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It really is just a small, efficient convection oven, it's less that you can cook new things and more that a bunch of recipes become faster and easier. But that has made a pretty big difference, to us as people who spent a lot of time thinking "I WOULD cook that in the oven but ehhh... too much effort".
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I just bought the low-effort cookbook Cooking is Terrible after seeing it recced a bunch on tumblr, and I feel like it was worth $5USD for me, even having to scroll past anything reliant on cheese/beans etc. I haven't actually cooked anything from it yet, but I recognised a bunch of things I already make, and got a bunch of interesting ideas I intend to try. And I was inspired to create something new and tasty(*)

Where it differs from traditional cookbooks is that it's designed for people who don't have the energy for a lot of thinking or preparation. So the easiest stuff is at the front: a list of things you can eat with no prep at all. Then come suggestions for nice sandwich fillings, moving on to general advice for making soup plus some nice combos of ingredients etc.

I can see it being useful to scroll through when I'm hungry and have enough ingredients and energy to cook something but nothing seems both attainable and appealing. I might take the text as a base for a personalised version, removing all the things I will never eat and adding in extras.
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This is relatively healthy, and pretty forgiving, if you're open to the general not-quite-right-ness common to single serve microwave cakes.
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Mostly for my own future reference. I'm making this public in case other people find it useful, but if you don't have a colonoscopy coming up you will probably find it TMI and boring.
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As you may guess from the title, this is neither nut free nor vegetarian. The original recipe I'm adapting, and made a LOT when I could still eat dairy and chocolate, is nut free. Here's something very similar, with a vegan alternative on the side bar. The cashew based Indian desserts Kaju Burfi and Kaju Katli are vegan and pretty great (I have no recipe since I just buy them from Indian supermarkets) Also this Dairy Free Fudge site has some promising looking recipes including ones that are vegan and nut free.

There is no healthy version of this recipe, since the basic structure of fudge is sugar and fat. MMmmm.
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I actually found this works a lot better in a high rimmed bowl, but you CAN use a mug if you insist :)

Dry ingredients, mixed in cooking bowl/mug:
2 Tablespoon plain flour
1 Tablespoon quick oats (or plain flour)
1 Tablespoon brown sugar
1 Tablespoon white sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
large pinch cinnamon
pinch ginger

Wet ingredients, mixed in a different bowl:
1 mashed banana
1.5 Tablespoon chunky peanut butter
1 egg
dash vanilla essence

Fold the wet ingredients into the dry, don't mix for too long.
Microwave about 2 minutes on high. Let sit for a minute if you can bear it and then eat. Nice with defrosted frozen blueberries added to the wet ingredients and/or sprinkled with sugar once cooked.

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Nice with maple (flavoured) syrup. The spices and vanilla are optional. You can make it without baking powder but it's super dense. Ends up a little goopy in the middle, if you prefer a drier cake only use half a banana.

I get cravings for sugar, eggs and carbs sometimes and this fulfills that pretty well hurrah. Adapted from several other recipes, all of which either called for masses of fat and sugar or didn't fit my personal definiton of "cake" (I'm still not sure if I'm brave enough to try this recipe)

So it finally occured to me that if I put my garden chair in the shade and used an extension cord, I could surf the web outdoors. Brilliant! (I do sometimes sit happily in the garden WITHOUT a computer, but I get bored eventually) The cat is happily exploring the garden and I am getting some fresh air.

Here's Kira sticking her nose out from underneath a black umbrella I was using to shade the screen for a while:


I did my Quantum Computation exam today, after literally no study because I couldn't be bothered and wanted to get it done. I got 75% which seems pretty good unless you know the pass mark is 80%...still, I think I'll pass overall given my marks on the assignments. I'm definitely not up to solidly concentrating for hours any more, luckily the questions divided pretty neatly by subject so I could take breaks, especially since we got 6 hours to do it in. All those years working in the maths learning centre gave me REALLY good skills at quickly scanning through notes (or in this case, lecture videos) to find the relevant equation and answer a question without thinking too hard. It was a fun course, anyway, I may have a go at explaining some of the simpler quantum algorithm wierdnesses at some point since they're pretty cool.

I made this banana baked porridge/oatmeal and snacked on it during the exam. It was pretty nice, like a cross between porridge and banana oat nut muffins. And that's using quick oats and mixed nuts because it's what I had to hand. I think using almond milk added to the flavour. Will definitely cook again, one of the variants looks like a good way to make a low fat alkaline version of fruit crumble/crisp with my leftover frozen boysenberries. Probably veganisable?

Very dodgy "what I have in the house because I forgot today was a public holiday and also have a bazillion intolerances but it is TOO HOT FOR HOT FOOD" recipe. Wasn't terrible, will happily eat for lunch tomorrow (we go shopping tomorrow night). Hopefully the raw garlic won't make me miserable.
( Mostly for my own reference )

Replacing the breadcrumbs/cornflakes in a generic baked chicken tenders recipe with crushed slightly stale corn thins (which is all I had to hand) was surprisingly nice. Not necessarily nicer than breadcrumbs or cornflakes, but Cam happily stole some despite me making it with spices he doesn't like and with his own Sophie-unfriendly dinner not long to go.

Specific technique in case google fails me in future but it really is pretty generic:
preheat fanforced oven to 190C
Crush about 6 corn thins (less if you do a less crap job of crushing)
Coat 1 packet chicken tenders with garlic powder, onion power, tumeric, sesame seeds, salt, pepper(*).
Mix with plain flour.
Coat in beaten egg (I mixed this in the container the chicken came in since spicy floury chickeny egg is a nasty mess) then the crushed corn thins.
Bake for about 12 minutes.

Not sure how nice the soggy leftovers will be tomorrow though (which is why I encouraged Cam to steal some :)).

(*)Seasoning the flour in advance makes it harder to judge how much spice gets onto the actual chicken.

Just discovered this, remarkably similar taste to Thai Green curry given that it doesn't contain most of the major ingredients, or maybe I've just forgotten what that tastes like... Nice even if you don't have an intolerance to chilli, most curry spices and coconut :)

Makes 1 serve (since it was an experiment!)

Spices:
garlic powder, fresh onion, fresh ginger, tumeric, cinnamon, cardomon, coriander powder, lots of salt and pepper

Sauce:
1 Tb Peanut butter
1.5 Tb beef stock
1/2 a banana
1tB fresh coriander

Vegetables:
Brocolli and spinach

Mix chicken with spices. Fry. Mix in sauces. Mix in vegetables. Simmer.

Realise you've screwed up the rice :( Eat some anyway. Make lj post.

(Yay to furriku for inspiring me :))