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Food and Drink Post: The Right Tool For the Job
When it comes to cooking and my kitchen, I’m not really a fan of single-purpose tools. So I almost never feel impelled to investigate the “strawberry huller ” (just use a pointy knife); or the “condiment gun” (doesn’t most ketchup and mustard come in plastic squirt bottles already?); or the “carrot sharpener” (Wait. What?); or the “cookie dipr” (shown at right); or any other silly “let’s solve a problem that doesn’t actually exist” sort of appliance. (I’ve found it’s possible to avoid consideration, and even knowledge, of most of these items just by ignoring as many of those “As Seen on TV!” advertisements and aisles in the kitchen stores, as I can).
Nevertheless, I do on occasion discover a useful little implement that does one particular job better than anything else possibly could. Such a tool is my ceramic ginger grater. I have no idea why it only has 2.5 stars in the Amazon reviews. It’s a lovely thing. Stipulate that I love fresh ginger and that I have, over the years, grated my fingers down to stumps, and the ginger to a stringy mess that could not be used in the recipe, because all the tough, hairy fibers, not to mention the … umm … blood, overwhelmed the small amount of it that I’d actually managed to grate successfully. Followed by the cleanup issues, involving scrubbing, picking, and more bloody fingers, as I tried to rid the murderously sharp metal grater of the residual ginger bits.
This tool grates the ginger, and not my fingers, to a nice moist pulp. And the “stringy hairys” are left behind in a handful whose juice can be squeezed out into the mixture and then discarded. What’s not to like? Nothing, IMHO.
Do you have a particular kitchen tool that you’d not give up, no matter what? Inquiring minds want to know. (Or, if you’d like to nominate a particular item for consideration as the daftest, or most useless kitchen implement ever, we’d love to hear about that too!)
Have at it, please.
Published in General
Possibly. But a true church key can open cans as well as bottles. There weren’t always pop-tops.
Hear, hear! Having missed these for year, relying on Swiss Army knifes and Leathermans, I was handed one by a hotel bartender, along with the non-twist top beverage I had ordered and planned to take up to my room. I still have it 5+ years later, and bought an extra one for my car.
The pointy side still comes in handy with a can of condensed milk, or coconut milk, or such, even if I just intend to transfer the liquid to another container with threaded lid. Much easier to control the pour than if the lid is removed with a can opener.
I’ve always thought of another tool when hearing “church key.” These have a loop to capture and leverage the bottle cap. The loop evokes the top of a church key:
For bartenders today, who need mechanical advantage when serving hundreds of bottles, you get to this, at about 7 inches long:
We have one of those, too. But I never heard it referred to as a church key.
I think mine dates back to when the beer companies give them out so you can open the cans.
You mean the manual, hand-crank one, right? I’d forgotten about them, because, yes, they were useless, and were always locking up.
Although I have a few wooden and bamboo chopping boards, I really like the flexible chopping mats that are not nearly as decorative, but which can be scrubbed or put in the dishwasher, and which can be picked up and rolled to aim the chopped meats or veggies into the pan, or the peelings or other unwanted bits into the trash or compost bin.
Yep.
I have to disagree with you on this, having found one that works well. I can’t stand having separate threads of egg white in my scrambled eggs, omelets, etc. – something from my childhood no doubt. You have to really whisk vigorously to get it totally incorporated.
This Oxo egg beater never jams, probably because the beaters are like whisks rather than the old-fashioned beaters with the flat metal strips. Also, you can remove the beaters and put them in the dishwasher!
EB, what brand is your microplane? My wife likes to make limoncello, but she uses a knife to zest the lemons.
That does look like a pretty good one–I like that there’s a “separator bar” between the beaters. Perhaps that keeps them a consistent distance apart and prevents them from jamming.
On the subject of Oxo, they make a very nice little pepper mill which doesn’t look particularly glamorous or conventional, but really works well. The “grind” is adjustable, from fine to nice and coarse (which is what I like), the grinder part is ceramic, so it doesn’t rust, and I like the little protector thingy on the bottom which both keeps it clean, and which I leave on if I’m trying to grind a specific amount of pepper, so it collects it, and I can tip it into a measuring spoon, or directly into whatever I’m cooking (if the amount is actually important and I need to measure it).
@randywebster The handle says Microplane with an R, so I guess that means they are the only ones that can use the name. It also says, “A Product of Grace Manufacturing.” They also have the patent number!
Thanks, EB.
I always found Ginger grating. Which is why I was always more of a Mary Ann guy myself.
Mrs. Tabby (what – you thought I was in the kitchen enough to know anything about kitchen tools?) really likes her silicone garlic peeler. Mrs. Tabby likes to use fresh garlic in lots of stuff.
Otherwise the trade-off between storage space and occasional use for single purpose tools makes most of them not worthwhile.
I do find that a small sharp knife with a hook at the end of the blade is easier to use than a standard paring knife for removing strawberry hulls. I eat a lot of strawberries.
Ginger is definitely higher maintenance, but … wait, what were we talking about?
My Feemster’s famous vegetable slicer. My mom had one that she bought when she got married in 1946. I bought mine in ‘94. French fries or home made chips, a Feemster’s is a boy’s best friend.
It certainly looks efficient. No room for error though, otherwise I bet it does just a good a job on the fingers . . . Ouch.
The best cutting boards ever are these Epicurean cutting boards. They come in many sizes and are lightweight, easy to clean and dry fast. I keep them sitting on the counter stacked in a sturdy napkin holder so I can grab them fast. I use the small ones for slicing lemons, onions, radishes, etc. I have a really big one with a drain trench around the edge for slicing roasted chickens, hams. roasts.
Speaking of poached eggs this thing really does work. It poaches eggs perfectly to the doneness you want and keeps your toast warm until the eggs are done.
I have to second all the votes for the microplane for zesting citrus. The first time I used one I wondered where it had been all my life.
Had one of those. Broke after 6 weeks. In-laws had one too – theirs died in 8 weeks. Really disappointed in the Q/C on those.
Hmmm. We’ve had ours for over 2 years. No problems.
Knives. I want more of them, and better ones.
I also splurged on 2 very fancy pressure cookers (second one half price) with a glass window in the lid and a spare for the removable fancy silicone gasket. But now the Instant Pot seems to have rendered the pressure cooker obsolete.
Really good nonstick cookware is a high you’ll never get from drugs, too.
I can’t do without the round gripper pads for opening jars, known hereabouts as a “rubber husband.” Even though I still retain the flesh-and-blood version, he knows if he pushes me too far, his replacement is right there in the kitchen gadget drawer.
Thank you! I have a “rubber husband” too. Mine was a gift from the Allstate Insurance Company 20+ years ago. It’s the item that makes it possible for me to dismiss the “who’s going to open the pickle jars?” anti-feminist argument (answer: the “rubber husband,” of course), and which gives me the freedom to ponder relationships between the sexes in terms of complementarity and other, nicer, and much more interesting, terms than those of simple brute strength.
“Rubber husband” sounds vaguely obscene.
That’s an added attraction.
In the years before Amazon was at my beck and call, the only sources of rubber husbands were media kits and conference goody bags. My current ones promote a mystery novel and in-home nursing care. So I’ve still never ordered one, but it’s a comfort just knowing I can.