The Wonderful Tools of Cooking
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, these
things can only be enhanced by making use of the perfect tools for the job at
hand.
When it comes to pots and pans and skillets you should keep
in mind that conductivity is of extreme importance. You should also select 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
scorch during the cooking process. This means that simply stopping in at your
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 also important ingredients in the
kitchens of today. 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 sizeable 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. You should also try the
handles in your hand to see how comfortable they feel before purchasing a set of
knives. If you do a lot of chopping and cutting during your meal preparation
and cooking you will want to make sure that the knives you are using feel
comfortable in your hands.
If you are like me and plan on cooking a great deal of meat
then you should also invest in a jacquard. This useful tool helps not only when
it comes to tenderizing rather rough and tumble 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 my 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cheese products on the market today this tool is obsolete but nothing could be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 of flavor that freshly grated cheese provides.
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 I could
possibly mention here. Those mentioned above simply happen to be among my
personal favorites. There are all kinds of appliances that in my humble opinion
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. My 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.
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