My two best kitchen gadgets are a set of American cup measures, these are really useful when using american recipes (like many found online) and they are quick to use. I got them from Lakeland, a shop that does all kinds of kitchen things. In the UK recipes are done by weight, rather than volume.
My second is a little blender, it is only about the size of a small cup and barely takes any space. But its big enough to chop onions, garlic, tomato, or for blending butter with garlic for garlic bread, and various other things.
My best piece of equipment in the kitchen has got to be my left-handed tin opener. Not only does it actually work, it is also fun to watch everyone else (all right-handed) struggle with it. Just as I do when I have to use a right-handed one.
The blender is god!
Next comes the grill. I blend up some herbs and other manly things, put the meat on the grill, pour the sauce onto the meat and wooha.
I'm hungry.......
I'm now eating pork
mmmmmmmm
coo I bet you and Amy have some great grub, Gareth - and baby too!
Stella
I love my can opener. It is a very expensive type that runs horizontally around the top and removes the lid with absolutely no sharp edges on the lid or can.
Next is my table top mixer. I can make cakes, bread dough, pasta dough or candy with it.
Third is my non-stick pan. I have heard that using teflon coated pans causes cancer. I know they get wrecked from using them on high heat. I only use it on medium heat (electric stove) and try not to burn anything. It makes the best pan cakes (and crumpets recently).
I love cooking. I was thinking maybe I would like the job of housekeeper in a home, just cleaning and cooking, no kids or pets. I will ask at the disability placement centre I am going to this week.
I have a cast iron mincer that clamps to the edge of the kitchen table. It has a wooden handle, and a choice of three interchangeable cutting discs, which can be used individually, or in combination, to vary the mincing from very fine to very coarse.
Electric and even electronic mincers come and go, and end up in landfill sites, but my 1930s mincer will go on and on till the Crack of Doom! :roll:
Stella
I like the sound of your blender, Amy. When I chop onions they make my eyes water like crazy. I think I might ask for one of those for Christmas!
My favorite gadget is my bread machine. I never actually use the bake feature, though, but use it to make dough for pizza, calzones, rolls, etc. It mixes, kneads and raises the dough, all I do is dump in the ingredients.
I resisted buying one for years, as I thought the process of making bread dough was kind of fun, and I'm proud that I took the time to learn the 'by hand method' years ago. But it IS time consuming, the machine makes it so much easier. I make bread more often now I have one.
Stella, I've been looking all over for a mincer like that (I'm assuming what you've written about is the same thing my grandma called a meat grinder? It was cast iron and clamped onto the side of the table like you describe) I want to try making homemade sausages with one, the store sausages here are pretty yucky. I agree with you, I like the idea of using really basic tools like that. You don't even need electricity to use them and they last forever.
I have just bought for 50p a second-hand egg slicer to replace the one I had which broke.
The broken one had a plastic body, and when the cutting wires broke (which they did when I cleaned it last) there is no way of fixing them.
My new egg slicer is cast metal throughout, and the cutting wires are one continous piece threaded back over metal studs to form the cutting grid, so that if the wire breaks it can easily be replaced with a new one. It may well be forty or fifty years old.
It's true that I don't slice eggs very often, but when I do there's nothing beats a proper egg slicer for making thin sections without risk of the yolk crumbling out, even with knives well-honed.
I am so clumsy and "accident prone" that I've found that unless things are made of solid metal like this egg slicer, my cast iron frying pans, and my mincer, the chances are they won't last very long before some mishap befalls them and off to the landfill they go!
With my new cast metal gadget, i can feel confident of years of carefree egg-slicing to come, and a weight taken from my mind. You'd have to beat it with a hammer to break it, so I shan't ever have to worry about not having an egg slicer again. :smile:
Stella
:smile: :smile: :smile:
I'm not too impressed with the finished results when I actually 'bake' the bread in the machine, fozziebear. My machine turns out a hunk of bread that's very short and too big around to slice for sandwiches. It would make a good substitute for a concrete block, though :roll: I've seen some machines that turn out a nicer size loaf of bread, but they're more expensive.
Actually, a food procesor to help handle the mixing/kneading part would be handy. Then all you have to do is raise the dough and shape it.
One of my first memories when I must have been two was of an egg slicer, the design fascinated me, I also remember I had an egg cup shaped like Dougal from the magic roundabout, I was a fan of Dougal because he was furry like a cat.
I occassionally make my own bread, its extremely delicious, sometimes I add chopped nuts, walnuts, hazelnuts, pumpkin seeds, lovely.
I like Florence best, Amy! :smile:
I have an extremely strong two pronged fork that is the only one i can use for corn on the cob.
Also a curvy knife just perfect for grapefruit and tomato. Nothing else will do.
They are quite old utensils. I like checking garage sales and op shops for ancient tools because they were made better years ago before all the palstic stuff we have these days.
I do like fun with electrical appliances though. But i am not very considerate of them. I have had two microwaves. The last one i blew up because I liked to nuke all sorts of items. ( no not alive ok?) It was the only way i would eat tofu. Crisped in the microwave. So now I do not have a microwave. I also blew up a glass plate on the stove top. It was spectacular and i was very lucky to turn my head at the time because my cat meowed. Now I set my beeper if i am leaving something on in the kitchen.
Lately i have been a little safer yet still adventurous, experimenting with what things will do in a coffee grinder. This is better than my days with the juicers because they were bigger and I would just keep putting a little bit more in. And the juicer was very hard to clean so i got bad bugs.
I do not expect my coffee grinder to last long but I cannot die of a coffee grinder. So far i have done interesting avocado, orange, cinnamon, yoghurt thing for freezing and scooping or you put herbs and salt in and call it savoury spread. Don't worry i do not feed anyone else yet. :smile:
becca
I love my wok. I find it very useful in cooking; as I eat mostly stir frys (It's also fun to flip the food :smile: ).