimes the garbage men will only empty trash cans--and you want to make sure the food gets taken even if they don't do the branches.  If you are a Costco member, be warned that hurricanes particularly like to hit after you have just bought hundreds of dollars worth of meat.

As a child, eating hurricane food was a treat--but when I was a child, we rarely lost our electricity, and when we did it was restored within three days.  Now, though, I've went as long as three weeks without power.  You can get pretty tired of canned and boxed food very quickly.  We were lucky with Hurricane Irma that FPL restored power to traffic lights and businesses within three days, and so we were able to go to restaurants for a hot meal and cold drinks.

How to cook food during a hurricane has always been an issue for me.  Florida houses are small, so you have to take into account how much storage room you have for hurricane supplies.  One thing I hated about most things used for cooking food was that they were flammable.  We have a propane stove which I am scared to death of.  I have nightmares of the tanks exploding and setting me afire, causing me gross deformities that would force me to live in the sewers with all the flushed down pets and play an organ.  I considered a solar stove, but what if the sun is not out or particularly bright?  I also worried about birds pooping in my food, or the food being stolen by our cat mafia family.

Almost all cooking options have one main flaw, no matter what the type--all require you to cook outside.  In most cases, they require ventilation.  In the case of solar ovens, they also need the sun.  This is rather inconvenient, particularly if you want a meal during a storm.

I had made a delicious Hungarian Goulash.  The day Hurricane Irma hit, I was just about to warm some up in the microwave.  Suddenly, the power went out--for good.  Now, we had other food...but I had really looked forward to having Hungarian Goulash for breakfast.  Visions of potatoes, tomatoes, and sausage were dancing in my head and making my mouth water.  Frosted Flakes just wasn't the same thing.  Never mind that I'm scared to death of the propane stove--I can't use it inside anyway.  I can't cook outside because we are having a hurricane.

So I'm sulking and looking at my prayer candles while crunching on Frosted Flakes.  Suddenly, I got an idea.

How I organize candles for small pots and skillets.  The two larger candles on the side support the pans, and the three candles in the center are lit to cook the meals.

Prayer candles are not great as a hurricane supply and usually can be found on the shelves after other candles have sold out.  They were made for praying.  They don't give a lot of light unless you have a lot of them.  However, one thing about them is that if you pass your hand over them, they send up quite a bit of heat...and that is what gave me the idea to use them for cooking.  What is also nice about them is that they aren't scented.  Unlike other ways of cooking, you can use these inside.  Of course, you have to be careful--the same caution you use for candles--and it can get hot when they are lit.

You need something to support the skillet or pan.  If I was using a small skillet or pan (8 1/2" wide), I used two of the taller religious candles to support the pan (see above picture--the two candles that don't have soot stains at the stop were used to support the pan).  Three smaller candles were lined up and were responsible for the cooking.  It is important that your center candle or candles have to be smaller than the candles that support the pan.  The pan can never totally cover a lit candle--it will deprive the flame of oxygen and extinguish it.

You need pots and pans that can handle being exposed to flame.  You want to make sure that the bottom of the pans haven't been splashed with oil or any flammable product.  You have to be careful not to slosh any flammable oil or product if you cook with it.  For safety, I had a small fire extinguisher next to me.  Cooking with candles can be messy--they leave soot on the bottom of the pans.  A lot of times, the soot will transfer to your fingers and everywhere else too.  It can be easily cleaned, though.  However, you may want to put down a protective cloth on your furniture to prevent stains.

In addition to a skillet or pan, you will need water and a lid (and matches, of course).  I would put anywhere from a teaspoon to a tablespoon of water into the pan--no matter what I was cooking--and then put the lid over the contents.  The water aided in cooking the food.  I couldn't believe what I was able to make! I cooked eggs, hamburgers, chicken, and even steak this way.  It didn't take as long as I expected it to either--though of course, it wasn't as fast as an electric stove or microwave.  I can't really say how it compares to other ways of cooking like hibachi, propane, or solar ovens either.  It depended on the food, but it would take anywhere from 20-45 minutes to cook a meal.  With the meats, I tried to pound them out with a tenderizer to make them as thin as possible.  I was also able to cook instant pastas this way.  Though I didn't use them this hurricane, during Hurricane Wilma I found out that Barilla pastas don't actually require heat to soften up--or at least the spaghettis didn't.  You can put them in cold water and let them set for several hours, and they will soften up.  They may not have the greatest texture, but I find that during hurricanes your palette is more flexible.  Instant rice is also something that can be made this way.

When I cooked with a larger skillet or pan, I had to alter my candle arrangement.

This arrangement was used for larger pans and skillets.

As shown above, I used five prayer candles to support the pan.  These candles would be lit, but the pan would only cover them halfway.  The center candle was smaller than the support candles--in this case I used an unscented pillar candle.  This arrangement was a little more tricky because it was easy to accidentally extinguish a flame.  Sometimes, particularly as the melted wax pooled around a flame, the candles would extinguish anyway.  This was prone to happen with meals that required longer cooking times.  It was annoying but not impossible.  I preferred the five prayer candle arrangement for cooking meats.

Anyway, I plan to stock up on these types of candles for the next hurricane.  I am quite happy with this way of cooking.