Rocky Mountain Power: “Wattsmart” Kitchen Tips

Your kids are home from school. Any chance they’re “window shopping” at
your refrigerator? If you can minimize the time your fridge door is open and
prevent cold air from escaping, you’ll be doing a lot to reduce electricity use
and save money!

Its called being “wattsmart,” and we have a lot of great ideas for being
wattsmart in the kitchen.

This year we’re celebrating 100 years of serving our customers … more than
1 million of them!

For years we’ve been emphasizing the importance of conserving energy. We
used to send home energy advisors to community groups and school classes
to test recipes and teach about reducing energy consumption. (Black and
white photos attached.)

Those demonstrations might have included appliances like this. Pretty
vintage, and retro cool now, isn’t it?

Here you’ll see we’ve made caramel popcorn in the microwave and baked a
loaf of bread in an electric fry pan. Both methods use less electricity than a
stove top or oven.

Here are some basic wattsmart kitchen tips:

· If you have both a large and a small oven, use the smaller one whenever
possible.

· Save time and energy by using one oven to prepare the entire meal. A pie
or cake can go into the oven as a main dish is removed.

· Warming foods, plates and platters with the oven’s stored heat after
baking requires no extra energy. If the food must be kept warm for an
extended period of time, set the oven no higher than 140 to 200°F.

· Consider using a microwave oven, small portable electric frying pan, grill,
or toaster/broiler instead of the oven.

· Cook by time and temperature. Precise timing eliminates repeated
opening of the oven door to check on cooking progress. Each time the door
is opened, the temperature drops 25 to 50 degrees.

· Choose pots and pans that evenly cover the heating elements. Use pans
with flat bottoms, straight sides and tight-fitting lids that hold heat and
permit lower settings.

· Use a slow cooker or crockpot to cook stews and other single-dish
meals.

· Use only enough water to produce steam and prevent sticking when
cooking fresh or frozen vegetables.

Microwave Carmel Popcorn

4 quarts popped corn
½ cup margarine
¼ cup light corn syrup
1 cup brown sugar
½ teaspoon soda

Place waxed paper on counter. Spray non-stick coating on the inside of a
large brown paper grocery bag; add popped corn. In saucepan, combine
margarine, syrup and brown sugar; bring to a boil. Remove from heat, add
soda and stir. Immediately pour over popcorn in paper bag.

Roll down top of bag and place in microwave oven. Cook on high for 1½
minutes. Remove from microwave and shake vigorously for a few seconds.
Return to microwave oven and cook on high 1 minute; shake. Return to
microwave and cook on high 30 seconds more. Immediately turn the candied
popcorn out on waxed paper on counter to cool.