Have you ever thought about the history sitting in your gadget drawer?
Why is it that when you are staying in a bach there is one gadget that's always missing - the can opener.
What's even more odd is that the can and the can opener were not invented at the same time. In 1810, the can was invented to provide a suitable way of preserving British soldiers' rations. But they had to use knives, bayonets and rifle fire to open them.
And when the first openers did appear the part-bayonet-part-sickle design wasn't particularly effective at opening cans. It wasn't until 1870 that the first effective can openers turned up, looking much like today's ones.
On to the corkscrew. The English were the first to seal wine bottles using oak cork from Portugal and Spain, but the identity of the person who came up with the first corkscrew remains a mystery. We do know, though, that it was derived from a gun worme, a tool used to extract an unspent charge from the barrel of a musket.
And what about the origins of other essential kitchen gadgets? The Norwegians invented a cheese slicer when Thor Bjorklund, having a lunch break in his carpenter workshop, found the pieces of cheese in his sandwich had melted together. He tried to slice it with a knife, then a saw, and then a wood plane which worked but was cumbersome to use. Then he found a thin slice of steel, cut it and bent it down, which worked a treat.
So excited was he by his thin slices of cheese that he patented the idea.
In 1919, Charles Strite received financial backing from friends to make 100 toasters for restaurants, complete with a pop-up mechanism and a timing adjustment.
In 1850, the first wooden dishwasher appeared, consisting of a hand-turned wheel that splashed water on dishes, although it wasn't particularly effective.
Josephine Cochran launched the hand-operated mechanical machine at a world fair where only hotels and large restaurants were interested. It wasn't until 1950 that she founded a company to manufacture them.
The Magi-Mix compact food processor was first exhibited in Paris in 1971 by inventor Pierre Verdon, based on his earlier restaurant-scaled Robot-Coupe.
Carl Sontheimer, an American engineer and inventor, refined Verdon's machines to produce the Cuisinart, a huge success following its 1973 exhibition in Chicago.
Mango lassi
Pear, lime and ginger cake
