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I’m a longtime enthusiastic home cook, and while I’m happy to fire up the oven at any time of year, I am, like many home cooks, I would imagine, especially into cooking during fall and winter, when temperatures drop and things get real cozy. So this week, we’re going to take a look at some of the kitchen items I turn to most regularly. I realized while writing this that there are probably a dozen more I could add to the list, so let me know if you’d like to see more of this kind of content. And while you’re at it, feel free to tell me about your most essential kitchen items.
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The Kitchen Items I Can’t Live Without
For a long time, I used the Peugeot Paris Pepper Mill, which has routinely topped “best pepper mill” lists for as long as I’ve been reading them (don’t ask), and I had exactly zero issues with it. But then, a few years ago, I was lucky enough to have Mannkitchen send me their Pepper Cannon, and I have never looked back. This thing is no joke, and it would make a perfect gift for the serious home cook in your life. It’s made from a solid piece of aerospace-grade aluminum, giving it a very serious and significant feel in the hand, but its features and performance are what really stand out.
First, you’ve got a “button-enabled quick-release top,” so you don’t have to worry about unscrewing annoyingly small toppers when it’s time to refill. Then you’ve got a nifty removable base cup that allows you to pre-grind up to ⅓ cup of pepper for bulk seasoning. Most impressive of all, though, is how easy it is to get a frankly ridiculous amount of pepper out of it: I keep mine on a fairly coarse setting, and I’m not joking when I say I season a pan full of scrambled eggs with less than a full turn. Is $199 a lot for a pepper mill? Yes, it is. But as they say in the FAQ on the Mannkitchen website, “And a Ferrari is expensive compared to a Volkswagen.”
If I had to put together a list of my most used kitchen items, this seemingly unassuming salt box would almost certainly be at the very top. I received it as a Christmas gift back in 2016, and it’s been a constant presence ever since. It’s easy to open, holds a ton of salt and looks good on the counter. Easy to clean, too. I’ve got the blueberry blue color, but I kinda want the navy blue one to match my Moccamaster and my KitchenAid mixer. And, come to think of it, my…
I’m very much on board with the Le Creusets and Staubs of the world, but my go-to Dutch oven for the past year or so has been this one from French brand Emile Henry. It lives on my stovetop and is used multiple times per week: I turn to it for chili, for various sauces and stews, and I even use it to boil pasta if I don’t feel like digging out another pot. It’s great for deep-frying, too; I used it to make homemade potato chips with my daughter last summer, and it fared brilliantly. One of the main reasons I’m drawn to it is its considerable amount of surface area for browning meats and softening vegetables — I have the 7.5-quart model, which has a massive 13” diameter. You’ll get similar performance from any of the big brands, of course, but it’s nice to be a little different sometimes, no?
My wife and I have an ongoing…disagreement about the intended use of kitchen towels. I think they’re there for me to wipe my hands on while I lovingly prepare meals for her and my children. She thinks they’re there to look pretty. Rather than continue to fight this fight, I have taken to wearing an apron while cooking — it protects my clothes from splattering sauces or grease, first and foremost, but it also gives me somewhere to wipe my hands from time to time, thereby saving our precious kitchen towels from ever being asked to do anything at all.
This is not a super hot take, as Hedley & Bennett seems to be the go-to apron of anyone who’s ever appeared on a cooking show, but it’s for perfectly good reason. They look great, have exactly the right pockets, come in a million colors and patterns and, most importantly, they do really well in the wash. I’ve also been testing out the new Flint & Tinder Waxed Apron for the past couple weeks, and while I haven’t washed it yet, it also seems like a perfectly good option (though it’s currently sold out).
When I first started getting into cooking, I was obsessed with Alton Brown — I loved his campy, scientific take on the traditional cooking show, but I also loved that he was very clearly a gear nerd, full of opinions on everything you’d ever conceivably find in a kitchen. One of his biggest pet peeves was what he called “unitaskers” — pieces of kitchen equipment that perform just a single job. These Meat Handling and Shredding Claws have long been a punching bag of his, to give you an example. But all the way on the other end of the spectrum sits the mighty bench scraper. I’ve got this one from OXO, and I use it constantly. Transferring chopped vegetables from my cutting board to a pan. Dividing pizza dough. Scraping debris off my cooking surfaces. I’ve even used it in place of a spatula for flipping foods. Maybe the best $12 you can spend on your kitchen.
I realize the whole idea of a dude proudly boasting about and meticulously caring for his cast iron cookware like it’s one of his children has become a bit of a cliché at this point, but whatever. Guilty as charged. I have a fair amount of cast iron, but this is the one I turn to most frequently. I’ve had it for five or six years, and I use it for all sorts of meat-forward pursuits. Frying bacon, cooking steaks, making smashburgers, etc. I clean it with a little soapy water, along with some kosher salt to help scrub off stubborn food bits, then I season it with a light coat of vegetable oil, get it nice and hot, then wipe off any excess fat left on the surface, let it cool overnight, and that’s it. I expect it to outlive me.
No, I don’t actually use a 6” pink chef’s knife. I currently alternate between a Korin knife and a Shun Classic, both of which I’ve had for around a decade. Again, the “problem” with buying only awesome stuff is that you have very little reason to ever buy anything new — although I am very closely eyeing this carbon steel Bob Kramer number. But anyway, the pink Wusthof isn’t for me, it’s for my 9-year-old daughter, who loves cooking with me. I’ve had her using a couple different paring knives and a utility knife, and she’s done great — just last week, she cut four pounds of Yukon Golds as we made the best crispy roast potatoes ever — so I’m thinking there might be an upgrade for her under the Christmas tree this year.
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