In this final entry to this min-series, I’ll be sharing my
personal experiences with 2 ethnography-styled short studies based on microwave
use. For 3 days I cooked all of my meals using only the microwave as a heat
source, and then did 3 days of not using the microwave at all. I also talked to
a variety of different people about their microwave use and their thoughts
about it (advantages, disadvantages, etc.).
The Microwaveless Days
I wasn’t sure how much this would affect me because I don’t
often use the microwave. I typically use it to either make some popcorn (when I
am too lazy to make it over the stove) or to warm up some foods I eat as a
snack (being an extremely odd person, I tend to snack on weird things like
thawed peas and mango chunks… though never at the same time, a girls’ gotta
have standards). Although I don’t generally consider myself a heavy microwave
user, when I look back at what I just wrote, I could potentially use the
microwave 3 times a day! To me, this actually does seem like a lot, seeing how
much I use the other appliances in my kitchen (toaster oven, oven, stove,
etc.).
I had to write a large note and post it on the microwave to
remind myself that I wasn’t allowed to use it for the three days. This
demonstrated to me just how unconscious the use of the microwave has become;
that the only time I had to actually put effort into thinking about it was when
I couldn’t use it, not the other way around. Also, as soon as the first day
started I ended up feeling very restricted in what I could do in the kitchen
even though I still had a large variety of ways I could prepare my foods. I
would just walk in and kind of stare at the microwave, ticking off foods in my
head that had now become more difficult to eat.
After that, the 3 days passed with relative ease. I don’t
think it really changed what I eat because I just ended up eating some things
cold (stews, soups, etc.), but I eat them cold most of the time anyway, because
I often eat ‘em during class with no access to a microwave.
Microwave Central
I knew that out of the two options I had that
this one would be the most difficult, but also the one with the greatest
explorative possibilities. Even the people I encounter who rely heavily on
their microwaves to make their food generally use some other appliance in
combination to cook their meal. Solely using the microwave to cook my food was
going to be tough. My goal for these three days was to not just get through
them but to explore the many things that you could cook in the microwave that
you wouldn’t necessarily think you could (ex. a cake, soup, eggs). My biggest
concern was dinners, and how to cook a whole meal in the microwave.
 |
My first muffin in a mug. I suppose its called a mug muffin. A blueberry mug muffin. |
On the first day I had great difficulty in forcing myself to
use the microwave to cook things I normally would do on some other appliance.
For example, I wanted to make hot chocolate but couldn’t force myself to heat
the water in the microwave. I seem to have developed a block against it. Weird.
I basically used the microwave a couple of times for some things but mainly
lived off food I didn’t need to cook (fruits, veggies, hummus) for the rest of
the day. I did cook eggs though. Tasted and looked exactly like hotel
continental breakfast eggs…
 |
A lovely bowl of carrot cake oatmeal a la microwave. |
 |
Turkey meatloaf in the microwave. Looks kinda homely but tasted great. |
Above are pictures of food I made on my third day, where I
fully embraced the whole microwave as a cooking appliance idea. It was actually
pretty interesting because it was totally unfamiliar to me so figuring out
cooking times was something that constantly amazed me (they were so short!!!).
By the end of the third day I got really used to cooking food in the microwave
and even on the day after made an entire meal using it.
Interviews
I've ended up talking to a lot of people about their microwave use. Some people I talked to either don't have one or use it very, very rarely, where other people rely heavily on it. One of my friends recalled how her mom had lectured her so much about the dangers of the microwave that for a long time she always held her breath while using the microwave to stave off the radiation (a highly logical solution). One person I talked to stated that her microwave recently broke for 3 days and it was, "like a living hell, Trying to get all the kids fed and make meals. Those 3 days were torture". A lot of people I talked to said they used the microwave to reheat dinners for family members who missed that meal, or to cook one part of the meal to cut down on the overall cooking time. I also asked people when the were allowed, or when they allowed their children to start using the microwave. Generally, people said that they let their kids use the microwave and toaster before they let them touch the oven or stove, mainly for safety reasons.
Microwave Study Recap
Over these last 4 posts I have looked at a variety of
components surrounding microwave use in modern society. I’ve looked at its
early years; when it came out, who used it, when it became more accessible to
the lower classes, when it entered pop culture and became so mainstream that microwaveable foods became
the normal, and the resistance movements and subcultures that try to subvert
the microwave’s grasp of the subconscious of our society. I think the goal of
this study was to look at microwave use, not for the reason of lecturing at
people to stop using it, but to make us more aware of the amount we rely on it
and how immersed in society it actually is, to the point where it becomes a
harder choice to not use it than to use it. I learned how much I take it for
granted, but at the same time how relatively easy it was to not live with it
(compared to living only with it).
Time to go celebrate the completion of this mini-series with some good old microwave popcorn to suit the occasion! :) (you thought I'd be tired of it by now eh?)
