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Many would say that a life without the microwave is a life probably not worth living. Ok that seems a little on the dramatic side, so maybe it’s fairer to say it’s on a par with not having clean underwear everyday. Exactly horrendous!

Thinking back to days gone by, when the now familiar whirring of the microwave and turning glass table could not be heard in the family kitchen, one has to wonder how we all managed to eat everyday.

Missed meal’s suffered the indignation of being dried to a crisp in the oven. Meat often resembled cardboard and as for peas, well, they could easily have been exchanged for a box of pellets from the local pellet gun king who lived in the corner house. One can only imagine the danger of flatulence after that meal.

The other option was to put your plate of food on a pot of boiling water, cover the food with a saucepan lid, and then while away the next 20 minutes as steam filled the kitchen as it escaped from beneath the confines of china. One good thing gained from this method was that hungry bodies could have a facial or sauna, or both, while they waited. Perhaps not everybody’s favourite pastimes; but then again, if you’re hungry you’ll suffer almost anything to fill your gut, even sell your Granny's false teeth straight from her gummy mouth.

It’s astounding to think that the first microwave was introduced to the world in 1947, designed by a Mr Percy Spencer, who by chance noticed that the chocolate bar in his pocket had melted during a radiation experiment. What better place to invent a valuable kitchen appliance the sarcastic will no doubt be surreptitiously chirping.

The 1947 microwave may not have been as compact as the models we now carry home under our arms, after all miniaturisation didn’t become a priority until the early to mid 1950’s. But it must have done the trick, because today the majority of homes in developed countries have one. Not to mention restaurants, café’s and even your grandmother who used to chastise the need to cook quickly, preferring instead to slave over a hot stove, sweating buckets over boiling potatoes and flying hot fat.

Probably, if a survey were to be conducted, the majority of Microwave users would say it’s a vital appliance to put on your wedding gift list and or house warming gift list. Simply put you just don’t go it alone in the kitchen without one. There’s just no better way of defrosting a brick heavy chicken at the end of the day when the juices in your stomach are gurgling away, insisting your throat must have been cut. And then let’s not forget the joy of re-heating last night’s take away for tonight’s supper, ahhhh, pure heaven.

Cooking from scratch, admittedly, is a bit dodgy in the old microwave. Cakes often flop and become substitute doorstops, or act as cheap teething rings. Scrambled eggs become lumps of rubbery matter that is best given to the dogs, but not if you like them a lot that is. Coffee is good, although not to cook, just to re-heat. Tea is disgusting when it’s re-heated, but hot milky drinks are wonderful. Popcorn, now we’re talking, well that is if you can get the cooking time right. Have you ever tried ridding your kitchen of burnt popcorn? Man, it’s impossible. It’s about as bad as trying to rid your house of smoke when somebody has forgotten to open the flue in the chimney, in short near nigh impossible.

So hat’s off to you Mr Percy Spencer. You’ve made a world full of people happy, and staved off much hunger with your miraculous invention.

Let there be a day of thanks to the man who gave us the opportunity to re-heat and de-frost as easily as flicking a switch, or even pressing a button.

Mr Spencer, you are the man!