Cooking with your nose and ears

Question: How do blind people cook?

Answer: Carefully.

 

 That sounds like a joke.  But basically it is true.
 

If you can see normally, can you imagine cooking dinner without being able to see what you are doing?  I had to learn how to do that when I lost my eyesight.  I’d like to share some of my experiences.
 

I am married and my wife, thankfully, is a good cook.  But I like to help with the cooking so I cook twice a week, on Thursdays and Fridays.
 

Some blind people cook using the gas flame, frying pans etc. But I am not so brave.  I am a little bit scared that I will forget to turn the gas off or accidentally touch the flame and so I do all my cooking using the microwave or other electrical devices such as a rice cooker.

You might think that it would be impossible to cook a nice meal using only a microwave.  That is because the microwave is often used to defrost frozen meals or to heat up pre-prepared meals which are of a poor quality.  But the microwave can be used to steam food, which is healthier than frying it.  And with practice it can be used to do most things, like making pasta.
 

All you need to do is learn how long you should put each food in the microwave for, find the right container to put them in and learn where all the buttons are on the microwave.
 

I have attached some stickers on the buttons of my microwave.  So I know that this one is one minute, this one is ten seconds, this one is start etc.  I also regularly use a silicone steamer.  If you put meat, fish or vegetables in the steamer and then inside the microwave, you can cook them without the need to add oil.  This is not only healthy, but also very convenient.  It is quick to use and easy to clean.  My wife has also started using the silicone steamer that I bought instead of frying many foods.
 

Washing, cutting and chopping vegetables can all be done quite easily if you are careful.  I have been cooking this way for about three years and have only cut myself once.  That was while trying to grate daikon and I tried to grate a piece which was too small.  Basically, I forgot the first question I asked at the start of this blog.  How do blind people cook?
 

The biggest problem I have with cooking is deciding if the food is old or rotten and cannot be eaten.  Of course, if my wife is home I can ask her.  Otherwise, my last defence is my nose.  Unless it is expensive cheese, if it smells bad then you probably shouldn’t eat it.
 

I would like to post a simple recipe for something that I cook but my blog has become long already so maybe I will do that next week or soon.

 

Vocabulary:

A flame - A small fire

To be brave - A brave person has courage.  They do not run away from difficult or dangerous situations.

An electrical device - A machine which uses electricity to operate.  A tv is another electrical device.

To defrost something – If something is as cold as ice, you defrost it by heating it up.

A container – A container is something which holds something else inside it.

To grate something – To peel or cut food into many small pieces.  Daikon and cheese are examples of food which is often grated.

To be rotten – To become old and smelly; to be bad.