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Well, America -- the truth came out in Chicago. Judging from the appliances on display at the International Home and Housewares show running in the Windy City earlier this week, what people really want is what they've been clamoring for since the 1950s -- convenience. No matter how we profess our love for chefs, watch culinary how-to shows, or snap up lushly illustrated cookbooks, apparently most of us still aren't so wild about cooking itself.
In fact, it seems as though grocers and appliance makers have teamed up to create a futuristic "cooking" future where no one really has to think at all. Remember when it seemed crazy that microwaves had a button for popcorn? Well, now they come outfitted with one-touch options for pizzas and omelets.
A huge swath of the country lacks kitchen competence, and it would be foolish for food and appliance companies to ignore those consumers. "I would say that cooking ability is really minimal," Janet Andreas, consumer culinary development manager for French's Foods, told the New York Times. According to market research by the NPD Group, small kitchen electrics netted $3.8 billion from 2008 to 2009, a jump of more than 8 percent, while sales of housewares -- real kitchen tools like knives and pans -- were down 11.5 percent.
After all, why use a pan when you can use a toaster oven, one of the most popular appliances on the market today? They're used mostly, it appears, as a means to cook frozen pizzas. The majority of them now have a rounded bubble (nicknamed a "bump") to accommodate the pizzas; never mind that a standard oven already does the job nicely. A couple of them even boast a "smart cookie" button for store-bought cookie dough, a depressing marriage of convenience if there ever was one.
For those cooks who have lost the will to think completely, a Los Angeles-based company called Microwave Science has come up with a system called True Cook Plus that does all of the calculations for you. Enter in your ZIP code, and it will adjust for your elevation. Then enter a code on a box of whatever it is you're cooking. The software programs the microwave oven to cook the food so that it tastes its "best" and reaches a safe temperature. Or...you could chuck the box, pull out a pan, and make something the old fashioned way.
[via The New York Times]
Related Link: 8 Essential Kitchen Gadgets
3-17-2010 @11:46PM Bean Reel said... Seriously? Nine million cooking shows, from PBS to the Food Network, and people only cook frozen pizzas? Holy Julia Childs! I have a number of appliances I use to cook -- really cook -- meals. I like the convenience of assigning a task to each appliance, but I orchastrate the entire meal from planning to shopping to prepping and cooking. It's not until the dishwasher has been filled and run that I consider the meal complete.
So you suppose this had come about because fewer generations are growing up without a full time parent in the home who does things like cook? Technology and change are good, to a limit, but look what we've done. It's a sad statement, I think.
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3-18-2010 @10:58AM Chris said... There does seem to be a growing chasm between the 'live to eats' and the 'eat to lives'. There are people, a lot of whom read this blog no doubt, who would think it a perfect Sunday morning spending time preparing a sunday roast or some other special dish for their loved ones. For other people it's laying in bed reading the Sunday papers or recovering from their hangover, for whom a microwave meal is perfect. I think a lot of the gadgets in the show won't be seen by the people they're aimed at until they see them advertised on TV or in the local electrical store.
Judging people comes too easily to me, but as I get older, I realise it's best to live and let live. For a lot of people it's worthwhile compromising on taste to gain time, and that's their decision, it doesn't make any of our lives worse. Indeed, it makes it better. If people realised that you could buy the best cheddar in the world for only 3 times the price of the cheapest, it would be much more difficult to get hold of! Imagine if you could buy a Rolls Royce for only 3 times the cost of a Dacia Sandero, everyone would have a Roller...
Also, the whole cookery show thing is really no more than food porn. I bought a celebrity chef endorsed cookbook, with the determination to cook everything in it. When I looked in the back to what was considered 'store cupboard essentials' it would have cost me hundreds of pounds to buy all the things that are considered 'essential' even though my larder is pretty well stocked. A lot of the speciality ingredients for the recipes, you wind up having to buy a massive box of something, just to use a pinch, and then the rest winds up in the bin when find it at the back of the cupboard 3 years later with funky green things growing on it.
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3-21-2010 @4:29PM mcdicarlo said... my microvawe isn't that new and doesn't need the zip code to cook anything
it already had the features you mentioned of entering the item to be cooked
so wht's the big deal about the new one
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