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"Roger Ebert, who used to do movie reviews on television, doesn&amp;#039;t do that since thyroid cancer left him unable to speak in 2006. He does still write movie reviews, however, and he blogs.  Ebert, 68, blogs about whether Elvis is still alive and he blogs about God and Catholicism and he blogs about Sarah Palin and wonders how so many people can participate in the political process and be &amp;quot;persuaded by a relentless process of insinuation, strategic silence and cynical misinformation.&amp;quot; For our purposes here, however, he also blogs about food. Namely, food cooked in a rice cooker.  Although Ebert doesn&amp;#039;t technically eat anymore \u2013 that cancer alluded to in the first paragraph claimed his jaw destroying his ability to eat and speak \u2013 he cooks. He loves the act of cooking, loves cooking for his wife and his friends, and loves \u2013 in particular, it seems \u2013 how a discussion of food can veer off into various other topics, such as how does a simple, two stage rice cooker know when the rice is ready?  &amp;quot;It is a mystery of the Orient,&amp;quot; he concludes.&amp;quot;Don&amp;#039;t ask questions you don&amp;#039;t need the answers to. The point here is to save you some time and money. If you want gourmet cooking, you aren&amp;#039;t going to learn about it here.&amp;quot; As it happens, that rice cooker is something of an obsession for Ebert and he has written a cookbook about it. Much like the microwave cookbooks that began appearing in the 1970s and 80s, or the slow-cooker books that roll out with recipes for things like Crock-Pot Chocolate Cake, Ebert&amp;#039;s book &amp;quot;The Pot and How to Use It&amp;quot; is filled with recipes to be made with what is arguably the simplest of kitchen appliances.  I have a rice cooker and I use it frequently, usually for rice but I cook eggs and steam vegetables in it, as well. It frees up a burner on the stove, and \u2013 best of all \u2013 you can turn it on and then walk away from it to do something else completely unrelated without worrying about whether the food inside will burn and set off your fire alarm, which will simply add one more thing that must be taken care of to what you had hoped would be a simple meal.  &amp;quot;The idea for the book came after a 2008 blog post he wrote about rice cookers prompted hundreds of comments, with many readers including their favorite recipes,&amp;quot; according to a story by the AP. &amp;quot;&amp;#039;I think I was somewhat frustrated by not being able to eat and I wanted to live vicariously,&amp;#039;&amp;quot; the 68-year-old said during an interview at his Chicago home, his laptop computer speaking his typed answers.&amp;quot; &amp;quot;In 2008, long after he accepted that he would never put food in his mouth again,&amp;quot; said a story in the , &amp;quot;he wrote a blog post presenting his philosophy of The Pot as a way for all the people with not much space and not much time or money to cook for themselves.&amp;quot; The blog post is funny. The book, written in much the same vein, is introduced by one of my favorite food writers Anna Thomas, who wrote the groundbreaking &amp;quot;Vegetarian Epicure&amp;quot; back in 1972. If you have a rice cooker but haven&amp;#039;t figured out what to do with it, now&amp;#039;s your chance. Free up a burner and be thankful that Ebert, a man who lost the ability to speak, hasn&amp;#039;t lost his voice. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.delish.com/food/news/a38220/roger-ebert-on-god-elvis-and-rice-cookers/>