Allows you to spend time with guests

CookinGenie makes enjoying fresh food simple – our Genies shop, cook, and clean, and you get to enjoy! But in the world of COVID-19, what is the risk of having someone else prepare your food, in your home?

Ensuring Your Safety

CookinGenie takes health and cleanliness seriously. In addition to following CDC and FDA guidelines, our Genies follow food safety practices, and we have several procedures in place to ensure the safety of you and our Genies through the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.

To begin, we look to the CDC, which states: “Currently, there is no evidence to suggest that handling food or consuming food is associated with COVID-19,” and “there is no evidence that the virus that causes COVID-19 spreads to people through food.”

The FDA provides additional guidance around food preparation safety. With COVID-19, we understand the concern related to high-touch surfaces, especially those in the kitchen. Our Genies take special care with handwashing and clean your kitchen when they are done preparing your food.

Image Source: FDA

In addition:

• We will reschedule appointments if anyone – you or our Genies – are not feeling well
• All our Genies wear masks at all times while in your home, regardless of local mandates
• All our Genies are mindful of social distancing while in your home

So, what’s the risk?

Compared to other activities, CookinGenie provides a lower-risk option to enjoy fresh, quality meals in the comfort of your own home without a trip to the grocery store. To better understand the risk level, we compare the CookinGenie experience to the risk level of some common activities below, using the Texas Medical Association Risk Chart as a guide.

Image Source: Texas Medical Association

• Getting restaurant takeout – Low Risk (2/10)
  • Getting restaurant takeout is low-risk due to little contact with others and the safety measures now in place.
  • With CookinGenie, there is also little contact between you and the Genie. In addition to the cleanliness and safety measures we practice, online pre-payment means there is no payment exchanged during the Genie’s visit.
• Eating at a restaurant (outside) – Low-Moderate Risk (4/10)
  • Outdoor dining allows for free airflow, which lowers the concentration of the virus and keeps risk levels low, especially when more people are present.
  • Unless using an outdoor kitchen, CookinGenie is inside your home, but with only one Genie entering your home with a mask, the risk level remains low.
• Eating in a restaurant (inside) – Moderate-High Risk (7/10)
  • Inside dining increases risk due to recirculated air, more people, and people not wearing masks.

Following our safety protocols, CookinGenie offers a lower-risk alternative to getting restaurant-quality food.

While there are few activities these days that are completely risk-free, CookinGenie is committed to doing all we can to offer delicious, fresh meals cooked right in your kitchen, in the safest way possible.

References

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/daily-life-coping/food-and-COVID-19.html

https://www.fda.gov/food/food-safety-during-emergencies/best-practices-retail-food-stores-restaurants-and-food-pick-updelivery-services-during-covid-19

https://www.texmed.org/TexasMedicineDetail.aspx?Pageid=46106&id=53977

For many people, pad Thai—the delectable sweet, sour, and spicy stir fry of rice noodles, tofu, eggs, veggies, bean sprouts, crushed peanuts, and an umami-rich sauce that can be found on the menu of virtually every Thai restaurant in the US—is their first taste of Thai cooking.  

So, it’s interesting to learn that the dish that most Americans think of as the quintessential Thai food didn’t even exist until the mid-20th century.  

In her book Materializing Thailand, nutritional anthropologist Penny Van Esterik says that the dish was born out of prime minister Plaek Phibunsongkhram’s campaign throughout the 1930s and 40s to build a national identity for Thailand. Hoping to create a sense of pride in “Thai-ness” by uniting his country through culture, he changed the nation’s name from Siam to Thailand,  commissioned a new national anthem, banned local languages and dialects from schools, and set out to create a national dish.

(Also Read – Tracing Tacos – A Journey Through Time)

Curiously, the main ingredient in the dish that Phibunsongkhram—who was known as Phibun—promoted isn’t even native to Thailand. Stir-fried rice noodles originated in China and were introduced to the kingdom of Siam by Chinese traders in the 1700s. But promoting a stir-fried noodle dish helped solve a serious problem that Phibun’s nation was facing: flooding and war had caused a severe rice shortage, and encouraging people to eat noodles helped preserve the country’s precious rice supply.2 Phibun’s administration took the basic recipe for stir fried rice noodles and loaded it up with nutritious bean sprouts, onions, peanuts, eggs, meats, and a tamarind-based sauce, then encouraged vendors to sell the dish from street carts all over the country. It was, Phibun’s son later pointed out, the first fast food in Thailand.3   

Phibun’s efforts to make pad Thai a part of his country’s heritage succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. Today, it is a staple of the Thai diet. Beyond Thailand, it has become a beloved dish worldwide: In 2011, pad Thai ranked number 5 in CNN Go’s reader poll of the “World’s 50 Most Delicious Foods.”4 Wondering how this simple noodle dish became an international culinary superstar? Mark Padoongpatt, a professor of Asian and Asian American studies at the University of Nevada Las Vegas and the author of a history of Thai food, says this, too, was driven by the Thai government as an act of culinary diplomacy: in an effort to stimulate exports and encourage tourism, it established the Global Thai Restaurant Company, Ltd. to train chefs and send them around the world to open Thai restaurants5.     

And now, CookinGenie brings this beloved classic noodle dish to your house. We offer three varieties of classic pad Thai—Chicken, Shrimp, and Vegetarian—cooked from scratch with wholesome, authentic ingredients like rice noodles, sweet-and-sour tamarind paste, spicy chile-garlic paste, and Thai preserved radish. Book your Genie to bring a true taste of Thailand to your very own kitchen. 

Can we all just agree that teachers are the unsung heroes of the pandemic?  

This spring—as the world as we knew it turned upside down—they quickly pivoted to teaching virtually, creating new lessons and mastering new technology with just a few days’ notice, and saying goodbye to their students at the end of the year via Zoom.  

And then this fall, when the promise of a vaccine seemed like a distant pipe dream, some welcomed students to a virtual classroom while others headed back to school and toggled between in-person and hybrid schedules. And they mastered this all on top of teaching daily lessons, providing emotional support (to kids and their hyper-stressed parents), fostering kids’ social development, and all the other invaluable services teachers provide their students…and then they headed home to care for their own kids and families.    

 For all these reasons—and so many more! —teachers deserve a little extra appreciation this year during Teacher Appreciation Week. 

 While many gift ideas exist, CookinGenie can be perfect for teachers. At the click of a button, they can have us shop cook, and clean for them. Whether it is for a small dinner party they are hosting, or it is for them to take time off from cooking for the workweek – CookinGenie gift card is a great way to give the gift of fresh home cooking to your favorite teachers and make them feel extra special as the school year winds down.  

Ordering is as easy as 1-2-3. 

Click here to order a gift card. 

1. Choose from a variety of teacher-themed designs. 
2. Select the gift amount. 
3. Send the gift card electronically or print and hand deliver for a personal touch 

 However you choose to appreciate the teachers in your community, this Teacher Appreciation Week, we at CookinGenie, thank this wonderful group of people who have ensured our children’s growth, development, and well-being as we look back at an unprecedented year through the pandemic.