Wonderbag Update

I blogged last week about the amazing, energy saving wondrous, Wonderbag.
I considered attempting to make my very own homemade wonderbox, but then decided that actually, I think the Wonderbag pretty effectively meets my post Make Do and Mend Year “If I do buy new, make sure it’s ethical” rules. The polystyrene chips that they use are all recycled, and for every bag bought in the UK, one is given to a family in need in Africa, where the benefits go far beyond saving energy.
So I bought one.
And amid much excitement, it has arrived!

AND we’ve used it. Twice. So far.

It comes with a handy recipe book to get you started, but as we didn’t have the things we needed for any of the recipes, I perhaps slightly rashly, decided to adapt a recipe from a slow cooker book I found in the library. It was a kind of cauliflower-y, mild curry thing with potatoes and chickpeas (I think it may have had a catchier title than that…)
It is almost a little eery ‘cooking’ with a Wonderbag. Because everything is all snugly tucked up inside the bag, there are no cooking-y smells. And normally, when cooking, the kitchen warms up a bit, but again, there is none of this. And no noise from the oven, or from anything bubbling away on the hob. As I said, eery.

I will admit to feeling a certain amount of trepidation as I carried the Wonderbag over to the table for the first ever big reveal. I had ben sorely tempted to have a prod and a poke several times during the ‘cooking’ process, but the advice book advises (for that is what they do) quite sternly that you should not do this, as all the heat escapes, rendering the Wonderbag more of, well, just a bag.
So, drumroll please…..
It was cooked! And hot! And it tasted pretty yum. And 50% of the Smalls ate it 🙂 (Which actually, given that it had cauliflower in , which all small children seem to think is the food of the devil, I am pretty surprised at)

So flushed with success, I wanted to try a pudding, and went for the Golden Syrup Steamed Pudding in the recipe book.
Again, that slightly weird “is it actually doing anything” sensation, and possibly a few butterflies as I unwrapped the pud (mother in law was round to add to the pressure, and we all know mother in laws are aficionados of steamed puddings).
Another drumroll….
Again, it was cooked! And delicious. And this time, 100% of the Smalls ate it 🙂

There was much excitement…

I think it is safe to say I am a convert.
It certainly takes some getting used to, and I think might take another few attempts before I stop panicking that things won’t be cooked, but it is most definitely energy saving-tastic, and gets the Make Do and Mend, and Great Energy Race seals of approval.