03.13.2009
T-Man Tea Strainer by Jeewon Jung
If it seems like brewing tea can't get any easier, perhaps it can get more interesting. Jeewon Jung's concept design of the T-Man Tea Strainer will almost certainly warrant a second look. A small hinge reveals the compartment waiting for your tea leaves. Once filled, this little guy is ready for a nice soak.
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Posted by Laura
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03.12.2009
Thinking about drinking: help with alcohol
If all be true that I do think,
There are five reasons we should drink;
Good wine--a friend--or being dry--
Or lest we should be by and by--
Or any other reason why.
That wry commentary on the human love affair with alcohol seems to have come down to us from the 17th century, attributed variously to Brit churchman Henry Aldrich and French poet Jean Sirmond. You may not know--or care--why you or someone you love drinks, but perhaps you're worried that the drinking is excessive.
If so, here's a new free US government site that wants to help. Rethinking Drinking tries be everything you ever wanted to know about booze and more. What counts as a drink? Is a particular person's drinking pattern risky? Is that "lite" beer lite in alcohol as well as calories? How strong is that mixed drink?
The Rethinking Drinking site is also full of tools, like calculators to figure out a person's drinking pattern, drink sizes, and alcohol calories, plus tips to help handle urges to drink, cutting down, even quitting. There are also links to other resources and free publications. Raise a glass to the taxpayers for this helpful free service!
Posted by Tam
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03.10.2009
Eat your keyboard
I know it's naughty, but I have to admit to having pounded my keys a little too hard on occasion - and once I even swore at my trackpad. Okay, more than once. But one thing I never thought about doing was eating my keyboard.
Some folks a little more creative than me have however created the means to do just that. No-one seems to know where exactly you can buy this white chocolate keyboard, but it's a great design that would be the perfect gift for the frustrated geek in your life. (I bet you'd need to hit it really hard against a table to dislodge a piece... much better than throwing your real keyboard against your furniture, and almost as soothing - I'm guessing)
I just have one problem with it: why white chocolate? 70% cocoa would have had much better healing properties...
Via Boing Boing Gadgets.
Posted by Diane
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02.25.2009
Eco-friendly Sodastream's Pure homemade soda system
A few years ago, we covered Sodastream's Peguin, a homemade soda system. Last December, Sodastream released their newest model, the Pure. It still produces homemade soda in 30 seconds using reusable BPA-free plastic bottles and carbonators filled with CO2 gas. You can then drink it plain or add anything you want to make flavored carbonated beverages, like pomegranate-orange-ginger soda. Being able to control what goes into your carbonated beverages has obvious health benefits, by replacing or reducing sugar and corn syrup with real fruit juice and other natural ingredients.
Moreover, there are ecological reasons to make your own soda and sparkling water. The recent wave of attention over plastic water bottle was important, but soda and sparkling water seemed to get an easy out in the discussion. The average American drinks over 600 cans of bottles of soda and sparkling water each year, of which 55% aluminum cans and 66% plastic bottles fail to get recycled and end up in landfills. There is also the issue of imported sparkling water, which must often cross continents and oceans to get stores in the US.
The Pure uses one canister of CO2 to make 110 liters (30 gallons) of soda (without batteries or electricity,) which has a vastly smaller carbon footprint than transporting all those cans and bottles to the store and then into your home, not to mention all the material and energy that goes into creating those containers themselves. It's rare that a product is healthier, reduces consumption, and allows for increasing ways for creative experimentation, but Sodastream has achieved it.
Posted by Ray
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01.28.2009
Easy tea with IngenuiTEA
Making a good cup of loose leaf tea just got easier with the IngenuiTEA from adagio teas. Open the top and drop in your loose leaf tea. Pour in your hot water and let steep. When you're ready to drink, simply place the IngenuiTEA on top of your cup and a valve at the bottom will release the hot liquid through a mesh filter. Watch it in action here. Dishwasher and microwave safe to make your life even easier.
Posted by Laura
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11.21.2008
S'mores Maker for the indoorsy type
When I look at a new kitchen gadget, I usually ask myself, "Would this thing make my life easier or more complicated?" This S'mores Maker seems to be designed to make a cozy camp-fire tradition both simpler (and therefore less fun) and more complicated (and therefore less fun). It promises to make two whole S'mores in the microwave in less than 30 seconds, the water reservoir ensuring even heating of chocolate, marshmallows, and graham crackers. Those folding arms that hold down the whole mess are kind of cute, and would probably amuse a kid whose home sick from school (if you're like me - the type of parent who gives sick kids sweets instead of soup). It's dishwasher-safe, so at least there's no huge mess to clean up. At just $7, it could make a good stocking stuffer - and it's available at Amazon.
Via Kitchen Contraptions.
Posted by lydia
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09. 2.2008
Make your own stone baked pizza (without a huge expensive oven)
The word 'pizza' always piques my interest. Add the word 'stonebaked' in front of it and resistance is futile. But I always thought the only option for make-your-own stonebaked pizzas was a huge expensive oven, and even if I had the cash, I'm not sure I'm so pizza-obsessed that I'd get a special oven just for one food stuff. (Ah, who am I kidding, I make my first million and it's the first thing I'll do!)
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Posted by Diane
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08.13.2008
Miracle sour-to-sweet berries
Everyone's experienced the unpleasant sensation of eating something very sweet, say syrup-soaked pancakes, and then taken a bite or sip of something just slightly less sweet, like orange juice, and found that the juice suddenly tastes sour and bitter. How much nicer would it be if you could eat something sweet and make everything else you eat even sweeter? Miracle fruit tablets, or "miracle berries" accomplish just that by causing a protein reaction in your mouth which makes even the sourest, bitterest things, like a sharp lemon, taste sweet.
The geeks at ThinkGeek have tried the miracle fruit, and claim that it makes straight limes taste like the sweetest, most ambrosial limeade. Even better? Something already sweet, like ripe oranges, tasted like "they were plucked straight from the Garden of Eden."
While it's a bit strange, it's also quite appealing because unless you live near a farmer's market, you're unlikely to ever encounter truly ripe, fresh, naturally sweet fruit. Supermarket fruits are often gorgeous, with shiny luscious skins, but their beauty is superficial - take a bite and there's barely a hint of fruit taste at all. I am always longing for the sweet plums and cherries from my childhood, but except for peaches and strawberries, which my Mom grows in her yard, most fruits I eat are sub-par and need a sprinkling of sugar or Splenda. Perhaps the solution is to eat a Miracle fruit tablet before eating any other kind of fruit. One tablet's effects last up to an hour, and just a half-tablet is enough to sweeten most tart, acidic foods. There's nothing artificial in the tablets, just the fruit powder and corn starch.
A box of 10 tablets (which is really 20 servings) is $20 from ThinkGeek.
Posted by Mia
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08.13.2008
Customise your M&Ms for special occasions (or just for fun)
This news has excited both the chocoholic and the egomaniac in me: you can now personalize M&Ms! You can both select the colors of your choice and choose the letter you'd like instead of an M. As Shiny Shiny reports, you can have your very own message printed onto each piece of candy, too (but keep it short or it might take Ia magnifying glass to read it).
However, the best news of all as far as I'm concerned is that you can add a photo to each individual M&M -- a great way to celebrate a special occasion, and let's face it, just plain fun to make!
I can see these being used as wedding favors instead of tired old almonds, as a unique way to wish someone a happy birthday, or just a fun experiment. Find out more via the M&Ms custom print store.
Posted by diane
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08. 1.2008
Twitter fortune cookies
I may not be able to recognize whether these Twitter fortune cookies are actually real, but I do have enough sense to know that even the worst "tweets" would still be better than the nonsense being passed off as "fortunes" in most Chinese restaurants. Because until fortune cookies are renamed, proverbs and feeble attempts at humor just don't belong on that strip of paper.
Via Neatorama.
Posted by Jenn
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