When I was a kid, my parents took me to see A Goofy Movie[1]. I don’t remember much about that movie, but the scene when Goofy heats a can of soup using an automobile cigarette lighter stuck with me. At the time, I thought it was a cool way to use an ordinary object found in most cars.

I found the scene on YouTube[2] (view below).

I’ve been thinking of new or different ways to use common items during a survival situation and that scene in the movie keeps coming to mind. I’d like to know if it’s possible to cook canned food using an automobile’s cigarette lighter.

Let’s experiment and find out.

Research

I hit the web to do some research and was pleased to see that someone else asked the same question on Reddit[3]. As to be expected with such websites, the responses were all over the place. The answers ranged from: yes, no, maybe-so, use it to light a larger oven, plug in a DC burner instead, or they went completely off topic.

I saw similar results on other websites too.

Materials for the Experiment

Undeterred by my research, I decided to answer the question through experimentation. This project will need:

• Can of chicken noodle soup (easy to find).
• Car with plug socket (easy enough).
• Cigarette lighter (not as easy as I thought).

I have everything I need, except the cigarette lighter since my car didn’t come with one. Actually, I don’t remember the last time I saw a cigarette lighter in a car[4]. I don’t smoke and most people plug chargers into the power socket nowadays.

Finding a Cigarette Lighter

I took to the web in search of a cigarette lighter… and the search results returned tons of crap I wasn’t looking for. I quickly learned that I needed the technical name for the part I needed. I did a quick search for: “What are car cigarette lighters called” and I found out what I need is an: automobile cigarette lighter.

I found what I was looking for amidst several pages of crap trying to sell me stuff to plug into the socket. AutoZone supposedly had the part, but I’m a spoiled millennial and don’t want to visit a box store. Plus, the website didn’t have any photos of the product. I eventually found a cheap lighter on Amazon for $6 and it looked just like the cigarette lighters I saw in the 1990s.

The only drawback is the handle. It’s small and doesn’t look safe for the experiment, and I have no intention of burning myself or my car. I looked for similar products, but ended up settling with this lighter because everything else looked like useless decorations.

The Moment of Truth

I finally have what I need, so let’s plug this bad boy in and get cooking! I grabbed a fire extinguisher and drove my car to the nearest park with picnic tables, because I need a very flat surface to balance the can. Plus, I don’t want to burn down my house/car if things don’t go as expected.

I pushed the lighter in and…

… 🦗 …

A minute passed and it didn’t pop out.

… 🦗 …

After two minutes passed, I began to wonder if it’s working. It’s been decades since I’ve used a cigarette lighter, but I don’t remember it taking longer than a minute to pop out and light a cigarette.

I removed the lighter and felt heat coming from it. I guess I just need to be patient.

It pops out after 15 minutes. I quickly pulled out the white-hot cigarette lighter and placed the heating element directly onto the bottom of the can.

I balanced everything on the picnic table and let it cook.

After 1 minute, I removed the can and noticed the lighter is not hot and only slightly warm. The can itself is cold! Even the area the white-hot burner was touching is barely warm.

I pushed the lighter back into the socket to see if multiple cooking sessions will heat the soup enough to eat. This time, it took 25 minutes to heat the lighter. I grabbed the (now) completely cold can and repeated the same “cooking” process. I let it sit for a minute before checking… and there’s no noticeable change in the can’s temperature.

Again, the bottom of the can wasn’t very warm either.

I recorded the data and decided it’s time to call it a day and get something from Whataburger. Here’s the data I recorded:

🌡 The temperature is 75°F outside.

🌬 It’s slightly windy.

🚙 The 2022 Jeep Cherokee is turned on.

⌛ Time to heat the lighter: 15 minutes the first time, and 25 minutes the second time.

🔥 Number of times placed on the burner: 2 “cooking” sessions lasting 1-minute each.

🥫 Status of the can? Cold! Even the area the white-hot burner was touching is barely warm.

⏳️ Total experiment time: 42 minutes.

Conclusion

It appears that it’s not possible to cook a can of soup using an automobile cigarette lighter. The key factors in this conclusion are: the length of time it takes to heat the lighter and heat retention.

Heating Time

It takes too long to heat the lighter. At 15 and 25 minutes, the time it takes the lighter to heat is just too long. The time between cooking sessions is so long, the can of soup cools back to room temperature (75°F).

I am troubled by the amount of time it takes to heat the cigarette lighter. If memory serves, it should only take a minute or two for these things to work. This makes me wonder if there’s a difference between the sockets in modern cars and those found in classic cars. Perhaps older cars put out more energy? Hardly anyone uses the socket for a cigarette lighter, so maybe the power output was changed.

I don’t know anyone with a classic car. And even if I did, I doubt they’d let me test this theory.

Heat Retention

The heating element cools too quickly and doesn’t remain hot long enough to cook the soup. Logically, this makes sense because the cigarette lighter is designed to only remain hot long enough to light a cigarette. Being able to cool quickly means there’s less risk of personal injury and heat damage to the center console of the car.

***

This is the first experiment I’ve done to test the practicality of a far-fetched survivalist idea. We now know that cooking with a cigarette lighter isn’t possible because it takes too long to heat the lighter and the heating element doesn’t stay hot long enough.

I thought about another method of cooking I want to try and I’ll work on getting the materials set up to do that experiment. Be on the lookout for that article!

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[1] Lima, K. (Director). (1995). A Goofy Movie [Motion Picture].

[2] waltdisney512. (2015, March 5). A Goofy Movie Hi Dad Soup. Retrieved from YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0uEyx7SHKc

[3] NovaLumen75. (2021). How did goofy heat soup with a cigarette lighter? Retrieved from Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/FilmTheorists/comments/ovc1s5/how_did_goofy_heat_soup_with_a_cigarette_lighter/

[4] Where did Cigarette Lighters Go? When I was in my 1-digits (early 1990s), almost every car had an automobile cigarette lighter. Cars also had ash trays conveniently placed throughout the car. These conveniences were phased out at the end of the 1900s, as smoking habits changed because the health hazards related to smoking became more commonly known.

Nowadays, you can’t find cigarette lighters anywhere and I wonder what a Gen Z person would do if we asked them to use one (sounds like a great idea for a YouTube video). Auto manufactures replaced ashtrays with cup holders and stopped including the lighters altogether. Thankfully, they had enough foresight to keep the sockets because we wouldn’t have anywhere to plug in our phone chargers.