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A solid wooden spatula

There is no tool more useful in the kitchen than a solid wooden spatula. Ours happen to be bamboo and after hundreds of hours of use, it is still going strong. When I wake up in the morning and crack a few eggs into the pan, I subconsciously reach to my right and grab the spatula to guide my eggs on their cooking journey. A little bit of dishwashing liquid and a sponge bath later, it is ready for lunch. Then I simply repeat for dinner. Sure, there are synthetic spatulas and metal spatulas out there, but neither can match the usefulness of a wooden spatula. Synthetic spatulas do not pair well with the intense heat of a grill or the hot metal of a pan on the stovetop. Metal spatulas are usually adorned with a synthetic handle too, so they fall prey to the same faults. Wood on the other hand is perfect. A wooden spatula will not scratch your non-stick pan. It will not melt if left to sitting in the pan. It doesn’t conduct heat and thus it will never burn your hand. Best of all, over the years the spices of your meals will flavour your spatula.

The porous wood becomes a spice in itself, ready to serve you as you make your next meal. Too many people take the spatula for granted. Their new non-stick pans may get a lot of attention from dinner guests. A glimmering stainless steel stove may steal their attention. Understandably, your meal may win the hearts and minds of all of your guests – but without that spatula you would have been left with a burnt mess. I’m not sure who first invented the spatula, but its purpose is seemingly as old as the art of cooking food over a fire itself. The wooden spatula harkens back to these early artefacts.

Maybe the first spatula was a bone from scavenged dinner or a twig that may otherwise have served as kindle for the flames. Wherever the spatula can find its roots, surely that ancient chef and I can agree, there is no more useful tool for cooking up your next meal.

Cooking Rice

When I cook rice, I use a rice cooker.

The benefits of using this appliance outweigh any negative aspects of using it. When I use the rice cooker, I find it makes the rest of my cooking easier, because I do not have to think about moving the rice or turning down the heat. The rice basically cooks itself! The rice cooker has a really convenient removable pot, which is good for not getting any food or oil stuck in the cooker itself. I remove the pot, and set it on the counter away from the cooker. Here I pour in a small amount of olive oil to coat the bottom so that the rice does not stick. I then measure out the rice and pour it in the pot. I add the water as well, and a dash of salt. I take all the ingredients conveniently combined, and place it in the rice cooker. The pot goes in very snugly and easily into the cooker.

I plug in the cooker, and press down the lever for the rice to start cooking. That is all I have to do! Cooking the rice is essentially done, and I go on to do the rest of the cooking. It is nice to not have to worry about the rice, and I can concentrate on other parts of the meal, like adding the ingredients to and stirring the beans, and also defrosting, preparing, and cooking the meat. Another huge benefit of the rice cooker is that it doesn’t matter how soon before cooking the other foods I make the rice. Once the rice is done cooking, it automatically switches to the “keep warm” function, and keeps the rice warm as long as it is on.

So I don’t have to worry about it getting cold while I am cooking the beans and chicken! The rice is nice and warm when everyone is ready to eat. The rice cooker is my favourite appliance because it works really well, and is really convenient and easy to use. The rice always comes out great, and I never have any problems!

Black Coffee Anyone?

There is a belief among the women folks of my family that if you drink black coffee at a very early age, the chance of you becoming a black guy is more. If you become a black guy, it seems to be very difficult or you to marry a fair girl. There were times I used to really worry about the Africans as they cannot marry a white girl. But now when I go back to my memories, all seems to be a fun. We had a big coffee plantation. When the coffee seeds become red colour, we started collecting them and keep them in sunlight for many days till it becomes black color. Then we fry them nicely in hot fire in a special iron vessel.

The smell which comes during that time is really awesome. We used to add some fenugreek also along with the coffee seed almost at the end of frying. Then it is my turn to go to the flour mill along with our chief of tenant to ground the roasted seeds and bring some portion of that back to home for our daily needs. The remaining part will be given to the mill owner for trade. He will give the money to my grandfather after the trade. After spending seventeen years in Kerala for my school education, I went to Bangalore for my college education. This is the place where I could taste filter coffee for the first time. There will be decoction kept at every hotels and the way they mix it with milk is really in an artistic way. The taste of filter coffee was new to me but still I enjoyed it a lot. Even during the final year of my when I was stressed and busy with my project, filter coffee was really a tension reliever. Another instance with coffee is my first date at the coffee day where I could taste cappuccino for the first time. Both cappuccino and the girl couldn’t last long in my heart. My relation couldn’t survive long as there are a lot differences between the Syrian catholic guy who hailed from a village country side and the girl who is from the metro city of Bangalore.

Coffee was really a tension reliever even during my break-up times also. Then I thought that a change is really needed in my life and I changed my station to Chennai where the city has not gone very fast like Bangalore. This is where I met my soul mate who is actually a fan of tea. I got the opportunity to introduce her to my coffee world. She could enjoy this new taste and now she is a hard core fan of coffee. Also she is my life partner now and I am able to enjoy each and every moments of my life with her. We try a lot of varieties in coffee every now and then to make our life more sweeter.