When I was a kid my brother sister and I had the chore of doing the dishes after dinner. Each of us had a turn at this rotating every night to the next in line. Not really a tough job you put all the dishes in the dishwasher and then wash the pans. With the pans always came a game of should it soak. You always wanted to get away with leaving one pan that had to soak but there was a trick to this. Mom had caught on that so you had to pass the mom test to be able to leave one in the sink. She would come to the sink and look at the pan, then look at you and pass judgment. If you were able to leave one you walked away with a smile knowing someone, probably mom, would have to scrub it later, but it wasn’t going to be you. If you were unsuccessful you would grumble under your breath and complete the task. You had to know just what would pass the test, it couldn’t be any old pan. Rice, for example, did they leave it too long or too hot? A little burnt rice on the bottom might just pass. Crispy bits from something fried, not likely. Lasagna, usually a winner. I never tried anything malicious like turning up the heat on the stove while the rice was cooking, but you can be sure that on my night to do the dishes while I served myself some dinner I was checking out the consistency to see if it gave any hints to possible pan status. You couldn’t tell how the pan looked because mom never served anything in the same dish it was cooked in, but that is a topic for another post.