Sustainable Substitutions #2: The Blowtorch

Disclaimers:
Kids: DO NOT DO THIS WITHOUT PARENTAL SUPERVISION!
Parents: DO NOT LET YOUR KIDS DO THIS!

We're getting into nut pie season. We might also be heading for much higher gas prices again, and your bike-commuting pie maker may have to celebrate with Schadenfreude Pie. This requires roasted nuts, and, given the price instability and unsustainability of fossil fuels, a natural gas oven is not an option.

So, how do we get nuts hot enough to carmelize some of their sugars and break down their bitter flavor? We need two things: A metal bowl and a butane blowtorch. Butane is a lot easier to make out of biomass than gasoline, and a lot easier to transport than natural gas.

Place the nuts in the bottom of the bowl and rapidly wave the flame over them. Those little balls of proteins and fats will burn vigorously if you're not careful, so keep that flame moving. Make sure you keep the flame moving, shake the bowl to get nuts from the bottom to the top, and stop as soon as the kitchen smells warm and nutty.

This approach will lightly char some of the of the nuts, giving your pies a more complex flavor profile. It does involve a bit more active labor, but significantly less total time than oven roasting, so depending on which econometric you use this process improves or harms pie making productivity. However, it does involve playing with carefully wielding fire, so the added enjoyment makes this a net positive from a PMCIN perspective. For more on making up convenient economic metrics, check out William Easterly's excellent Aid Watchers blog.