I cook and Val cleans. This is the way it has been since man first cleaved meat from bone with flint tools. And so it will be forever, amen. To make her life easier, and because I simply must watch The Wire while I cook and cannot be bothered to make sixty trips to the trash can, I use a garbage bowl.

Yes, I got the idea from Rachael Ray. Yes, she is unnecessarily effervescent.

The jist is: throw your “garbage” into a “bowl.” When the bowl is full dump it into the trash. Seriously, it makes cleanup a lot easier — not that I would know anything about that.

Incidentally, I have this set of nesting stainless steel mixing bowls that I got at Costco. They are among my most used kitchen-y type things. They work well for garbage bowls, popcorn bowls, or silly hats.