Must Have Kitchen Equipment / Gadgets?

Utilizing the freezer is important too because sometimes I am the only one eating a recipe i make and i can divide it up and freeze some. Also, I like to keep my low calorie bread in the freezer because sometimes it takes me a while to eat the loaf.

tony2545 wrote: »

What items do you have in your kitchen that are essential to keeping you accountable for preparing & tracking your nutrition? Mine are a good set of knives, scale, storage containers, Instant Pot, & a good non stick pan.

Pretty much the same. I also love my blender and my mini food processor. I actually lost well before I started using an instant pot, though, and neither the blender nor the food processor were essential. The storage containers were important to me for bringing lunches to work and just generally being able to prepare food ahead, which made things a lot easier. Knifes, well, makes cooking a lot easier, especially if one is chopping lots of veg, and of course the scale.

Scale
Ninja Foodi ( combo air fryer/instant pot/crockpot/dehydrator)
A sharp knife
Silicon spoon/scraper
Oxo hand-crank bearer
A wooden spoon my then 6 year old daughter got me for Christmas from the dollar store twenty five year ago, and which has proven fabulously useful.

Everything you listed plus a sheet pan and air fryer.

This knife sharpener

https://www.amazon.com/Victorinox-Handheld-Manual-Knife-Sharpener/dp/B001X5A998

1 scale (which I hate. I really need to get a new one.)

1 measuring cup for liquids.

1 espresso coffee machine so I spend less money on coffee and can actually relatively accurately tell how many calories are in my lattes (relatively accurately because the coffee ground packages dont have calorie info on them).

Also normal cooking utensils.

Enjoyable, but not truly needed:

1 ice cream machine (you can make healthy-ish stuff yourself).

1 Slow Cooker.

For cutting down on fat I find the new generation non stick pans indispensible. These are ceramic coated or stone coated, not teflon. I can cook pancakes and eggs without any added fat to the pan.

acpgee wrote: »

Instant read meat thermometer has made my cooking much more consistent. Costs about $10 and requires as much room to store a an extra fork.

Yes, I used to always overcook chicken breast "to be safe" and love not having to do that anymore. And I've learned I like thighs cooked more than the standard 175 degrees.

I also realized I like salmon and tuna cooked to around 125 degrees. If I'm ordering it from a restaurant I'll say "medium rare" and that's been very helpful.

kshama2001 wrote: »

sgt1372 wrote: »

tony2545 wrote: »

What items do you have in your kitchen that are essential to keeping you accountable for preparing & tracking your nutrition?

What's ESSENTIAL for food prep and nutrition tracking?

Nothing more than a few knives, some basic cooking utentsils, a basic set of pots and pans for food prep plus a food scale ad MFP for nutrition tracking.

Everything else is extra and I've got a lot of extras; far too many to list here.

Ditto, lol

And don't even get me started on how many spices I have.

Yes, but spices aren't kitchentools. One never has enough spices. reminds me that I need to buy new galangal and assafoetida.

Scale - mine is a little silver Escali that works great, about $30 on Amazon and available in a bunch of pretty colors. Very sensitive, stays on long enough to be useful (IIRC the timeout is 4-5 minutes or something).

Prep bowls - there's something to be said for mise en place, but also it's so easy to weigh things out into a bowl and then set it aside to prep the next thing. I could use more of these, actually. I don't remember which Food Network personality introduced me to the concept of the "garbage bowl," but that's also been a game changer - it's just a bowl that you designate for all your vegetable peels, bones, trimmed fat, whatever. You wouldn't think it would make that much of a difference, but it really helps make cleanup quick and easy, if you're like me and often accidentally spend all your energy cooking and don't have any left to clean up afterward.

Good, sharp knives - I had a literal nightmare the other night about trying to cut some sausage with a knife so dull it might as well have been a rock. I woke up mad about it and everything. Sharpen your knives - there are few things more satisfying than cutting meat or produce with a good, sharp knife.

Good cutting board - right now I have a crappy plastic one I've carted around for the past 7 years, but hubs is going to make me a nice wooden one for Christmas, so I have that to look forward to! Also, pro-tip if your cutting board slides around on your countertop - put a kitchen towel or a wet paper towel underneath it, keeps it in place.

KitchenAid stand mixer - GAME. CHANGER. It's not just for baking. You can shred meat in it using the mixing paddle - pop that roast in the Instant Pot for an hour, then in the KitchenAid for literally like a minute, and you have instant shredded pork/beef/whatever. You can make your own butter with the whisk attachment (although shaking a jar is a good arm workout and, frankly, a lot of fun!) I got mine secondhand, she's a gorgeous emerald green color and she turned 31 this year. Great thing about KitchenAid is that all of the attachments are compatible with all models, so no matter where you get your bits and bobs, they'll work with your machine. I have a spiralizer attachment that's only kind of a PITA to clean, LOL but it works amazingly well.

springlering62 wrote: »

yirara wrote: »

I need to buy assafoetida.

OMG. OMFG! You use that stuff for pleasure cooking?

When I was a kid, my mom used to mix it with something and force it down our throats as cough medication.

Quite simply, THE worst thing that has ever passed my lips.

You’ve reawakened all kinds of toxic buried memories there.

I think I’ll go rinse my mouth out now with gasoline or something to get rid of the reimagined taste. Meh! Bleck! Urp!!!

Ugh.. I do use it for Indian cooking. It goes really well with fenugreek in vegetarian dishes. Carefully of course and not a whole spoon full

Food scale, of course.

Cast iron pans.

Instant Pot.

Spices.

Good knives.

Good quality blender.

Citrus juicer (because I use a lot of lemons and oranges).

kshama2001 wrote: »

sgt1372 wrote: »

tony2545 wrote: »

What items do you have in your kitchen that are essential to keeping you accountable for preparing & tracking your nutrition?

What's ESSENTIAL for food prep and nutrition tracking?

Nothing more than a few knives, some basic cooking utentsils, a basic set of pots and pans for food prep plus a food scale ad MFP for nutrition tracking.

Everything else is extra and I've got a lot of extras; far too many to list here.

Ditto, lol

And don't even get me started on how many spices I have.

Shhh...ix-nay on the ices-spay! 😉
Actually, probably on the cookbooks too, in my case.. 😳

Sorry, have to disagree on that one. Now that I think about it, I haven’t used measuring spoons in a couple of years.

It’s so much more accurate, loggable, and simply easier to weigh, once you get used to it.

Wow. Maybe I can get rid of my measuring spoons when I do my annual “Ain’t Used That/ Get Rid of It” kitchen survey in January.

What I do go through daily is regular spoons. Mixing teas, blending marinades, spooning out spices, or cottage cheese etc. Luckily I found someone selling spoons in the pattern I bought 40+ years ago, so I have a life long supply. Thank the Lord for dishwashers.