Nothing is worse than preparing a recipe and realizing midway through that you lack all the necessary kitchen equipment. Don’t worry; we’re here to gear your kitchen with everything you need, from a food processor that serves as your sous chef to a touch-free smart oven.
There are countless kitchen gadgets available on the market, and we’re not just referring to the typical can opener or measuring spoon set. So, use this list of essential kitchen gadgets and equipment to help you organize your cabinets. While you can get by without a few items on this list, having these essentials on hand can make cooking more productive and easier.
Food Processor
Using a food processor can spare you from having to perform laborious and exhausting prep work; it’s like having a personal sous chef. Dice, grind, mince, knead, slice, puree, and shred are just a few tasks an excellent food processor can handle. You’ll be able to quickly prepare various foods with it, whether you’re grating cheese, slicing vegetables, cutting nuts, or making dough.
Food processors are fantastic for producing pates and dips in addition to creamy and smooth deli-style tuna fish. They produce better outcomes than premade items from delis and supermarkets and are simple to clean.
A food processor is a crucial kitchen appliance that will keep your kitchen time productive. Once you begin using one, you’ll find that you can use it for an increasing number of time-saving cooking tasks.
Meat Thermometer
Invest in a top-notch digital meat thermometer to end your worries if you’ve ever worried that you might unintentionally serve your loved ones undercooked meat. It’s among the few culinary items that will immediately boost your self-assurance. These instant-read thermometers can be used for grilling, monitoring the temperature of cooked meat in the oven, cooking on the stovetop, or using a smoker to test the meat’s temperature very swiftly.
The simplest method to guarantee properly cooked meat is using a thermometer. The better ones let you quickly and easily check the core temperature to prevent undercooking, which could lead to disease, or overcooking, which would result in delivering dried-out food.
There is no need to probe or cut into the meat to determine whether it is cooked through. With a digital meat thermometer, you can know whether your roasts, chicken, or pork chops are done.
Slow Cooker
Since the early 1970s, when they were most popular, slow cookers have advanced significantly. Slow cookers are used to prepare anything from breakfast to dessert, and there are specialized slow-cooker recipes for various cuisines and diets.
This little gem is a terrific way to use leftover meats and vegetables, aside from the energy efficiency of using a slow cooker rather than the oven for cooking a roast. Just toss everything in with some stock, let it stew all day, and you’ve got soup!
The simplest way to prepare a chicken for pot pies or casseroles that ask for cooked chicken while also producing your chicken broth! You can use a good slow cooker to make recipes for lunch, supper, and everything in between, whether pot roast recipes, slow cooker chicken recipes, or BBQ jackfruit recipes.
Crock pot cooking also readily fits into the routine of a busy household when various family members occasionally need to eat at different times. They can each have a hot supper thanks to this basic cooking technique without having to exert too much energy in repeated cooking sessions.
Rice Cooker
Any thrifty cook’s pantry must include rice, and it’s likely to be used frequently. It can be challenging to cook rice precisely, but it doesn’t have to be. A rice cooker makes cooking rice considerably simpler and demands less attention.
Consider how often you’ve had to wait to prepare another part of your meal because your rice overflowed, dried out, burned, or cooked for too long and used all the burner area. Rice preparation has never been simpler, thanks to the development of the electric rice cooker.
You add the specified amount of rice, fill the container to the specified level, place it in the cooking chamber (most include an outer and removable inner chamber for convenience of use and cleaning), cover it, press the “cook” button, and that’s it! They come with precise measures prominently stated on the cooking vessel, so there’s no guesswork involved.
Making oatmeal for breakfast is another great application for your rice cooker! You only need to throw your items in, shower, and get ready for work, and in 20 minutes or less, you’ll have a cheap, hot, filling breakfast ready.
Blender
If you’re whipping up a refreshing, healthy morning smoothie, you’ll need a blender that can quickly turn your components into smooth, creamy perfection. The greatest blenders can make nut milk, transform granulated sugar into powder, blend silky soups, and much more. These culinary essentials are useful for more than just that too.
Whether you use your blender to make the occasional margarita or a regular smoothie—and the blends didn’t even turn out all that smooth—you’re due for an upgrade. Your blender should be able to grind oats for homemade oat milk, purée velvety soup in minutes, and crush ice for vegan protein shakes and silky smooth frozen cocktails.
Blenders do not have to be pricey. For $20 to $30, you may purchase a decent low-end blender that will function well. You can use this useful appliance to make smoothies, your sorbet from frozen fruits, blended drinks, and juice.
Juicer
You know the significance of eating plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables. Without a doubt, nutrients are crucial for good health and well-being. Juicing’s rise in popularity in recent decades due to this reason is understandable.
It’s simple to prepare freshly squeezed produce in a matter of minutes with a decent juicer. They allow you to squeeze fruits that you’d never be capable of extracting with an old-fashioned citrus juicer and allow you to squeeze plants you would never be capable of squeezing by hand alone. They also save you energy and extract the maximum amount of juice.
The three basic types available are Citrus, centrifugal, and slow juicers. The best juicers for keeping the nutrients in vegetables and fruits are often slow juicers (also known as masticating juicers). Citrus juicers are wonderful for easily pressing oranges, limes, lemons, and grapefruit, while centrifugal juicers are ideal for quickly juicing fruits and vegetables.
Rubber Spatulas
A good spatula is sturdy and convenient to use, and the one you select can make the difference between a properly flipped pancake and one flopped and deformed. You’ll save time and money in the kitchen if you have a complete set of rubber spatulas in three different sizes. With a rubber spatula, using the remainder of that mayonnaise or pouring batter from the baking mix you just made won’t result in food waste.
Rubber spatulas are excellent instruments when spreading condiments on a toasted sandwich or bread. They can complete the task quickly and spread considerably more effectively than butter knives.
Sure, whatever spatula you use will probably be able to spread brownie batter or transfer pancakes to a plate. Still, a subpar spatula might worsen your cooking and be annoying.
Even today, a nice spatula is still reasonably priced and may significantly affect how well your dishes turn out. You can see how essential a decent spatula can be for improving productivity when cooking sandwiches for a large group of people.
Four-Sided Stainless Steel Grater
A decent grater comes in handy for grinding raw vegetables of all kinds, including carrots, potatoes, radishes, and much more. It’s a terrific time-saving tool for quickly grating cheese (and doing so with your cheese is significantly superior in taste to buying store-grated cheese). You don’t need much strength to grate on your own, and you’ll discover that some foods can be grated considerably more quickly than they can be cut with a kitchen knife.
Large Metal or Plastic Colander
Depending on your cooking method, you might require two or three colanders. The good thing is that you have a lot of options. A colander is a quick and effective tool for draining pasta, veggies, or even sliced potatoes for gourmet French fries.
For big batches of pasta or enormous bushels of greens, a large, over-the-sink, or free-standing colander is the best tool, even though lightweight, fine mesh strainers are handy for many applications. Do not assume that you may drain away extra water from a pot without using a colander by simply keeping the lid on the pot. The “holding the lid and just pouring the water” approach is inefficient, and the steam that escapes poses a serious risk of serious burns.
Dealing with a burn or injury will take much longer than it would if you had used a colander in the first place. Investing a little bit more in the quality of this gadget won’t be prohibitively expensive.
Smart Oven
You can now turn your oven on without touching it. To manage controls conveniently, connect your smart oven to some other smart device. The oven you buy will have different features depending on the brand.
If you have a smart oven connected to your speaker, you can give commands, and the speaker will pass those instructions on to the smart oven. Other smart ovens have capabilities like using an app-based recipe library, scanning product barcodes to alter settings to the product’s instructions, and more.
Coffee Maker or Machine
You probably enjoy starting each day with a cup of coffee, whether you commute to the workplace or work from home. It starts your day well, and with the perfect coffee maker, it’s delicious and of the highest caliber. Your ability to start your day well can depend entirely on your coffee machine.
Although conventional at-home coffee makers have been available for a while, more recent models provide more benefits. You want a machine that produces coffee quickly, is easy to operate, and prioritizes taste intensity. You should be enticed into the kitchen by the coffee’s aroma and compelled to return for more.
Today’s coffee machines come with a speedy water heater, frothers, many cup-size options, and other features. Although they are frequently referred to as coffee machines or coffee makers, these devices can also produce many other drinks, such as hot chocolate, hot or cold tea, and in certain cases, iced coffee.
Airtight Food Storage Containers
To neatly store your rice, dry baking ingredients, pasta, and snacks, and even tidy your spice packets and meal mixes, airtight food canisters will save you time in the kitchen. They will help you quickly locate the goods you need in your pantry and prevent you from unintentionally spilling that package of instant rice, elbow macaroni, or open bag of flour and causing a kitchen calamity that calls for extensive sweeping and vacuuming.
Egg Separator
Instead of using an entire egg, many baking recipes ask for egg yolks or egg whites. There are a few manual methods to separate the two, but they can be difficult to learn and, at best, messy. However, using an egg yolk separator gadget will make the job easier.
Separating egg yolks from whites is simple with this kitchen tool. There are numerous options, including ceramic pots, silicone suction tools, and metallic spoons.
Zoodle Slicer
Spiralizers are a fantastic addition to your kitchen arsenal, whether you’re attempting to switch to a plant-based diet, increase the portion of veggies in your diet, or shorten the time you spend in the kitchen. Most spiralizers come with many blades and are thus more versatile than merely being used to generate zucchini noodles.
Most spiralizers come with many blades and are thus more versatile than merely being used to generate zucchini noodles. With the help of a spiralizer, you may quickly and precisely chop vegetables with a chef’s eye for detail, hastening the preparation of a nutritious dinner.
Many of these devices are presumably already in your possession, but some may have fallen by the wayside over time. But if you start using these necessary gadgets again, you’ll notice a significant decrease in the time needed for cooking and cleaning. So there you have it—kitchen gadgets that will undoubtedly save you time and increase the productivity of your cooking.