Love Your Microwave

LEAF’S BACK! This week, our favourite gastro-guide steers you through quality cuisine cooked solely in the microwave.

alan sugar cooking food leaf arbuthno microwave muggins

If forced to, I would pick the humble microwave as my number one favourite appliance.

And you know what? It wouldn’t be a tough call. Blenders are great in that they reduce chopping time and make a macho noise, but I know a lady who is missing six and a half fingers because of a Magimix accident! It made the barn-dance really awkward; you had to grip her wrist to spin her, rather than her hand.

And coffee-grinders are capital gadgets (you have to rate the amount of caffeine those guys coax out of the beans) but they epitomise the one-trick pony. The same goes for toasters.

So, on the grounds of versatility alone, microwaves are clearly The Almighty. They also come in a stunning variety of prices and designs – from the functional white boxes that domesticate our gyp rooms to the stainless steel beasts that haunt the kitchens of the likes of Alan Sugar and Sauron.

Someone should start a microwave appreciation society. Oh, wait! Good old ‘Kathy Ka Yan Chan’ from Leicester University already has: see for yourself on Facebook.

Here are four microwave recipes that will make you snigger haughtily when you next clap eyes on a hob:

1. Microbutty

Two rashers of bacon

Ketchup

Lettuce (If you’re into leaves. I am.)

A roll

Put two rashers of bacon on a plate. Microwave for one minute, then turn the rashers over. Microwave for another 30 seconds. Remove, place in a bread roll, smother with ketchup and add a few salad bits. Devour.

A cracking little bap

2. Muggins (muffins made in a mug)

½ Cup of butter

½ Cup of sugar

1 tablespoon of oil

1 beaten egg

1/2 cup of self raising flour

50 ml milk

Cinnamon/cocoa powder

Blueberries

Mix all the ingredients with a fork. Put about two tablespoons of the mixture in a mug. Microwave for one minute, till it has risen and assumed a muffin-like texture (though it won’t go brown). Consume out of mug with a fork.

Delicious

3. Jam and Cheese Microdream

Mature cheddar

Jam

Bread

Sugar

Toast a slice of bread. Spread liberally with jam. Lie sliced cheddar on top. Microwave for 20 seconds. Sprinkle with sugar. Live a short and happy life.

Sat fat and sugar: excitable bed-fellows

4. Micromelette

2 eggs

Cream

Pesto

Chicken bits/tomato

Beat the eggs with a dash of cream. Add salt and pepper and a large dollop of pesto. Add whatever other omelette-y ingredients you want. Pour into a bowl and microwave for a minute or so, until nothing is runny.

Looks vommy, tastes yummy