Can't. Turn. Over.

I can’t flip pancakes. I can’t turn omelettes. And heaven help me if I try to make a stir fry. Sometimes, it’s the simplest things that bring us unstuck – or that don’t bring us unstuck, as is far more the problem! Apparently coordination is granted to some of us in limited quantities, and my quota seems to be used up (and then some) on ballroom dancing. I might’ve been ok to admit defeat on those particular culinary fronts, until my recent discovery that risottos are infinitely better, creamier and less gluggy when shaken, not stirred. I heard it on Masterchef, and it proved to be true.

Agitating a risotto is, in theory, a very good idea. In practice, it results in at least as much agitation of the person attempting to agitate the risotto itself (more in a physical sense than an emotional one, thankfully, but to the general amusement of anybody observing the activity in the kitchen). It also reminds me that risotto is not a particularly light dish* and agitation can be quite wearing - at least to us non-chefly types (who also, sadly, lack asbestos hands).

And then I stumbled on this - the boomerang wok

Picture: Nikolai Carels via Design Milk

Much as its name recalls a pot that you just can't let go of, or that comes back to clonk you on the head when you least expect it (nope, that's just the shelves in the cupboard under the sink... ow!), this is a pan designed to enable its contents to be easily flipped back on itself.

And, unlike most kitchen gadgets that just add to the gathering collection of stuff threatening to take over the kitchen, the cool thing about this is that it's just a wok. A really neat one, true, but something you probably already use for other things, so it can just replace the old, non-flippable version. After all, just because you can flip things in it, doesn't mean you have to. But there could be a lot of lost flipping time that needs to be made up for...

* Ballroom dancing focuses a great deal on building strength in the ankles - a lot less so on the wrists, much to the detriment of my risotto-agitating abilities...