> kitchen 🥘 > my tools 🍳

Every Kitchen has some tools, and i have a particulary care to have only the most useful and easy to mantain! Nothing worse in a kitchen for me than some "fancy" objects that are never used and / or are hard to clean and mantain.

So this is the list of what i selected for me, what i have in my kitchen, why i got it and if i suggest it to you as well!

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Some General rules and hints	Electric Tools	Little other (must have) things

^^^^ Questi sopra sono links a anchors

Some general rules and hints

That's how i decide if buy and what tools to buy, the details to look for and the "red flag" that prevents me to buy something.

• Things easy to clean . If the tool you want to buy need a lot of time to be cleaned, just look for another model easier to do so. This is an operation you will do every single time you use that tool, if not done properly will be a access port for bacteria, if hard to do, will be a turn off for using that tool in the first time. Look for pieces easy to disassemble, with all part easily reachable with hand and a sponge, that you can pass under the flow of water. [ IMMAGINE DI ESEMPI UNO BUONO E UNO DIFFICILE ]
• Good quality product . Do not look for fancy features for things that handle your food, like "non-stick films" or things with glitter, spend more buying less tools BUT with a better quality, like just one Pan made with stainless stell, than a set of 5 cheap for the same price with covering film that will eventually detach and ruin after some use. [ IMMAGINI ESEMPI STAINLESS STELL E NON STICK ROVINATO ]
• Check for electronic tools enough powerful . You don't need to go full throttle all the time, but a more powerful tool probably will last longer. An example could be the first blender i bought, it was able to reach only XXXX watts, and after a while using it for Hummus and veggies burger, it fused. Now i bought a much higher capable of wattage blender, and doing the same things works like a charm. For the same work, the new one put less stress on the motor. [ IMMAGINI IN CUI SI LEGGONO WATTAGGI ]
• Replacment parts, if possible : This is something hard to achieve, i can't do it properly as well, but if you can, try to look if replacment part are available for the tools you are going to buy. Sometimes just being able to replace one part can save an entire tool from scrap. It's hard to achieve though.
• Phisycal Buttons and offline mode : Your next blender, your next coffe machine or air fryer must do the tasks they are being designed for independently. So a coffe machine will need always to be able to make coffe, and then they must have some phisycal button (i unsuggest to buy touch ones because sometimes you will have wet hands) to do the job without internet or other devices. Just click and work, not server to reach, no touch screen ui to navigate.
• Space Needed : This the last general rule i follow, if i need to buy a tool that works, easy to clean, easy to mantain etc.. i need also to have somewhere to store this tool properly. So, always think "where could i leave this tool properly?" before buying one.

Electric Tools

Steamer

One of the best tools someone gave me as a gift (so much that i bought one for other members of my family as well). In my kitchen is my preferred one, and is literally a resistor that heats up and boil water, nothing more, but in his semplicity in setup and maintanenance, with great and tasty final results make it my favourite.

The Steamer is a appliance that cooks your food with vapor, is perfect for cooking all kind of veggies, rice and other particular food like asiatic vapor buns. One of the biggest pros is that it does not need the use of oil, so it's good if you are trying to stay in a diet.

I use it mainly for veggies like Broccoli, cauliflower with all his variants, carrots, but every kind of veggies you can think of is great in this machine. You just add some water on the bottom of machine, put baskets with your food on top and just turn the time knob to set it on. There is literally nothing more to do, and is great because you can turn it on and forget about it. When finished cooking the ring will alert you.

[ FOTO KNOB DIAL ]

The taste of the food is it greatest point of force, despite being a so simple machine, cooking with vapor give the possibility for the food to mantain intact the structure of themselves, the taste is not altered with oil or salt and is able to release all the flavour of what you cooking in a way usually you don't have if cooking the traditional way on hob (at least, not by just letting everything cook by itself.).

If you have a friends who has it, you should give it a try.

[ FOTO VAPORIERA O CIBO VAP ]

Store and maintenance it easy as well, the cleaning process consist only in pour the water in advance in the sink, pass the baskets under the flow of water and letting everything dry by itself. After that putting the basket in the reverse order make one go inside the other, reducing a lot the volume occupied while being stored.

[ IMMAGINE VAPORIERA MESSA VIA ]

If you want to buy one, don't spend a lot of money on fancy models, usually the classic is sold with 3 baskets, a dial knob to turn on the heating element and nothing else. I would not spend further 30€ for it.

Microwave

This normal tool for a lot of people, for me has been a discovery. I would never have bought a microwave if it didn't appeared in my home by itself. Microwave is one of the general tools that is becoming mandatory while cooking for me, speeding a lot things up and feeling the absence if cooking in a kitchen that doesn't have one.

If you don't know what a microwave is, essentially is a special type of "oven" that heats up the food by exciting the water molecule inside it, building up heat that cooks the food itself.

Don't you have a Microwave (like i did) and asking yourself: Why should i care about the microwave?

Well here are some advantages with it:

• Boils water almost instantly. You realize how much great is this feature the first time you need to boil water the "classic" way, with long time of waiting. (You could tecnically use a boiler, but i don't like those because with time they develop a white patina hard to remove).
• Warms liquids rapidily . Other than boiling water for cooking, is also useful to preparare water for tea or heating up milk in the morning, without the need of cleaning any stove!
• Unfrezze things fast . Same principle, different use. Food stored in freezer is rapidily unfreezed using a microwave, no more long waiting for defrosting.
• Warm up food already made . Cooking leftovers of the day before (or something that cooled down while cooking other things) in minutes, without the need of using a pan.
• Making old bread good again . Some drops of water on top of old bread, microwave it and make it softer again for the time needed to have dinner!
• Making fast popcorn . Just put the bag, press "Start" and forget about the risk of burning a pan.
• Making pasta . OK for this i just say i followed a internet recipe, i NEVER thought it to work (it needs some try and error), i will publish my recipe with my time, but meantime i link the recipe (is in Italian): Recipe

[ PICTURE OF MY MICROWAVE ]

Instead of making a list of "what to look for or not", other than the usual "no internet device" and "look for the power of the tool", i leave here two videos from Technology Connections that teached me a lot:

• The Antique Microwave Oven that's Better than Yours - youtube
• What's the deal with the popcorn button? - youtube

Air fryer

One of the tools i had higher expectation and probably for this reason failed more than the others to meet them. I have to say, is a good machine for doing what is made for: cooking as something between a traditional Oven and a Oil Fryer. It doesn't "fry" things like the name would suggest (in italian we could say is made of "aria fritta"), but instead is a relative efficient oven capable of cooking in "auto mode" things that usually would need some work or being checked.

It works by ventilating at a high speed the food (like a ventilated oven does, but in a more compact and efficient space), you just fill up the baskets, set a temperature and a timer.

It's really good at:

• Cooking Potatoes, pumpkins and similar stuff . It's my favourite feature and discovery. You just peel your vegetable, cut in cubes and let it go at 200°C for 10/15 minutes. It came out ✨ marvelous ✨
• Burgers, meat(veggie)balls, and anything frozen . Same thingm 200°C, 10/15 minutes and it came out tasty af!
• Any kind of finger food that usually is fryied in oil . Probably they have already a little patina of oil, but no care, you fill the basket and it does everything.
• Technically a lot of more things . But I've had it for a short time, so i still need to experiment. Follow this website to find new recipes!

[ FOTO CESTELLI CON CIBO IN COTTURA ]

Why "didn't meet expectation" ? Because people who suggested me, "sold me" as a auto-machine, you put everything in and then it does everything in no time.

It's not like that. Sometimes you have to turn up the timer (like even to 20/25minutes), sometimes you need to add oil to make it cook well, and some things are not so good cooked in air fryer (like Seitan) . I still need to "cook" while using it, and that's fine, but i bought it for the days i had no evergy at all.

If i can give you some suggestions for buying one, other than the usual "no internet" etc.., look for minimum and maximum temperatures. That has been my worse error, my Air fryier goes from 180°C min to 200°C max, with jumps of 5°C from the min to the max. I need to cook things at a lower temperature and i can't.

I like dual baskets, the "Dual Cook" and "Sync Finish" functions of Ariete come handy to not make me think about manually managing two cooing at the same time.

[ FOTO CON AIR FRYIER ]

The biggest suggestion i have for you is: find a place where to put it, somewhere that's enough comfortable to make it useful, find one that's easy to clean and with a large basket. Don't cheap out with little dimensions, you will stop use it in not time because not convienent. Buy a air fryer enough big to make you a full dinner without touch anything else.

Coffe Machine (+ Coffee Grinder)

Who doesn't love coffe? (my sister). But other than her, i don't know people who does not like it!

As Microwave, Coffe machine is the thing in my kitchen that it feel heavy to not have when not present in my home. I know, as italian i "should" use a Moka , but as other examples in this page, i don't have always time or will to clean things, so a coffee machine that does everything for me is a bless.

I'm also ecologist so (they gave me as a gift) a machine that does not pollute with single use coffe pods, but (they) paid a little bit more for a machine that works directly with powder.

[ FOTO MACCHINA ]

I have to say, other than being an ecologist choise, it made me free from being forced of buying pods some brand everytime i wanted coffe, and permitted me to experiment with different taste powder sold by different coffee roasting (Torrefazioni) . I don't have more to say, it make a good quality coffee, is easy to clean and is enough little to have his personal space on my top.

It should be able to do also tea and boil water, or make cappuccini (what you English people call Latte), but i never tried.

If i have to suggest what to look for, just for machines that use "universal standard" for filters and co, because in the future you could need to buy some replacments, and to not add tap water in the tank to not clog the machine with chlorine.

Oh and the coffee grinder is a must, you buy directly coffee beans and grind right before making you the beverage. In this way you can prevent them to absore moisture and lose taste.

Little other (must have) things

Sometimes the littlest things make the difference, something we don't think too much but if they are missing can make your life harder

Airtight containers

If you have to get only one thing from this list, get airtight containers. They are a life saver, here's some really useful uses:

• Saving food in fridge . All the veggies and fruits if left in the plastic bag of supermarket, tends to go bad faster, creating some "water layer" between the plastic and the food that with days make the food looks bad.
• Saving the fridge itself . In case food goes bad, you don't have to clean all the parts of the fridge where the food was, instead you more easily take the container out, empty it and then just clean the container, saving the fridge from becoming dirt and smelly.
• Taking an eye on the flour . Being transparent you can put flour in it (label what is after of course) and always check if some insects got inside (something more harder to catch with traditional packaging).
• Better organization . Containers are easies to move, inpile and organize. The problem with traditional packaging is that degrade, leaves crumbles of the product after being opened, doesn't protect from mold and get ruined after being opened and usually, like for biscuits, get hidden and forget behind other packaging.

Need an hint of buying these containers? Buy them BIG, so they are more usable regardless the size of the food you are using them for (and some paper adhesive to label what you put in and when).

Peeler

[immagine peeler] I know this could seem banal, like other things that will follow this list, but i have found a lot of people without a peeler and myself i learnt to peel potatos, carrots, apples etc.. with a knife and without a peeler. But a peeler is so frigging convenient, if you don't have one, buy it and you will never be able to stay without.

PLASTIC cutting board

Probably everyone has a cutting board at home (if you don't, you must!), but i especially suggest a plastic one because experience taught me wood boards tends to absorbe water, dirtness and create mold hard to clean up.

A scale

If you already have one, you can skip this. If you instead are new to kitchens, please please buy a scale and learn to weight things, if i can suggest, despite having a digital one, i would buy a mechanical if i could go back. They tend to be more precise and expecially don't need batteries to operate (and to replace time to time).

Color coded sponges

Especially if you live with someone else and share the kitchen, i have "color coded" my sponges, the green one for cleaning the kitchen itself, and the yellow one only for plates, cutlery, pots etc.. In this way you never risk to exchange them and use nocive detergent for objects you put in your mouth.

Buy better quality pots and pans

[ Immagine padelle ]

Invest more in high quality products for this category.

You don't need a lot of them, i bought mine with time and started with just a single pan and pot. Currently i have:

• Big Pot for pasta
• Little pot for generic uses (i already had it, that's why)
• A large pan with lid for veggies and curry
• A standard pan for normal cooking
• A wok i need to start using

For two people is more than enough, i tried as i suggest you to do the same, to not buy cheap pans that ruin faster and provide bad quality of life, instead if possible buy stainless steel one, without any kind of "non-stick film" covering your pan, that with time detach and goes in your food being nocive.