In another thread, I was asking for some recipes and suggestions on cooking a pork roast, and mentioned there that I don’t have and don’t want to buy a Dutch oven for this purpose, mainly because my kitchen is so full of other stuff I don’t have anyplace to store a such a big pot. I’m not sure I’d use it much either, though it’s possible I could surprise myself.
I think I need to weed out my stuff and just keep the most used/most useful items.
I’d say my food processor is one of my most used/useful items. I’d never had one until a few years ago, and I bought it for making a specific item. I find now that I use it all the time and I’m really glad I have it.
I could add my mixer to the list too, I don’t use it as often but it sure does come in handy for bread dough and other hard-to-mix-by-hand things.
Well seasoned iron skillets, including the iron griddle and the bigass skillet with the raised grill bars in the bottom which does grilled veggies and meat really well.
Coffee grinder. Thing is like 25 years old, used daily and still going strong. If it ever dies I will know Armageddon is around the corner.
Black & Decker under counter mounted can opener. Manual can openers are one of the two kitchen items I tend to have self destruct on a regular basis (the other is the toaster, commonly referred to as the “random carbonizer.” I’ve been through about one per year for the past twenty years.)
Mortar & pestle. What the hell else do you use for making garlic paste? Food processor just does NOT do the job right.
Spring-action locking tongs. I got one last year and use it almost daily. Now that warm weather is here, I’ll be using them even more. I might get a pair just for the grill.
Crock pot
Kitchen Aid stand mixer (I just got this less than a month ago, and already it’s indispensible to me… I’m doing so much more baking)
Big pots (all the soup, stew, chili and spaghetti we eat, and freeze)
Bread machine
On a more serious note, I’d have to go with my basic but high-quality knife set and my oversized anodized Wearever skillet. If you have good knives and a good skillet, you can do pretty well in the kitchen. Everything else is gravy.
The Rabbit corkscrew and a foil cutter and one of the regular waiter’s corkscrews (for when I’m feeling less lazy you see) are probably at the top of the list, as even though I might not cook every night, I do open at least a bottle of wine every night.
Then either the cast iron Dutch oven or the largest cast iron skillet we have, although the smaller ones are getting used with more frequency now that it’s just the two of us in the house.
The knives, the garlic press, the Microplane zester, and my new Pampered Chef mini chopper are way up there as well.
For me - it’s this puppy. That’s right a gigantic freaking Hamilton Beach toaster oven. (convection too!)
My friends got this thing as a wedding present but didn’t want it. So they asked me, “hey do you want a toaster oven?” “Sure I said.” Then they handed me this Goliath!
Of course, I protested. “My apartment will fit inside that toaster oven,” I moaned. But they left it with me. I set it up, just to see what it looked like and whether it would fit on my countertop. And then…once I used it…it completely replaced my oven. I never use the oven anymore, and there’s nothing this baby can’t do. It does everything. To quote Tom Waits, it can forge your signature and quit smoking.
I know it’s the most useful thing in my kitchen, because it’s the only thing in here - including my knives, my microwave, my mixer, etc - that I would replace with the identical product if something happened to it. I might try another brand of knife. I might try another make of mixer. But not my toaster oven.
Love it. Use it incessantly. And did I mention the timer feature?! Ok, I’ll go now.
ETA on preview, psycat might have topped me. I love my toaster oven, but only a savage would try to cook without a garlic press. So maybe that’s more essential.
There are some things that I never use, but by golly - my moms’ rolling pin - curly maple with red handles. How cool is that? Haven’t tried to use it, but could be useful to keep the kitchen area free of trespassers and soup-stirrers.
Anything made of pyrex - baking dish, casserole, measuring cups. Cast iron frying pan. Ancient meat-packing house carbon steel knives. A favorite spoon, whisks (only because the ^#$%#! thing isn’t needed often, but when they are nothing else will do. In fact, mine is with my camping gear, buried somewhere, because I needed it then. Now I can’t find it, a continuing source of aggravation) - and cutting boards. I also like teflon electric-fryingpans, as I can (mostly) make perfect omelets with minimum fuss while semi-comatose in the morning, and does double duty for burgers, spaghetti sauces, goulash, etc.
You can fake just about anything else in a kitchen except a good knife.
I’ve gotten to the point that I’m giving serious thought to getting a traveling knife case whenever I go anywhere that I might be helping in the kitchen (parties, etc) as people univerally have lousy dull, dangerous knives.
Interesting, because when we bought this house it came with an electric can opener mounted under one of the cabinets. I have NEVER used it, not even once. It just never occurs to me to do so. The manual can opener we have is ancient and I use it all the time (and I’m left handed, to boot, I guess I’ve just dealt with it for so long I don’t think about it). Occasionally I’ll ask the husband to take down the electric one, because it’s ugly and we don’t use it, and he agrees, but then we both forget about it for another year!
Love this Tom Waits song - and I love my toaster oven too. It’s a Farberware that toasts, broils, is a convection oven AND is a bread maker. The company does not make them anymore. When it dies, I will cry. I especially like using it in the summer, since it does not heat up the house like the full-size oven does.
Putty knives make great cake frosters.
I have a cookie sheet made of Pyrex. They don’t make those any more either. I loved mine so much that I tried to find another. I’ve never had any luck doing so. They aren’t even on Ebay! I use it for a lot more things than just baking cookies.
Oh yes, cannot underestimate the importance of good knives. But my favorite set is not the expensive Henckels set I got from my parents after I got married. It is the set I got for free for being a regular shopper at our local Harris Teeter. I just love them - the balance and the handles I like a lot better than the Henckels. And when I first took both sets to be sharpened, the place I go to for that told me that they were very impressed with the HT knives; said they sharpened up real well, better than the Henckels. Tis true.
What do people think of rice cookers? I just got a small, nonstick standard one, with no steamer tray. I’ve only used it a few times so I can’t say much. I’m wondering if there are other things I can use it for as well. There are books of rice-cooker recipes, but I think those are for electronic versions.
