Far too often people overlook the importance of using the proper tools when cooking fine meals. While there is nothing in the world that can quite compare to cooking with the finest and freshest of ingredients, your cooking can only be enhanced by making use of the perfect tools for the job at hand.
When it comes to your saucepans and frypans etc., you should keep in mind that conductivity is extremely important. You should also choose pots and pans that are made of a heavier gauge. This allows your pans to heat evenly avoiding hot spots, which can lead to food that may ‘stick’ to your pan or burn during the cooking process. This means that simply stopping in at your cheap shop or local mass market retailer and purchasing any old set of pots and pans is probably not the best course of action for the best possible quality in your kitchen.
Kitchen knives are probably the most important tool in the kitchen. If you plan to prepare many meals in your kitchen, then the quality of your knives is of the utmost importance. Your knives are an investment you shouldn’t have to make too often in your lifetime. For this reason, select a really good set and be prepared to make a decent investment in your knives. You will never understand, unless you’ve tried to prepare foods with knives of inferior quality, just how important it is to purchase good quality and well-balanced knives for your kitchen.
If you plan on cooking a great deal of meat then you should also invest in a needle tenderiser. This useful tool not only helps when it comes to tenderizing tougher cuts of meat but also pierces the surface so that rubs and marinades can penetrate for a more flavorful experience. This is by far one of our favorite kitchen gadgets and it isn’t a sizeable investment for the added value it provides to meals.
A good quality grater is another tool that no kitchen should be complete without. There are many who feel that with all the pre shredded cheese products on the market today this tool is obsolete but nothing could be further from the truth. First of all, pre grated and pre packaged cheese simply doesn’t touch the quality or flavor that freshly grated cheese provides. (Not to mention added chemicals) Second, cheese isn’t the only thing that these graters are useful for grating. Graters are excellent tools for grating citrus fruits, spices, garlic, chocolate, and even onions. If you do a good deal of baking in addition to your cooking you should not overlook the value of having a quality grater in your kitchen.
Of course there are many more cooking tools than we could possibly mention here. Those mentioned above simply happen to be among our personal favorites. There are all kinds of appliances and gadgets no kitchen is truly complete without. In addition to these great appliances there are many tools that are simple matters of preference. Do you peel enough potatoes to warrant a special device for doing so or do you simply opt to purchase an ergonomically designed potato peeler and peel them by hand? There are no one size fits all answers when it comes to kitchen tools and many of us are often limited by serious budget constraints and restrictions. Our best advice if this is the situation for you is to purchase the best possible quality you can afford and build from there. Even if it means replacing one pot or knife at a time until you can manage a complete set of superior quality cooking tools you will find it well worth the price you’ve paid in the long run.
