Return to the brass age

March 28, 2010 by  
Filed under Cookery School

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The more things change in cooking, the more nostalgic we become for the original

So much in our lives works in cycles. We retire things we’ve used for years and grown tired of, replace them with something new, and then come to miss the originals, which we recruit back into service, their attractions revived. This principle can be seen in the cycles of fashionability that revolve around clothing, furniture, styles of decoration, movie genres and much else. It even applies to household tools and kitchen utensils. These days Thai consumers of kitchen items place the emphasis on convenience and the appearance of modernity. Pots and frying pans are lined with Teflon to keep food from sticking, plastic electrical water heaters are preferred to stainless steel ones because they look more attractive and pepper grinders are made of clear plastic so that the level of the peppercorns inside can be seen. But the cook whose kitchen is equipped with a copper-coated frying pan with brass handles, expensive items that must be imported, will be seen as the most up-to-date of all. Copper and brass kitchen equipment is now seen in Thailand as especially desirable.
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