Just think about innovation.

If we look at the definition of innovation on Merriam-Webster online dictionary, here is what we get:

1. : the introduction of something new.
2. : a new idea, method, or device.

It’s quite simple, isn’t it.

Somehow when we think about innovation we always think to some scientist working in his lab full of expensive equipment. We feel like innovation is not simple at all.

Yesterday night I was cooking some past. I do like cooking and I have a few cooking pans on fire. One to boil water for pasta, another with some eggs in it, and the last one frying some bacon for Carbonara pasta.

I was cooking on autopilot and when bacon was ready I did not notice the handle was too close to the other pan and got very, very hot.

I hurt myself, nothing serious.

The main purpose of the handle on the cooking pan is to avoid these kind of problems, but it did not work since the handle was too close to another source of heat, the other cooking pan.

The original handle concept works for the majority of uses, but it could not avoid me to get hurt by heat. Since its original design, it did not change much. There are some fancy cooking pans with thermometer on the handle to check food temperature, but that’s more related to the food than to the safety of the user.

Yes, you know that handles can get hot and you should always use something to handle those pans. This is a rational thought. You have to think about it and not always you think, specially when you have three pans running at the same time.

There can be innovation in cooking pans? Obviously, yes.

We can think of:

• Having pans made of efficient material that will optimize energy spending.
• Different shape of pans for different food type.
• New nonstick material.
• Method to make cooking faster and better.

As you see, there is lot of room for innovation in pans. Most of the things I have written will take a lot of effort into development.

I was just thinking about an easy one.

I was just wondering why nobody has ever thought of having handles that can change color if they heat.

The usual nice looking black if everything is fine. Yellow if it’s hot, but still manageable, and red if it’s really hot.

Anyway, Carbonara pasta was great.