Testing Pressure Cooker

On a weekend recently, I went to purchase a pressure cooker from a near by shop. It had great looks and the brand was known for its quality. I brought that home and unpacked the box. And I was all set to cook rice for that afternoon. Flames were set and I placed the cooker on stove. Alongside I had my music turned on and a book to read till it cooked. Music and reading went on and I took pleasure in what I was doing. After 15 mins, surprisingly I didn’t hear a single whistle from the cooker. I dropped my book aside and went to the stove to observe whats happening.  To my shock all I found was hot steams were escaping through the lid of the cooker. I turned off the stove immediately and brought down the cooker from the stove stand. What a bad day... I opened the cooker and found rice was half cooked. And it was 2pm already and hunger killed. All I remembered then was how I got conned by the shop keeper. Never to blame him, and I know the fault truly lies with the buyer always for not taking the right decision. Only then I came to know looks and brands can be deceving too.

I’m sure you would have experienced similar disappoints post buying a mobile or dress or car and so on. Don’t you? Yes manier times illusion deceives us in all the senses not just visually.  So do you think there is an art of buying soemthing?  

Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Khamenan talks on illussion of validity and many other types in one of the chaper. What a great read. If you haven’t, you’ll enjoy the read.

So coming to the testing part, how did I get deceived? Let’s look in the tests I carried out before buying.

If you see the above mind map, I haven’t checked the function of steam escaping through the closing corners of the lid. And my mind said it’s not possible to verify them in the shop. All I thought was I needed to go home to cook and see if it works or not. Do I really have to go home to do this test? You can stop here and think for a while, how would you test in the shop itself. I’m sure you would have got it. How simple it is.. Isn’t it?

Yes, when I got a replacement for the defective cooker. I was aware and knew I could test that in the shop. I ensured the lid of the cooker was closed; I blew through the noozle like how we blow the baloon and looked if there is air leak. Try it for yourself if you haven’t. That simple it is. On driving back home I realised how often simple solutions becomes so extradinary and solves our problems.

Lessons learned:

Brands and looks can be deceiving

Most of the problems are simple to solve and needs no complication

Etymology:

Pressure:

late 14c., "suffering, anguish; act or fact of pressing on the mind or heart," from Old French presseure "oppression; torture; anguish; press" (for wine or cheeses), "instrument of torture" (12c.) and directly from Latin pressura "action of pressing," from pressus, past participle of premere "to press" (see press (v.1)).

Literal meaning "act or fact of pressing" in a physical sense is attested from early 15c. Meaning "moral or mental coercing force" is from 1620s; meaning "urgency" is from 1812. Scientific sense in physics is from 1650s. Pressure cooker is attested from 1915; figurative sense is from 1958. Pressure point is attested from 1876. Pressure-treated, of woods, is from 1911.