Cookin' With Coal

I grew up within about 2 blocks of Sopka's location. I just scaled it at about 3,500 feet from Sopka's to my childhood home.

lsayre wrote:I grew up within about 2 blocks of Sopka's location. I just scaled it at about 3,500 feet from Sopka's to my childhood home.

Ohio, or in Europe ?

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:

lsayre wrote:I grew up within about 2 blocks of Sopka's location. I just scaled it at about 3,500 feet from Sopka's to my childhood home.

Ohio, or in Europe ?

Paul

Cleveland, Ohio. My childhood home was in poverty central. Cemetery to one side of us, city dump to another (they had closed and land filled it over right before we moved there when I was 6 years old), and steel mills to another. My parents paid $6,800 for the century home I grew up in (and they likely got ripped off). The main post holding it up was a tree trunk in the damp sandstone half basement. The house had cloth wrapped knob and tube wiring, a working gas lamp fixture in the basement, a coal bin "room" in the basement, and when we did some repairs on its slat and plaster walls (drywall came much later than this house) we found that some of the slats were sourced from things like old wooden fruit crates, as you could still read the print on them.

Here's a thread about getting ready to do some cooking on a parlor stove.
Post by Sunny Boy - Crawford Cookware?

Shows you don't need a big kitchen range, . . . just a bit of thinking outside the cast iron box !

I'm hoping more posters will join in with some examples of their cooking experiences on parlor coal stoves.

Paul

I have made stews and soups on my baseburner stove in the living room. The temps are not as hot as on the cookstove but if the stove is going at around 400° on the barrel, it will boil food in a covered pot.

Let the cold weather fly, I had 6 tons of nut coal delivered yesterday. This year (after my complaints about last years coal being dusty and loaded with fines) the coal looks pretty good, it is oiled and did not look like many fines. The size looked a little smaller in general but looks pretty good. I bought 1 ton more this year because I intend on using more in the cook stove this winter.

Randy

Photog200 wrote:I have made stews and soups on my baseburner stove in the living room. The temps are not as hot as on the cookstove but if the stove is going at around 400° on the barrel, it will boil food in a covered pot.

Let the cold weather fly, I had 6 tons of nut coal delivered yesterday. This year (after my complaints about last years coal being dusty and loaded with fines) the coal looks pretty good, it is oiled and did not look like many fines. The size looked a little smaller in general but looks pretty good. I bought 1 ton more this year because I intend on using more in the cook stove this winter.

Randy

Agreed. Hotter (faster) than a crock pot and great for anything in a covered pot that you want to cook slowly. Perfect for wild-game, or any tough meat stews !!!! But, for frying, or boiling a large, deep pot, not really hot enough.

I've measured my range cover plate surface temps while frying fish and at about 650 - 700 it does best. But, with a range, those plates are only about 2-1/2 - 3 inches above the firebed. That would be really pushing a parlor stove to get the top cover that hot, that far above the firebed.

Paul

And, with the use of a trivet ,or cookie cooling rack, that fits in the stove top, it should be able to get it in the 200-300 degree range of slow cookers, so any slow cooker recipe can be used.

A crock pot that doesn't need electricity !

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:And, with the use of a trivet ,or cookie cooling rack, that fits in the stove top, it should be able to get it in the 200-300 degree range of slow cookers, so any slow cooker recipe can be used.

A crock pot that doesn't need electricity !

Paul

And they thought they had a new invention!

Randy

Yup ! All they've managed to do with modern stoves is complicate a good thing.

Speaking of complicating a good thing . . . .

With the Glenwood coal magazine project, I got to thinking that one thing that may change is, . .

What will a mag full of coal do to the stove top temps ? And can the top of a stove with a coal magazine still be used to cook on, or even heat a kettle of water ????

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:Yup ! All they've managed to do with modern stoves is complicate a good thing.

Speaking of complicating a good thing . . . .

With the Glenwood coal magazine project, I got to thinking that one thing that may change is, . .

What will a mag full of coal do to the stove top temps ? And can the top of a stove with a coal magazine still be used to cook on, or even heat a kettle of water ????

Paul

That may cool things down quite a bit...good thing you have a cook stove!

Yeah ! You and I have got both types of stoves covered, but what about the poor guys who are "out of range" ?

Here I am talking up how a parlor stove can be cooked on too, . . . while talking up how good having a mag in a parlor stove will be in another thread. I may have just shot down one thread with the other ?

Maybe that's why I never did well at a sales career !!!

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:Yeah ! You and I have got both types of stoves covered, but what about the poor guys who are "out of range" ?

Here I am talking up how a parlor stove can be cooked on too, . . . while talking up how good having a mag in a parlor stove will be in another thread. I may have just shot down one thread with the other ?

Maybe that's why I never did well at a sales career !!!

Paul

Well, back when these stoves were made, they had both kinds in the house. The Glenwood with the magazine would have been used for heating and the cook stove in the kitchen. They would not have been concerned with cooking on the parlor stove. If someone wanted to cook on the parlor stove, just take the magazine out and tend the stove every 12 hours. Easy Peezy...
Randy

I am sure that top plate will get hot enough to at least boil water for your coffee, poach some eggs and cook your oatmeal.

franco b wrote:I am sure that top plate will get hot enough to at least boil water for your coffee, poach some eggs and cook your oatmeal.

That won't be necessary.

The cook (and the outdoor thermometer) convinced me to start the range. It's doing tonight's dinner and boiling a full kettle of water much faster and all at the same time !!!

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:

franco b wrote:I am sure that top plate will get hot enough to at least boil water for your coffee, poach some eggs and cook your oatmeal.

That won't be necessary.

The cook (and the outdoor thermometer) convinced me to start the range. It's doing tonight's dinner and boiling a full kettle of water much faster and all at the same time !!!

Paul

It's a good thing you live far away from me, or you'd have a coalie mooching dinner!