301–310 of 528 posts
You can reduce the energy consumption drastically by boiling way less water than "a large pot" as every packet recommends. Just enough to cover the pasta + some evaporation margin is good enough.
That's why I tend to avoid spaghetti these days. A smaller pasta fits in the small pot better.
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>every American has a microwave in their home Of course we do! Europeans don't all have microwave ovens? How do you warm up leftovers? And yes, I drink tea daily with microwaved water.
Isn’t it problematic to heat water in a microwave?
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Americans largely don't use electric kettles because Americans largely don't drink tea at home and thus don't use kettles as often as the rest of the world. Most households I know don't even own a kettle. Not a stovetop one, not an electric one. If you were to ask most Americans why they don't have an electric kettle at home they won't say "because I only have 120V outlets in the kitchen." They'll say it is because t…
But that's partially because 1100W kettles are less _useful_. I'm mostly a coffee drinker, and use a bean to cup machine for that. But I still use my kettle a good bit, because it's quicker to boil the kettle and then pour into the pan and bring back to the boil than bringing cold water to the boil in the pan. I've got a 3kW kettle, though, if I had a 1100W one I wouldn't do that because it _wouldn't_ be quicker.
The claim: reduces CO₂e emissions by up to 80%* The asterisk: water boiling phase excluded When I boil pasta, I use full heat to get the water boiling, drop in the pasta, then let it come back up to a boil, then drop the temperature as low as possible to keep a slow boil going--about medium-low. Guesstimating that the boil takes about as long as the time to cook the pasta, I'd say that the pasta cooking portion only…
You can also use a lot less water than is standard: just enough to cover the noodles. Kenji Lopez-Alt has written about this a bunch [1]. Noodles cooked that way were indistinguishable in his testing. He's also discussed it on his cooking youtube channel, which I recommend to anyone. For example, a 3-ingredient macaroni and cheese [2] in which he discusses the noodles at 0:40-ish. [1] https://www.seriouseats.com/how-…
The idea is that by minimizing the water you can maximize the starchiness of the water, which creates a great emulsifier for the cheese sauce, along with evaporated milk. The combo is truly creamy mac and cheese, with no grittiness or separation of oils. It tastes great, it's faster than Kraft, it's energy efficient, it's easy to learn (literally 3 ingredients plus water).
It also has easy-to remember-units (6 oz pasta, 6 oz cheese, 6 fl oz evap milk). The evap milk amount perfectly divides the USA standard 12 fl oz evap milk can.
Kenji has tweaked the ergonomics of scratch mac and cheese light years ahead of where it was.
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You sure? Germany is a (shit) coffee country and everybody has had electric kettles since the 90s.
What do they use the kettles for? For most non tea drinking households in the US there is no essential use for a kettle. They do sell them here, people buy them, they are usually tea drinkers.
electric kettle
french press for coffee
tea kettle for tea
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Americans largely don't use electric kettles because Americans largely don't drink tea at home and thus don't use kettles as often as the rest of the world. Most households I know don't even own a kettle. Not a stovetop one, not an electric one. If you were to ask most Americans why they don't have an electric kettle at home they won't say "because I only have 120V outlets in the kitchen." They'll say it is because t…
Once introduced, it's hard to downplay the usefulness of an electric kettle.
If it broke tonight I don't know that I'd bother replacing it tomorrow. I'd probably go a while before I got another kettle. It might even take someone gifting me one before I bother getting one.
Sure, it's marginally faster boiling water than my stove. It's about as fast as my microwave (which is insane at 1650W). It's definitely more efficient, but the break even on that is measured in years probably for even a cheap kettle and decades for this fancy one I have.
I just don't really drink many hot drinks and my microwave does just about as good of a job for getting things hot.
https://www.cuisinart.com/shopping/appliances/tea_kettles/cp...
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The claim is weird, though. If they said “just add to boiling water and turn off immediately” then they would claim it’s 100% more efficient*. If you turn off your water right before it’s boiling and cook your pasta, then Barilla is an energy generator*.
Actually reverse cycle air conditioners are said to have a heating efficiency of over 100%, but what they really do is to move the heat from one point to another. It's all about definitions; if you define the system as your room, it will be more than 100% efficient. If your system is the universe, then it's always 100%. By the same logic, yes, your hypothetical statement can be rephrased as "if you already have boili…
Back in reality, the purpose of a heat pump is to heat/cool an enclosed space. Its efficiency is rated by comparing it to a direct conversion from electricity to heat. So long as what occurs outside doesn't affect what occurs inside, it isn't relevant to the question of efficiency.
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>every American has a microwave in their home Of course we do! Europeans don't all have microwave ovens? How do you warm up leftovers? And yes, I drink tea daily with microwaved water.
Isn’t it problematic to heat water in a microwave?
According to Kenji, you don't even need boiling water to cook pasta: https://www.seriouseats.com/how-to-cook-pasta-salt-water-boi... https://www.seriouseats.com/tips-for-better-easier-pasta "Want to get even more crazy efficient? Try soaking pasta in water as your prep your other ingredients. By the time your sauce is ready, you can just add the pasta (along with some of its soaking liquid) to the pan and, with a min…
You can just eat dry pasta like chips and save a lot more energy!