What is it with telly chefs and microwaves?
There’s Nigella Lawson’s much-memed pronunciation of the word. There’s Mary Berry’s lost-to-time microwave cookbook from 1988 (yes, really).
And, of course, there are the endless clips of Gordon Ramsay literally raging against the machine.
“I mean, microwaves are for lazy cooks,” he told Insider in 2020, adding that there’s no way to replicate “the texture and the searing and the contrast” pan cooking can offer.
So why, then, does his OWN ten-minute sticky toffee pudding recipe take place in “Chef Mike”?
The chef admits the microwave can be useful on “certain occasions”
“I promise you, [a microwave] can be helpful ― on certain occasions,” the chef said at the start of his video. “Every chef uses them,” he later admitted.
He also called the microwave “my amazing assistant who never answers back.”
Gordon then slices up some dates and mixes them with baking soda and “a touch” of water to “break down” the dates. He puts that in the microwave for 30 seconds.
Then, he creamed brown sugar with butter using a wooden spoon. After that’s combined, he added Golden Syrup and an egg before beating the lot together.
He put the freshly-nuked dates and bicarb back in the microwave for another 30 seconds before adding them to the syrup, egg, butter, and sugar mix.
Only then does he fold the plain flour in to form a batter and pour it “two-thirds full” into a buttered and floured bowl.
“Normally we’d be steaming these ― this is a really fast way,” he said of the mixture; then, he tapped the bowl, put a sheet of kitchen roll on top of the mix to “help it steam,” and then cooked it in four 30-second increments.
He prepped a classic caramel sauce while “chef Mike” was working, adding creme fraiche at the end on top of the double cream.
Why are microwaves good for baking?
If you love to bake, you’ve probably learned that as long as you’re careful, they’re uniquely good for tasks like melting chocolate.
“For recipes where the chocolate just needs to be melted and drizzled over or stirred into something else before baking, melting it in the microwave is quick, simple and convenient,” BBC Good Food writes.
“This is why microwaves are so good at re-heating food: rather than heating the food from the outside like a normal oven would, they heat the water within the food, so it heats up quicker and more evenly,” a CNET article reads.
It’s also why they can be so good for steaming foods, as most puddings are traditionally cooked.
So, ignore the bluster ― even Gordon Ramsay uses a microwave from time to time.