Now THIS would have been helpful as a college student! Apparently that overvalued college education I’ll be paying off for the next ten to fifteen years paid off because I discovered an efficient way to cook pasta without a pot, without a direct heat source, and without boiling water. Living in a small 1 bedroom apartment without a full kitchen has seriously hindered my ability to ingest pasta like it is my job in the past 14 months. Before this lifestyle change, my devotion to everything CARBS was unwavering. Especially as a college student, I couldn’t find any reason to justify not eating it for several days in a row. It’s cheap. It’s easy. It’s imperishable. It’s yummy. The end.

Last week, I tried cooking ravioli in a coffeemaker for the first time. I had no idea how it was going to turn out, as I doubted that the heat generated to make a measly cup of coffee would be a sufficient amount for cooking pasta. It turns out I had no reason to doubt the power of the coffeemaker. I bought a small package of three-cheese ravioletti by Buitoni at the grocery store down the street. The next step was to make sure the coffeemaker was clean of any leftover grounds. Considering I make coffee every morning, I knew that this might be the hardest part of the entire process–and looking back on it, it was! After cleaning it thoroughly, I filled the reservoir with water, emptied the package of ravioli into the coffee pot, and press ‘BREW’. I wish I could tell you it required some sort of culinary prowess on the part of its chef. I wish I could say that I made the ravioli with my own two hands as a sort of concession for my laziness. No such luck. I merely had a crazy idea and was crazy enough to try it out!

-J