Apparently, We're All Idiots

I know that the art of cooking is lost on most people these days. We're all in a rush to get to soccer games and meetings. Putting together a meal in a busy time frame can be hard and sometimes it's easier to go with fast food or pre-packaged. I think we can all admit that frozen puff pastry is simply the quickest alternative for the busiest of home bakers (not that homemade isn't delightful when you find that glorious free afternoon after bending spacetime itself in order to relax).

This leads up to the ease of home cooking gadgets. No one will snub the glory of the stand mixer or blender, or, in my home, the ice cream machine. They've become such standard tools that we write out our recipes under the assumption that home cooks have them (and though this thought could segment to another post all together, stay with me on this one for a while longer).

These devices and items are supposed to aid the cook. They reduce stress, labor, and the amount of time needed to preform certain culinary tasks - whipping egg whites into stiff, glossy peaks only take three minutes in the Kitchen-Aid as opposed to the arm numbing task of whipping them by hand.

Convenience foods have their place as well. Phyllo dough supposedly take 5 years to learn to make correctly. However, when was the last time you had five years, when a five minute drive to the local market will do just fine?

But there's a point where convenience and efficiency crosses a line into stupidity and handicapping the average human being's ability to feed themselves. Sadly, modern marketing has pounced upon this notion and made it it's mission to convince you that you're an incapable twit who is easily vexed by the simplest tasks.

I recently saw some commercial for a fruit drink of some kind. A woman is sitting at her desk, bites into a peach, and the juice gets all over her. Then the narrator states, "Take the difficulty out of eating your fruit," and plugs the drink.

Difficulty? Eating fruit is difficult now? (Minus certain exceptions like coconut, of course.) How sad is that? That our society is so out of touch with how to eat food - never mind cooking it - that we're told that fresh food, even something as simple as eating a peach, is too difficult, bothersome, and trying for the everyday person.

We're talking about eating. The basic act of giving our bodies fuel. Is it THAT hard? We have to be instructed to easier methods?

With a peach I can just bite it. The juice container is tchnically heavier and I have to struggle with twisting a cap off it. I mean if we're gonna talk about how much work eating either one of these products is, the juice is a loser due to the cap acting as an extra step between picking it up and it being in my mouth.

From this commerical we can establish two things:

1. This woman is an idiot, and as she represents the average consumer, the company says we're idiots too.

2. Possible solutions. Cut up the peach. Eat it over a plate or napkin. There are plenty, tastier, more logical options than buying fruit juice and tossing yet another container into the trash.

As for the cooking, wow. I have no words. Actually, no, I have many.

One infomercial for some specialty pizza cooking oven thingy blew me away. The narrator prompted, "Do you have problems heating your frozen pizza and ensuring a crispy crust and melting texture?" Then it cut to a black and white video of a woman attempting to cram a frozen pizza the size of a Goodyear into a toaster. Her over-dramatized frustration was meant to connect with, apparently, my own everyday experiences of trying to fit whole pizzas into toasters (and that's nothing to say about my plight every time I try shoving bagels into zippo lighters).

People, seriously, if this is a major issue in your life then a fancy pizza cooker isn't going solve the massive intellectual bankruptcy that obviously hinders you on a daily basis.

Take the lady in this infomerical for the Egg Genie, a device that hard boils your eggs because you didn't graduate high school.

I understand not knowing how to boil an egg if you haven't cooked before, but this woman is all kinds of incompetent. Not only can she not figure out how to cook an egg through trial and error (i.e. "This egg is not done, I should boil the others longer."), she is also incapable of consulting a cookbook or the internet for help, or asking anyone on the street for advice on how to hard boil an egg. This is total ineptitude on a cosmic level. Where are her keepers and why have they let her alone to play with a stove!? Moving a pot of water is even a struggle for her, especially without her pillow padded helmet on. No, the modern adult needs a safety device for cooking a fucking egg.

I mean, Christ, we were trusted with Easy Bake Ovens as children! We could have burned ourselves! Parent supervision be damned, because that cakelette wasn't going to bake itself! Today moving a 2 quart pot of water is a trial, and we haven't even gotten to the knives or burners yet. At this rate we'll soon convince ourselves that eating and drinking all together is a trying inconvenience. Just pump a nutrient rich slurry directly into my stomach and get it over with.

So people, hard boil your eggs without devices. Eat your peaches and let that sticky juice dribble down your arms and onto a smartly laid out plate. Prove to the world your pregnant mom didn't do lines longer than the one outside the Matterhorn ride. We're capable of cooking and eating, no matter what TV says.

We're not idiots.