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Megan McArdle

Megan McArdle - Megan McArdle is a senior editor for The Atlantic who writes about business and economics. She has worked at three start-ups, a consulting firm, an investment bank, a disaster recovery firm at Ground Zero, and The Economist. More

Megan was born and raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and yes, she does enjoy her lattes, as well as the occasional extra-dry skim-milk cappuccino. Her checkered work history includes three start-ups, four years as a technology project manager for a boutique consulting firm, a summer as an associate at an investment bank, and a year spent as sort of an executive copy girl for one of the disaster-recovery firms at Ground Zero … all before the age of 30.

While working at Ground Zero, Megan started Live From the WTC, a blog focused on economics, business, and cooking. She may or may not have been the first major economics blogger, depending on whether we are allowed to throw outlying variables such as Brad Delong out of the set. From there it was but a few steps down the slippery slope to freelance journalism. She has worked in various capacities for The Economist, where she wrote about economics and oversaw the founding of Free Exchange, the magazine's economics blog. She has also maintained her own blog, Asymmetrical Information, which moved to The Atlantic, along with its owner, in August 2007.

Megan holds a bachelor's degree in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago. After a lifetime as a New Yorker, she now resides in northwest Washington, D.C., where she is still trying to figure out what one does with an apartment larger than 400 square feet.
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The kitchen gear that wins Christmas

By Megan McArdle

Dec 29 2008, 7:17 AM ET Comment

The newest addition to our family Christmas celebration shook his head in wonder as we opened presents.  "Do you guys give each other anything except kitchen gear?" he asked.

Well, I also got Guitar Hero World Tour.  But mostly, no.

This year, my sister got me a Rotato express.  For years, I've joked about buying one--in that not really joking way where you knew that some day, I was going to stagger home from a discount kitchen warehouse with a Rotato in tow.  My sister got tired of waiting for the inevitable denouement.

I am pleased to report that for an "As Seen on TV" product, the Rotato Express is surprisingly useful.  I do not honestly expect it to last all that long--the plastic construction does not exactly scream "heirloom quality".  But it was awesome during Christmas dinner prep, peeling an entire bag of potatoes about as fast as I could stick them on the bottom prongs, adjust the peeling arm, and press a button.  The vats full of scalloped potatoes traditionally consumed by my family at Christmas have never been so painless.  If anyone has any advice on prologinging the life of their Rotato, I will be an avid listener.




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