New Cookbook Has Tips For Technology Fanatics

Essential to preparing the cuisine of the digital generation are the can opener and the microwave oven, writes Jenz Johnson, author of “Giga Bites: The Hacker Cookbook” (Ten Speed Press), available at bookstores and computer rendezvous.

Hackers, he says, are technology fanatics who live with their computers in an all-consuming cyberspace and endure only one interruption, known to them as “cyberchow,” “technogrub” or simply “the nosebag.”

And because the food industry has made a science of cranking out “sagans” (i.e., billions and billions) of ready-made burgers, Twinkies and Spam, he asks: “Why reinvent the wheel?”

While “giga” means billion, Johnson offers only dozens of easy suggestions using such hacker staples as Cheez Whiz, corn flakes, canned macaroni and cheese, Kool-Aid and Jell-O.

Humorous hints on protocol include using floppy disks as doilies (watch out for the Pepsi syndrome, i.e. data meltdown). To save on cleanup, he recommends paper plates and only one utensil, or “just your fingers.”

When fingers get greasy there’s the “Coke dunk,” the “discarded printout napkin” or what he politely refers to as the “Vitalis look.”

Though Johnson, who lives in Tucson, Ariz., with four computers and a pet gecko, is not much for nutrition, some of his recipes might be tolerable - even the one for leftover macaroni and ice cream pie.