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I can shed some light, perhaps, on student-y issues, though my example is not from student days, nor from the US.

Once upon a time I lived in Brixton (South London - lovely place an unnecessarily castigated as either too rough, or too yuppified). My flatmate, and the owner of the place, Hugh, decided that he wanted a glass brick wall between the kitchen and the entrance hall. His plans gradually became more and more ambitious until we had knocked down any number of walls and had lost the use of: the kitchen, the downstairs bedroom, the dining room.

So we co-opted the downstairs bathroom as makeshift pantry and kitchen. The problem was that the only cooking implement we possessed was a microwave oven. And we had no microwave-safe cooking utensils. Hence the student-y set-up. Which lasted six months (the glass bricks were a long time coming, and an even longer time actually laying).

Our solution consisted of living off, in the main, rice and lentils. The cooking method was simplicity itself: we took the handle, plunger and lid off the Bodum coffee-pot and placed the lentils in it, bunged it in the nuker, and cooked until soft. Then poured it out into a bowl and started on the rice. Similar, but one-stage, operations, helped boil the water for tea, coffee and the like.

Life without a kettle, It's possible.

cheer

the sunshine warrior


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Me bear of ickle brain and long ideas much bother me, but...

The heat gained by the water must surely depend upon the total energy gained, itself reflected by the power consumed. The current, as it were, will in any case vary inversely as the resistance, and directly with the voltage, no?

In effect, for the same resistance (the heating element in the kettle), twice the voltage (UKian), would pump energy into the water at twice the rate, therefore (in theory at least) bringing it to the boil in half the time.

As far as energy efficiency is concerned, the issue would be that of an enclosed element (the Brit kettle), versus the open flame/hob of a kettle placed on a heater. I'd suggest that the enclosed element, ceteris paribus, would result in less loss of heat into the nearby environment.

But it's been an age since I did electrical circuits in school, so I could be deadwrong.

cheer

the sunshine warrior


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is USns don't drink much hot tea. It's pretty much an exception here, not a rule. Hot coffee in a thermos is the way to go. And, as NancyK said, people will often just nuke the water in a microwave. We have a kettle on the gas stove and use it daily, though more often for herbal teas than for the "real stuff" (which, like Helen does, is usually consumed cold).

In fact, in my experience, if you order tea in a restaurant here it's assumed you mean iced tea.


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woah man, the things you find out


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Yeah, and we use grease to treat a cooking pan before baking in it..Here in US grease is edible! (one of the simpsons shows Homer salivating at the thought of grease, ..most, of don't! but we do use the word differently.)

and over in Q & A about words, there is small side discussion about muffins, --cake like, but not as sweet or tender as cake; small cakes baked in small tins (6 or 12 depressions/cups to a single pan) lined with paper vs english muffins (a whole nuther kind of muffin)

and to those of us who watch some BBC/ITV shows, there are british foods (like Lionell's 'custard tarts') that are unknown here!

long ago (2 years or so) there were a series of threads about cooking utensils, (we cook on stoves, not cookers!) and normal 'household' appliences (i'd say 80% of US households have at least 1 electric coffee maker, 90% have some sort of coffee maker,and about 40% have 2 or more coffee makers, (i have an electic coffee maker, and expresso machine, and 2 stove top coffee makers... when i moved, i got rid of my coffee urn--that make 40 cups at a time!) but only 60% have kettles- and about 30% tea pots!

kitchens are very differently equiped! and even when we have the same stuff, its often called different names! --griddle to most in US are flat peices of cookware.. for making toasted cheese sandwiches, or pancakes, grills (indoor) have ridged surfaces, for cooking meat of vegetables.. BBQ or barbarque grills have wire racks that the food is cooked on-usually out of doors, over charcoal or more likely, lava rocks heated with propane (bottled gas).

Its interesting to learn about what each culture thinks is important-- and the name for things as well!


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How do builders brew up on site? How do you cope on holiday? How do you have a cup when someone is cooking? How do students stay alive?
As I found out on my trip to the UK and Ireland, just because you can't imagine something doesn't mean it doesn't exist! For your first question: I think any construction person over here who tried to "brew up" ANYthing on the job would be laughed right out of the place. You either bring it with you (thermos, as someone said) or go to an eating joint at lunchtime, if you're lucky enough to have one nearby. As to being on vacation--if you mean camping, well, you can find campsites with electricity, but most people use propane or similar stoves (they're made to be portable). When my husband takes the Boy Scouts camping, most of the time they just have a fire and use a grate to set the pots on (he DOES like his coffee!). As to students: in my daughter's dormitory, there's a lounge/kitchen on every floor. I don't think there's an actual stove, but there are microwaves.
Personally, I think it would be awfully inconvenient to have to go searching for an electrical outlet, to say nothing of the waste of counter space. I assume you also have to find something to protect the countertop from the heat? Or do these electric ones come with that built in?


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I think the holiday brew-ups are taking place in slightly less rigorous surroundings. Suppose you are in your hotel room and want a cuppa. How do you heat the water?

And what was it that you couldn't imagine that you found exists?

Bingley


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what was it that you couldn't imagine that you found exists? First and foremost: public eating places that actually do not have so much as one single cube of ice on the premises; also, a country where probably less than .01% of the population knows how to make iced tea; a hotel room without a shower (!!!); ordering smoked salmon and being served raw salmon, for starters. Then there were the places on the motorway where all traffic was required to slow down and (most) change lanes...for no visible reason at all: no construction, no wreck, no check point--nothing! You'd get through this little bit, then everybody would just pick up speed again... no police in sight.

Oh--most hotel rooms here have a coffeemaker--electric!--in them, with a basket of packs of coffee, creamer, sweetener, etc.


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FWIW, I watched a new program last night, Joan of Arcadia, and they showed a scene with a whistling kettle(I own and use one), not electric. I might never have noticed if not for this thread.
http://www.sonypictures.com/tv/shows/joanofarcadia/about.html


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assume you also have to find something to protect the countertop from the heat? Or do these electric ones come with that built in?
The range of kettles available is most varied. Most of the cheaper ones are plastic and jug shaped, they have a power lead out the back that is exactly like the power lead that comes out of your computer. In fact techies here call them kettle leads. In a tea emergency you can use them but the ampage ( what is the right word for that?) is different so it's a dangerously bad idea unless desperate. I just got a new kettle that is cordless ( a more expensive kind, it cost a whole twelve pounds) and that sits on a round base that is plastic. The kettle looks like a stovetop one though. I also have a travel jug kettle that plugs into a ciggie lighter in a car ( though I have no car, spose that is a bit crazy). I am instinctively opposed to the idea of microwaving hot water, but I can't think why. And that, you will be pleased to know, is all I have to say about kettles.

**except this on different cultures and essentials: 90% of French people drink fresh coffee every day but only 10% own coffee machines, they all go out for coffee.





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