The PhotonGrill is an inflatable, portable BBQ that uses the power of the sun to cook your food. It’s great for places where you’re not allowed to start a fire, since it uses no flames and no fuel to get the cooking pan scorching hot. It’ll reach temperatures of 500F/260C in as little as 5 minutes, which is faster than charcoal grills. It does this by letting you unfurl and inflate a parabolic mirror that focuses the sun’s rays exactly where the pan itself sits. The entire setup takes 3 minutes, and the pan provided with the kit is “solar-optimized”, whatever that means. The PhotonGrill neatly folds away into a backpack, making it easy to take with you on your adventures. If the idea of cooking your food with the planet’s only true source of extra-terrestrial energy tickles you, you’ll have to pledge around $225 to their Kickstarter campaign.
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The solar-optimzed pan is coated with a special material on the bottom. A solar optimized pan is getting much hotter than a normal pan, because the coating increases the amount of light energy the pan can absorb.