What Cooking Tools Have Changed Your Life In The Kitchen?
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Immersion blender with whisk and mini food processor would be my top choice. After those two, I would say mandolin and micro plane.
Chief Longwind Of The North
Certified/Certifiable
Cast iron pans, and a great chef's knife.
Pressure Cooker
High quality spring-form pans
Webber Kettle Barbecue/Grill
Pressure Cooker
High quality spring-form pans
Webber Kettle Barbecue/Grill
Addie
Chef Extraordinaire
My knife. My first husband was a chef, and he taught me how to use it properly. Then later in years it would be my mini food processor. It made it possible for me to eat a lot of foods that I shouldn't.
I also like my mini mandolin. It is so much easier than setting up the big one. Get the job done in half the time. Any tool that makes my life easier is my favorite tool. At my age, and after more than 50 years of cooking, I need "easy" in my life.
I also like my mini mandolin. It is so much easier than setting up the big one. Get the job done in half the time. Any tool that makes my life easier is my favorite tool. At my age, and after more than 50 years of cooking, I need "easy" in my life.
roadfix
Chef Extraordinaire
For me it was the refrigerator. It was such a hassle draining the ice box every other day. The blocks of ice which were delivered a couple of times a week didn't last long during the hot summer months. Ice cream didn't last long in the ice box and often melted by the second day.
With the refrigerator I can keep and freeze food in the freezer section, even make my own ice! I don't have to go to the market every day. I can buy a week's worth of groceries now. My refrigerator holds a lot of food.
An then, in the early 70's I bought a microwave oven!
With the refrigerator I can keep and freeze food in the freezer section, even make my own ice! I don't have to go to the market every day. I can buy a week's worth of groceries now. My refrigerator holds a lot of food.
An then, in the early 70's I bought a microwave oven!
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Aunt Bea
Master Chef
Nothing exciting here. 
A sharp chef's knife, plastic bar board, 30 year old Osterizer blender, Borner plastic mandolin, a box grater, 9 inch Wagner CI Skillet and my 1950ish Fire King 2qt batter bowl.
I guess the thing that transformed my life in the kitchen is having a few TNT tools within arms reach. Add a sink full of sudsy hot water so I can clean as I go!
The things I miss are my kitchen window, a double bowl sink, and a window in the oven door!
A sharp chef's knife, plastic bar board, 30 year old Osterizer blender, Borner plastic mandolin, a box grater, 9 inch Wagner CI Skillet and my 1950ish Fire King 2qt batter bowl.
I guess the thing that transformed my life in the kitchen is having a few TNT tools within arms reach. Add a sink full of sudsy hot water so I can clean as I go!
The things I miss are my kitchen window, a double bowl sink, and a window in the oven door!
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Maelinde
Senior Cook
Life Changing Cooking Tools
I have so many tools that have changed my life for the better!
Some of them would be my crock pot, food dehydrator, mandoline slicer, food processor, and immersion blender.
As for future tools that would change my life (big hint for my hubby), a meat slicer, meat grinder, and a santoku knife. Those are on my Birthday wish list.
Cool topic idea!
I have so many tools that have changed my life for the better!
Some of them would be my crock pot, food dehydrator, mandoline slicer, food processor, and immersion blender.
As for future tools that would change my life (big hint for my hubby), a meat slicer, meat grinder, and a santoku knife. Those are on my Birthday wish list.
Cool topic idea!
All of it, really. But the knife/cutting board has to be the first and biggest. It opened up the world of fresh foods.
The food processor is wonderful and lets me do all kinds of things I couldn't without it. The microplane is wonderful. (Whisks are my favorite item, though.)
For reheating in the microwave, the big bubble pig thing that keeps splatters in and is high enough to not stick to the food. It's a little thing, but eliminates a lot of cleaning and makes the reheated food better.
The food processor is wonderful and lets me do all kinds of things I couldn't without it. The microplane is wonderful. (Whisks are my favorite item, though.)
For reheating in the microwave, the big bubble pig thing that keeps splatters in and is high enough to not stick to the food. It's a little thing, but eliminates a lot of cleaning and makes the reheated food better.
Mad Cook
Master Chef
I think it has to be my Magimix food processor. It enabled me to make a lot of dishes that I avoided and cooking in bulk is easier too due to the help chopping veg and meat, etc. When I make pates and terrines I use the FP for chopping the meats as they lose less moisture than if they are put through the mincer.
The FP made also pastry a possibility for me. I cannot make decent pastry by hand (my mother used to say that you need cold hands and a warm heart to make pastry but I have warm hands and a cold heart!) but the FP solved that problem.
It doesn't live in a cupboard, it has pride of place on my work surface so it's ready and waiting whenever I need it
The FP made also pastry a possibility for me. I cannot make decent pastry by hand (my mother used to say that you need cold hands and a warm heart to make pastry but I have warm hands and a cold heart!) but the FP solved that problem.
It doesn't live in a cupboard, it has pride of place on my work surface so it's ready and waiting whenever I need it
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CraigC
Master Chef
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2011
- Messages
- 6,486
roadfix
Chef Extraordinaire
For me it was fire!
That's going waaaay back. How did you manage before fire?
Mad Cook
Master Chef
Caught the deer and ate it while it was still warm.
RPCookin
Executive Chef
Good knives. I hated prep before that, now I can endure it (not really, I enjoy working on the cutting board as long as I'm not cooking for 50 
)
Perhaps the most used items in my kitchen are the 2 restaurant quality half sheet pans that I use for everything from spill catchers under casseroles (before these pans it was either foil or run the cleaning cycle on the oven, often both) to cooking pans for free form breads to prep trays to cooking chicken parts. Once I even used them for baking a double batch of lemon bars, and that will be happening again next month, both times for local fund raiser benefit dinners.
Maybe my BIG stainless steel bowl. It's huge (15" across and almost 7" deep) and I can mix or stir just about anything in it without slopping over the sides. Along with that is my 14" nonstick frying pan... for the same reasons. I never have to worry about crowding stuff when I use that one.
Other things are definitely conveniences, but those first two changed how I actually do things more than most others. Most of my kitchen convenience stuff I just bought as I needed it, so although they opened new horizons, they didn't change the way I did the things I'd always done as much as those first two did.
)Perhaps the most used items in my kitchen are the 2 restaurant quality half sheet pans that I use for everything from spill catchers under casseroles (before these pans it was either foil or run the cleaning cycle on the oven, often both) to cooking pans for free form breads to prep trays to cooking chicken parts. Once I even used them for baking a double batch of lemon bars, and that will be happening again next month, both times for local fund raiser benefit dinners.
Maybe my BIG stainless steel bowl. It's huge (15" across and almost 7" deep) and I can mix or stir just about anything in it without slopping over the sides. Along with that is my 14" nonstick frying pan... for the same reasons. I never have to worry about crowding stuff when I use that one.
Other things are definitely conveniences, but those first two changed how I actually do things more than most others. Most of my kitchen convenience stuff I just bought as I needed it, so although they opened new horizons, they didn't change the way I did the things I'd always done as much as those first two did.
CraigC
Master Chef
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2011
- Messages
- 6,486
Kayelle
Chef Extraordinaire
I think it would be really interested to see what cooking tools have changed the way you work in the kitchen.
Please list them below and state how they have made kitchen work easier
What has changed my life in the kitchen is my SousChef.
Since I was lucky enough to marry him seven years ago, he does everything in the kitchen I don't like to do, and never complains about any of it. If I want to be left alone, he does that too. It makes cooking a joy instead of a chore. Doesn't get better than that.
Zagut
Head Chef
I'd have to say the internet.
Pots and pans or whatever gadgets are all well and good but what expanded my cooking was the easily available knowledge of recipe's and techniques as well as opinions that can be found with a few simple keyboard strokes.
The keyboard strokes are the hardest part for me since I type by the Columbus method.
Pots and pans or whatever gadgets are all well and good but what expanded my cooking was the easily available knowledge of recipe's and techniques as well as opinions that can be found with a few simple keyboard strokes.
The keyboard strokes are the hardest part for me since I type by the Columbus method.
A good chopping knife, recipes tried along the way that have enabled improvement and a skewer! When Delia Smith mentioned how valuable a skewer is I was cynical, but it is! I use it to test if veg are cooked, to poke into a chicken thigh and press (to see if juices run clear), and - of course - to test centre of cake to see if it is cooked through.
Souschef
Sous Chef
Columbus Method
I was curious as what that was, so of course I Googled it! This definition by someone is hilarious:
The Columbus Method
I'm one of those older computer users who never learned to type. I have tried several times with various typing programs but I have always failed. I must be over the hill.
It drives me crazy to see the younger computer users typing like only secretaries could in my day.
So what do I do? I use the Columbus Method of typing --- I discover a key and land on it!!
I was curious as what that was, so of course I Googled it! This definition by someone is hilarious:
The Columbus Method
I'm one of those older computer users who never learned to type. I have tried several times with various typing programs but I have always failed. I must be over the hill.
It drives me crazy to see the younger computer users typing like only secretaries could in my day.
So what do I do? I use the Columbus Method of typing --- I discover a key and land on it!!
Addie
Chef Extraordinaire
I love my chef's knife. I really enjoy prep work. When my kids were growing up, I always looked forward to going into the kitchen around three in the afternoon. My friends would moan about having to cook AGAIN! I didn't have many conveniences in the kitchen. So when I say from scratch, I mean really from scratch. Like most young brides, I didn't have a stand mixer. In fact I didn't even have a hand mixer. Yet I still got a lot of satisfaction from beating the batter of a cake. I loved standing at my stove fussing with the food. Making sure nothing was sticking in the pan. Or the heat was too high. Over the years, little by little I was able to obtain the niceties of making my work easy. But if you took them all away today, I could still fix a meal from scratch. And I would still love what I can accomplish in the kitchen.
Cheryl J
Chef Extraordinaire
My Weber grill. 
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