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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_oven https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haybox
But I've just found this and it looks excellent! https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_cooking
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Not all food is done once it reaches the desired temperature. A lot of food, e.g. tough meats, need to stay above a certain temperature for a long time until they're done.
Well, kinda? For example: smoking. You cook it for a long time at a low heat, but that's more about heating it up slowly as opposed to bringing it to a temperature and holding it there. And ultimately you (well, you're supposed to) gauge its doneness by its temperature; smokers still follow the "the vessel is hotter than your target heat" rule.
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You're not wrong - once the food is at the right temperature, it's done. You can hold food at the "right" temperature for a long time, but if you go above it, it'll over-cook. There's a few ways to heat food up, the most common of which is to heat the vessel to well above the right temperature and wait for the food to come up to the right temperature. The cooker linked takes advantage of this method since it is fine…
Not all food is done once it reaches the desired temperature. A lot of food, e.g. tough meats, need to stay above a certain temperature for a long time until they're done.
Or pasta. You don't bring the water to a boil and then immediately drain.
Or rice, similar to pasta.
Or some tougher leafy greens. Collard greens need to be simmered ~30-60 minutes.
Or caramelized onions. You are doing chemical reactions (browning sugar, etc.) that take time.
It's a very large teapot cosy, in other words. Seems reasonable, though obviously you still need some way to bring the pot up to temp (for that cast iron, induction would be efficient if not low-tech).
Yeah, when I think of a cooker, I think of something that heats something up, not just keeps it going. The stove with one burner dropped down [1] seems more practical, not requiring a separate device/extra step. [1] https://krisdedecker.typepad.com/.a/6a00e0099229e8883301a3fd...
A longer article that was cited, https://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2014/07/cooking-pot-insulati...
Everything related to heat transfer is still relevant and very, very interesting, but I love how dated the assumption of non renewable energy is now in that method of calculating thermal efficiency. Who cares if the perfect turbine could only ever convert 59% of the wind power through it!
"a rocket mass heater consists of an insulated combustion chamber where fuel is burned with high efficiency at high temperature, and a large thermal mass in contact with the exhaust gases which absorbs most of the generated heat before the gases are released to the atmosphere.... "
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Not all food is done once it reaches the desired temperature. A lot of food, e.g. tough meats, need to stay above a certain temperature for a long time until they're done.
And to further that, there's a lot of state change happening at those temps, often why things hold at exact temps for a bit (eg boiling), so they can take plenty of energy to go up a tiny amount. Biscuit for instance has "the rest" at around 165-175. It also sweats a lot and cools itself off unless you wrap it.
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Cooking when/where energy is scarce. Very useful to save on fuel while camping, for example. Also, I suppose, next time the electric grid is down and you want to cook on battery.
Another benefit is that it reduces the heat transferred to the living environment during cooking. Might be useful in a small living space like an RV or tiny house.
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Not all food is done once it reaches the desired temperature. A lot of food, e.g. tough meats, need to stay above a certain temperature for a long time until they're done.
Or dry beans. Imagine if you just brought those up to temperature and skipped simmering for ~1-2 hours. Or pasta. You don't bring the water to a boil and then immediately drain. Or rice, similar to pasta. Or some tougher leafy greens. Collard greens need to be simmered ~30-60 minutes. Or caramelized onions. You are doing chemical reactions (browning sugar, etc.) that take time.
There is a gradient of temperature from the surface to the inside of the food. Depending on the composition, it will take more or less time for the thermal energy to propagate.
In addition, cooking involves chemical reactions. Now, I’m not a biochemist, but if I had to guess, most cooking chemical reactions are probably endothermic (short of setting your food on fire), in which case the chemical reaction comes f cooking will remove thermal energy from your cooking medium (e.g. water or oil) and your cooking medium will cool down even if you had perfect insulation.