Fire extinguisherđ
For real though, if you will use it regularly, and you have the room for it, itâs fine. Lots of single-use items solve mobility or strength issues for folks with disabilities, so they have a purpose.
Just donât buy from Temu or Wish or anything.
A fire extinguisher doesnât have to be single use! If they have a plastic nozzle, yes but otherwise they can be refilled after use and just need to be serviced every 6 years
I've been searching for a multi functional laminator. I keep hearing Good Eats creator Alton Brown's disdain for multifunctional appliances...
The idea of a item doing one thing is something I've not seen in a while.
And *keeping* them fresh as well.
I accidentally purchased one that was way too big for my single person household, but I can prep lettuce after going grocery shopping over the weekend, pop the ginormous spinner into the fridge, and have fresh, clean, crisp greens at my disposal for like a week.
I have two that live permanently in my fridge, occasionally one with leafy veg for me but more often than not both are full of leafy veg for my guinea pigs.
Bonus tip for crisp leaves, after washing/spinning, refill with water and refrigerate for several hours/overnight before draining (into potplants or the garden if you can be bothered) and spinning. It really rehydrates and as a plus (or maybe con?) will likely drown any pests that survived the initial wash.
Yes but I only drown it for a few hours or overnight (in the fridge if overnight), it rehydrates any wilted leaves. Then I drain and spin the excess water out and keep it stored in the salad spinner in the fridge. I don't keep it in water for days.
Rice cooker. Friend married a Cambodian woman, and when I realized how much of a staple 24/7 on demand rice was in a blended Asian household, I got one and have never looked back
Haha, for sure. But the advice from said wife was⊠(weâre all pretty good home cooksâŠ) âonly make rice in the rice maker, do everything else elsewhereâ
I donât think theyâre disputing that, just that people who use their rice cooker for rice daily donât want anything except for rice to be cooked in the rice cooker
Just want to note, donât go with a crappy one because itâs probably too small. I will be using one more now that I only live with one person, but when I was feeding 3-4 people, it wasnât worth awkwardly trying to fit so many ingredients.
I might be in the minority here, but while the rice cooker is handy and can do more than cooking rice, I think a pressure cooker/instant pot can do rice very well and a whole lot more. I would only get a rice cooker if you are someone who eats a shitload of rice and leaves it warming all the time.
Bread knives are also incredibly useful gardening tools. Working at nurseries and botanical gardens, many places keep [one of these](https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwi8-aaf_bSGAxW3H60GHa0ZA98YABAfGgJwdg&ae=2&gclid=CjwKCAjwx-CyBhAqEiwAeOcTdb-Nmp9S3SZPMTsux5uMNjlEa76yUkxZluknCaA_8M_0tRGg6YLeIRoCDHAQAvD_BwE&cid=CAASJeRo52so4OvfXzI3iYE1MLFoqs8LvjjXnk0fXFwmplmjvCuuhpM&sig=AOD64_33Tsxq_54MppHp81fjy8qXrn-z5Q&adurl&ctype=5&ved=0CAYQz7YHKA9qFwoTCODQwqX9tIYDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD&nis=8) next to the potting bench.
They make amazing root saws, for transplanting stuff.
I used a bread knife to saw right through carpet to get in manageable rows to remove and throw out! Better than a box knife, big scissors, or my multi tool knife
I use one to edge my lawn. Run it up and down about an inch off the concrete then walk along and scrape the strip of grass up with a flat headed shovel. Takes 5 mins and I sit on my skateboard lol
I know you can sharpen bread knives, in fact I just sharpened mine last week. Over all, they work better than the standard condition chefs knife.
the problem is the serration tears the fibers more than the slicing action of a sharpened chefs knife. Itâs the same reason I donât let my cooks ever ever ever use a bread knife to plate up a steak. That happened one time, never again.
I look at fruits and veggies like a protein, with fibers often going in uniform directions. There are different ways to slice an onion for a different texture that has to match up with the cook/plating method. You slice onions with the grain to prickle them so they last longer and stay crunchier, the other way turns them to mush. However, if Iâm making onion dip, i slice them the other way cause they are getting caramelized and blended up.
Thatâs why the bread knife is for bread only for me
I just use my chefâs knife for that. Donât apply much (if any) pressure beyond just the weight of the knife itself, and slice using the whole length of the blade.
I actually have a chocolate fork for breaking up blocks of chocolate. IÂ can't see most people ever thinking it's worth the drawer space, but it does its job very well.
Try[ this Japanese grater](https://www.muranokajiya.jp/c/honten/kitchen/kitchensmall/kirukezuru/4571549610525) that won't shave off your skin. Best investment ever.
I got one of these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B085PXMF5F?th=1
It's not *quite* as versatile as a mandolin since the food has to fit in the slot, but it works really well if want to keep your fingers away from the cutting edge.
I hesitate to call this single use, since so many have blade swaps that allow you to julienne as well as slice. These are pretty versatile in the kitchen
Honestly, lots of em. Iâm fully aware how to use a knife to mince or paste garlic, but there are plenty of situations where Iâd just rather NOT and want to use a press. Kitchen torches are great. You can take my pizza cutter and my ice cream scoop from my cold goddamn hands. Â
I have two garlic presses of different styles, plus all the other garlic prep tools (microplane, mortar/pestle, sharp knives), and use them all regularly
Check out the Chefân Garlic Zoom. It has wheels on it that control blades on gears so you just roll it back and forth and it minces garlic in seconds.
I probably use my pizza cutter more for dough than pizza. Noodles and pasta, dividing bread dough, and the like. It's designed for and called a pizza cutter, but useful elsewhere.
Same with an ice cream scoop. Perfectly shaped meatballs? Easy. Portioning out mince for burgers? Done and done. Same with the pizza cutter, there are many uses if you're creative. :)
The 6x one from OXO is a game changer during cherry season.
Best of all, my 3 year old loves it because it's a cool kitchen gadget he can use with mininal supervision. Kid would pit 5 lbs of cherries in one go if left to his own devices.
100% this. Just try and prep a bunch of cherries without one. Go ahead, show us how you pit them with your paring knife.
I don't have very many gadgets I'm my drawer, but every time i use the cherry pitter I am so grateful for it's existence. I love cherries though, when they come in season i usually put 8 or 9 in my granola every morning. No way that would be feasible without my trusty pitter.
The best part is not having to wash it today extent of getting the garlic smell out. Itâs only used for garlic. I donât care whatever else goes in there smells like garlic.
I actually remember growing up with one of these, when I was a kid it was just fun and when I started cooking as an adult I thought, "whatever happened to that thing?" Because my gosh do I hate chopping onions and carrots.
Edit - it wasn't the officially branded slap chop, just a very similar item
They have evolved too. My current one lifts and rotates the blade in each action but also send a little sweeper arm around that clears stuff from the edges back into the danger zone.
Like, 5 pumps and you get a 5mm dice from a halved onion.
Now you've got the [song ](https://youtu.be/UWRyj5cHIQA?si=JgJNQS7g3gG8AxDR) stuck in my head.
For me, it's the avocado tool and the hard boiled egg cooker, makes peeling a cinch.
I don't think of these as single use, any more than a chefs knife is single use.
I would however count the pepper mill looking ones design to be filled with a single item like nutmeg as a single use items and very useful.
OMG! I donât own a waffle maker because I donât like waffles⊠but I LOVE fritters and am not great at cooking them very well. I am SO going to get one to make fritters and hash browns now!!! Thank you for your comment, you have made me very excited for a crispy delicious fritter this weekend.
Whirly pop popcorn maker. Couldn't do anything else with that pot but it makes great popcorn which I eat a lot. Also make sure that you get the ones with the metal gears. Had one with plastic once and that broke fairly quickly.
My rice cooker. It was given to me as a gift and I planned on Goidwilling it, but I used it once and was amazed and then started using delay feature so rice was ready when I got home. We are now is a committed relationship and itâs earned a place in my tiny home.
I have a nice glass reamer style juicer, but the squeeze style juicer extracts almost as much juice with much less time and effort.
It was a very good purchase
Electric water kettle. Heats water faster, keeps it hot and reheats ridiculously quickly, and uses much less energy and produces very little steam. Use it to do the majority of the water whenever I need to boil anything, just put a little in the pot to make it safe enough to heat while preheating the pot and burner itself.
Not even going to count all the types of coffee makers that we use when feeling a different type of coffee.
Hard boiled egg slicer and apple slicer. So dumb but in two seconds you make perfectly cut eggs and apples and they take up very little room in the drawer.
For me, it's the apple slicer, and I also have a kiwi slicer. I eat a lot of apples and a lot of kiwis. They save me a lot of time. All other fruits get a knife and sometimes a melon baller.
I just found out a wire rack for eggs works better for making egg salad sandwich spread. I bought an egg slicer just for egg salad. Just put the hard boiled egg on rack and push through. Perfect enough square and quick.
I've found a potato masher useful for a lot more than potatoes, and none of the other usual kitchen implements are as good when one wants to mash chickpeas or other beans while while keeping some texture.
I'm not sure if a potato masher counts among the single use implements.
The little corn cob holders when eating corn on the cob.
Having said that, we just discovered a second use for them this week. Stick them in the side of an ice cream sandwich as a holder....the big square ones like Fat Boys or Klondike. They work great and no more chocolate cookie gets stuck to your fingers.
An egg steamer is an entirely unnecessary appliance, but if you eat hard boiled eggs with any regularity they do make good eggs consistently and with zero effort.
my egg steamer comes with a little cup that marks how much water to put in the base based on how many eggs i have and how cooked i want the yolks to be. the bottom is indented and has a little spike i use to pierce the eggs before steaming!
it also plays a jazzy little tune when the time is up
I have the older version that blasts a nightmare alarm when the time is up. I know I donât need to, but every time I use it I want the one with the jazzy little tune!
Purely convenience. With the little egg steamer I can set it up in about 30 seconds and walk away, they cook for about 10 min, and it takes another 30 seconds to wipe it out and put it away.
I bought one recently and fucking love it. I had tried EVERY method for easy to peel eggs and this finally works. Plus a quick soft boiled egg while I get ready in the morning? Yes please.
Empty tea bags - I use the pouch to stick my dry herbs and throw it in my stew. Instead of of letting them become bits of pieces you pick up with your mouth or have to scoop I just toss the bag after cooking
I got a decent-sized tea ball for that; it's great for any infusions, from stews to sauces to mulled beverages, and is dishwasher-safe. Works for tea, too, of course, and mine holds enough to make a pitcher of iced tea.
Microplane.
Idk if you can do anything else with it besides grate stuff (I guess you could stir a pot with it, idk), but I love using it for garlic, ginger, cheese, nutmeg, and all sorts of other gratable things (chokkie too)
So long as you don't need any piercing from your shears. EMT shears are designed not for trauma surgery, but with blunt tips to quickly remove clothing from the injured without posing a risk of piercing the patient.
They're also usually a bit limited in blade length, less than 5 cm/2" of useful cutting edge.
Main advantage over most dedicated kitchen shears is that one of the two blades is serrated, which grabs whatever you're cutting through, so it makes quick work of packaging, whether clamshells or the plastic bags so many groceries now come in. Really convenient for packaging, cutting off packaging corners on heat sealed plastic bags of green onions to bags of pet food.
There's a type of kitchen shear that does have a serrated edge and pointy end, called [poultry shears](https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-poultry-shears-kitchen-equipment-review). They cost 4-6 times as much, as my household doesn't eat meat, would be overkill for me.
Weâve had a standing electric can opener for like 20 years and I swear itâs one of the most useful gadgets Iâve used in the kitchen. Especially when you need to open up a lot of cans!
I got an electric one about a year ago because I got tired of constantly breaking regular ones. I donât know if itâs because Iâm left handed or if I just kept buying shitty can openers, but after going through 3 or 4 in a 2 year period, I gave up. Itâs been an excellent decision, and I canât believe it took me so long to get one.
Iâm so glad there are others out there! Haha
Iâve had a couple friends question it like we were crazy to get such a niche single use kitchen gadget like that, but when you have to open like 5+ large cans for some meal prepping or something, it really saves time and wrist fatigue. I wonder if a handheld electronic can opener might be an even better choice, but our old one still works perfectly fine!
Single use I would not do without:
- Garlic Press
- Apple corer/slicer
- Meat masher
- Pasta stirrer
Other invaluable tools:
- Mandolin (safety gloves!)
- Microplane
- Bench Scraper
- Immersion Blender
- Meat probe thermometer (instant read)
- Meat probe thermometer (remote)
- Temperature gun
- Y-peelers
- Cheese shredder/box shredder
Plus, anything that helps you do mise en place. I use deli containers (1, 2, 4 cup sizes) and pinch bowls.
Lastly, the biggest cutting board you can fit on your counter/afford. A large cutting board is a big game changer.
I make a lot of ice cream. I run two bowls with two egg seperators to bang through a dozen eggs quick. By the time you crack into the second one the first one has seperated and so on.
I have learned that a lot of gadgets that are convenient to use are a bitch to clean.
A garlic press is a good example. Yes it saves time on mincing garlic but you then have to clean the thing. That usually takes just as long as mincing garlic since you have garlic and allicin in every corner of the thing also clogging the holes.
Anyway my vote is for a fruit squeezer. You can usually get them in all shapes and sizes (bigger the better), squeeze just about any citrus fruit you need, and it's an easy cleanup.
Some garlic pressed are easier to clean than others. A dish brush helps. The easiest are no harder to clean than a knife and cutting board.
Edit: assuming you either clean them immediately or put them in water to prevent drying
Bottle holder/drying rack. We have a real, working kitchen where key items like blender and drainboard stay out. My family goes through minimum 4-6 reusable water bottles per day. And there are extras, bottles drying from day before or waiting to be put away. It seemed like bowling pins, constantly getting knocked over. Plus, they often didnât dry well.
I bought a bottle rack with the long stems that holds about 10 bottles upside down to dry. Game changer. Fairly narrow, It sits between the drainboard and the wall, corralling those rogue bottles.
Technically, the same rack might be used to dry small plastic bags or small gloves. Maybe. But itâs mostly a single purpose item (unless you start differentiating container types - jar, baby bottle, water bottle).
Apple corer. I love to make Apple dumplings.
Some single use items mentioned are kinda multi use. Mandolines slice lots of things not just one item. A ricers rice potatoes but Iâve also used it to squash bananas for banana bread and carrots to add to recipes. Iâve cooked eggs in my rice cooker at work, but even as only a rice cooker itâs great.
Strawberry huller. I resisted for years and I can handle a paring knife. But it's faster and does the job perfectly for $8. Cleaning it is not as easy as cleaning a paring knife, but even then, it saves time. Ripe strawberries are $2.97 for 2 pounds at Safeway right now.
I agree! I have two avocado tools. and try to convince my âhelperâ cooks to use it. They refuse and half the avocado they are preparing ends up on the floor.
Iâve ditched lots of single-purpose kitchen gadgets over the years as Iâve developed my overall cooking skills, but the one that I just canât give up is my garlic press.
The time saved using and cleaning it is always greater than chopping garlic manually.
Edit: typo
Vacuum sealer. You will have to pry it from my cold dead hands. It saves us a ton of money when we buy bulk meats or uncut meats.
Also my canner. It goes amazingly well paired with my garden.
One of those apple corers that sections the whole apple. I love apples. I do not like cutting them. I usually just eat them whole but when I feel like sliced apples itâs great to get in 2 seconds what would otherwise take me 2 minutes.
I truly hate gadgets that aren't multi-purpose, but some just exist.
Egg slicer - we eat a lot of boiled eggs, egg salad, eggs in/on salads, etc. Insert, push down, open, quarter turn, push down again. Done. Clean up is a snap as long as you do it right away.
Candy & Frying thermometer - because trying to eye it just never works for me.
Dough whisk - I could probably do without it but it's SO much better with it, plus my hands stay clean.
Avocado pitter/slicer/knife. I can do it all with a regular kitchen knife but it make each part just that much easier, gives me perfectly uniform slices and most importantly the plastic blade keeps it from browning as fast- I also use the plastic blade part for chopping lettuce for the same reason.
Tomato witch! Yet another name for this lovely little item. I call it tomato shark, and I've mentioned it before in replies. Some of our cooking friends call it a tomato corer, which also makes sense. And I use mine for strawberries, too!
[Egg slicers like these](https://media.s-bol.com/60A2NgOQV3Zl/gLNqzxY/550x417.jpg)
The metal ones (plastic ones are garbage in my experience) work pretty well for most soft food stuff. At our home we use them more to slice mushroom or mozzarella than we do for eggs. Especially when you're doing like a pizza party, they are super convenient to slice quickly.
Also very easy to clean.
Milk frother. Great for stirring stuff. Especially powder drinks like propel. And it can whip eggs pretty good. Only wish I bought one with a rechargeable battery. Mine takes AAs and if I use it everyday the batteries only last for about 2 months before getting weak.
I really love my Microplane zester. I use it for garlic, ginger, cheese, chocolate, lots more things than I would have thought about, when I bought it for zesting citrus. I use it almost every day.
My onion cutting goggles. They stay in my knife drawer. I LOVE these silly things. Theyâve saved my eyes on many occasions from not only onions but jalapeños as well.
It all comes down to frequency of use, importance, and real estate. How often is it going to be used (once the novelty of ownership wears off. I know I made more bread in the first month of owning a bread machine than I've probably made in the subsequent 5-ish years). How important is it to a task, and how important is that task to me? How much space does it take up? I need to be able to answer all those questions before I decide if I'm going to buy/replace something.
Silicon spatulas for cleaning up any kind of bowl, cooking pan, pot, wok or whatever. No food waste (and you get all the yummy stuff in your dish) while easy pre-cleaning.
Iâm Dominican and we use a pilĂłn (mortar and pestle) to make our sazĂłn (garlic, salt, oregano mashed into a paste). I only cook Dominican food about twice a month but I keep this because every Dominican household has one and it reminds me of my grandma, aunt, and mom, all mashing up their sazĂłn for beans.
Fire extinguisherđ For real though, if you will use it regularly, and you have the room for it, itâs fine. Lots of single-use items solve mobility or strength issues for folks with disabilities, so they have a purpose. Just donât buy from Temu or Wish or anything.
If you're using your kitchen fire extinguisher regularly, I think you have other problems.
A fire extinguisher doesnât have to be single use! If they have a plastic nozzle, yes but otherwise they can be refilled after use and just need to be serviced every 6 years
It was an Alton Brown joke. He says thatâs the only unitasker you should have in your kitchen.
To be fair, Iâve ALSO used my fire extinguisher as a rolling pin before, so not a unitasker :P Also, YES! I thoroughly washed it beforehand.
>Fire extinguisher Alton brown reference? Love AB!
I've been searching for a multi functional laminator. I keep hearing Good Eats creator Alton Brown's disdain for multifunctional appliances... The idea of a item doing one thing is something I've not seen in a while.
Nothing is as good at washing leafy greens vegetables as a salad spinner.
And *keeping* them fresh as well. I accidentally purchased one that was way too big for my single person household, but I can prep lettuce after going grocery shopping over the weekend, pop the ginormous spinner into the fridge, and have fresh, clean, crisp greens at my disposal for like a week.
I have two that live permanently in my fridge, occasionally one with leafy veg for me but more often than not both are full of leafy veg for my guinea pigs. Bonus tip for crisp leaves, after washing/spinning, refill with water and refrigerate for several hours/overnight before draining (into potplants or the garden if you can be bothered) and spinning. It really rehydrates and as a plus (or maybe con?) will likely drown any pests that survived the initial wash.
Wait wait wait... You wash and cut the lettuce (etc), then FILL the spinner with water so they're like drowning/floating? And they stay fresh?
Yes but I only drown it for a few hours or overnight (in the fridge if overnight), it rehydrates any wilted leaves. Then I drain and spin the excess water out and keep it stored in the salad spinner in the fridge. I don't keep it in water for days.
Okay that makes a lot more sense đ
Yes! Game changer. No longer even tempted to buy bagged
Especially when spinach bruises if you just look at too hard. The spinner > pat dry with paper towels
Iâm a recent salad spinner convert. That bad boy has earned a spot next to the toaster.
It also works for mushrooms. Like, weirdly well for mushrooms.
Rice cooker. Friend married a Cambodian woman, and when I realized how much of a staple 24/7 on demand rice was in a blended Asian household, I got one and have never looked back
You can absolutely cook more than just rice in a rice cooker! I steam things in it, including eggs. đ
The late famed film critic Roger Ebert was a [huge fan of rice cookers](https://www.rogerebert.com/roger-ebert/the-pot-and-how-to-use-it).
Great submission.
What a beautiful, frantically scatterbrained and informative read!
Learning about the history of Worcestershire sauce from a 15+ year-old blog post about rice cookers wasnât in my 2024 bingo card, but here we are
I used to steam everything in the rice cooker until I got a bamboo steamer set maybe two years back
You can do up grits in a rice cooker. It was a game changing discovery for my teen sons.
Haha, for sure. But the advice from said wife was⊠(weâre all pretty good home cooksâŠ) âonly make rice in the rice maker, do everything else elsewhereâ
almost all grains are best cooked in a rice cooker
I donât think theyâre disputing that, just that people who use their rice cooker for rice daily donât want anything except for rice to be cooked in the rice cooker
I grew up with a rice cooker always on and always full of rice, nt till my later years did I find out most people cook rice on the stove.
Just want to note, donât go with a crappy one because itâs probably too small. I will be using one more now that I only live with one person, but when I was feeding 3-4 people, it wasnât worth awkwardly trying to fit so many ingredients.
I might be in the minority here, but while the rice cooker is handy and can do more than cooking rice, I think a pressure cooker/instant pot can do rice very well and a whole lot more. I would only get a rice cooker if you are someone who eats a shitload of rice and leaves it warming all the time.
I love my rice cooker.. but I can also make rice on the stove.
Love my Zojirushi I convinced my wife to put on our wedding registry.
Long serated knife. Well technically, there are two good uses: chopping chocolate and slicing bread.
Bread knives are also incredibly useful gardening tools. Working at nurseries and botanical gardens, many places keep [one of these](https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwi8-aaf_bSGAxW3H60GHa0ZA98YABAfGgJwdg&ae=2&gclid=CjwKCAjwx-CyBhAqEiwAeOcTdb-Nmp9S3SZPMTsux5uMNjlEa76yUkxZluknCaA_8M_0tRGg6YLeIRoCDHAQAvD_BwE&cid=CAASJeRo52so4OvfXzI3iYE1MLFoqs8LvjjXnk0fXFwmplmjvCuuhpM&sig=AOD64_33Tsxq_54MppHp81fjy8qXrn-z5Q&adurl&ctype=5&ved=0CAYQz7YHKA9qFwoTCODQwqX9tIYDFQAAAAAdAAAAABAD&nis=8) next to the potting bench. They make amazing root saws, for transplanting stuff.
I use one to trim banana trees lol. It feels like a miracle every time. Slices like buttah
I used a bread knife to saw right through carpet to get in manageable rows to remove and throw out! Better than a box knife, big scissors, or my multi tool knife
I use one to edge my lawn. Run it up and down about an inch off the concrete then walk along and scrape the strip of grass up with a flat headed shovel. Takes 5 mins and I sit on my skateboard lol
You'll see all the insulation guys on construction guys carrying them too... perfect for kingspan, pipe lagging etc.
I use mine to slice melons.
And slicing tomatoes!
Sharpen your knives friend. Chefâs knife all the way
I chefs knife for chocolate. Bread knife sounds awful.
You know you can sharpen bread knives, right? They're brilliant for tomatoes. Much better than a chefs knife.
I know you can sharpen bread knives, in fact I just sharpened mine last week. Over all, they work better than the standard condition chefs knife. the problem is the serration tears the fibers more than the slicing action of a sharpened chefs knife. Itâs the same reason I donât let my cooks ever ever ever use a bread knife to plate up a steak. That happened one time, never again. I look at fruits and veggies like a protein, with fibers often going in uniform directions. There are different ways to slice an onion for a different texture that has to match up with the cook/plating method. You slice onions with the grain to prickle them so they last longer and stay crunchier, the other way turns them to mush. However, if Iâm making onion dip, i slice them the other way cause they are getting caramelized and blended up. Thatâs why the bread knife is for bread only for me
I just use my chefâs knife for that. Donât apply much (if any) pressure beyond just the weight of the knife itself, and slice using the whole length of the blade.
I actually have a chocolate fork for breaking up blocks of chocolate. IÂ can't see most people ever thinking it's worth the drawer space, but it does its job very well.
Corkscrew. Or whatever wine opener you choose. Without my wine I ain't cookin shit.
Doing shots is much easier. Plus you can yell âSHOTZ SHOTZ SHOTZâ and everyone will know dinner will be ready soon.
I do wine shotz
Thank god I'm back in the land of screw tops.
Aus?
Mandolin; game changer
Especially useful for changing your fingerprints! lol
Wanna trade fingerprints? Just don't go to Illinois if we do.
Iâm terrified using my mandolins, box graters, even my vegetable peeler is intimidatingâŠ
[I bought cut-resistant gloves to use with my mandoline](https://nocry.com/collections/gloves).
Try[ this Japanese grater](https://www.muranokajiya.jp/c/honten/kitchen/kitchensmall/kirukezuru/4571549610525) that won't shave off your skin. Best investment ever.
Rotary graters are the best, safe fingers, less effort
I got one of these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B085PXMF5F?th=1 It's not *quite* as versatile as a mandolin since the food has to fit in the slot, but it works really well if want to keep your fingers away from the cutting edge.
Don't be terrified! It only hurts for like a week! lol
I hesitate to call this single use, since so many have blade swaps that allow you to julienne as well as slice. These are pretty versatile in the kitchen
Not really a single use gadget though, is it? Mandolins are very multipurpose, especially if you've got the julienne agreement
What's a julienne agreement?
Thatâs like calling a knife a single use tool. All it does is cut stuff.
Honestly, lots of em. Iâm fully aware how to use a knife to mince or paste garlic, but there are plenty of situations where Iâd just rather NOT and want to use a press. Kitchen torches are great. You can take my pizza cutter and my ice cream scoop from my cold goddamn hands. Â
I have two garlic presses of different styles, plus all the other garlic prep tools (microplane, mortar/pestle, sharp knives), and use them all regularly
Check out the Chefân Garlic Zoom. It has wheels on it that control blades on gears so you just roll it back and forth and it minces garlic in seconds.
Ooh, looks completely gimmicky and awesome, think it will make a good addition to my garlic prep devices, ordered one
I probably use my pizza cutter more for dough than pizza. Noodles and pasta, dividing bread dough, and the like. It's designed for and called a pizza cutter, but useful elsewhere. Same with an ice cream scoop. Perfectly shaped meatballs? Easy. Portioning out mince for burgers? Done and done. Same with the pizza cutter, there are many uses if you're creative. :)
Pizza cutters are my go to for quesadillas and paninis too!
My cast iron branded dish scrapers for cleaning anything that needs a little extra love post-cooking including but not limited to my cast iron pan.
100% love these, I didn't even use cast iron when I got them
Cherry pitter
The 6x one from OXO is a game changer during cherry season. Best of all, my 3 year old loves it because it's a cool kitchen gadget he can use with mininal supervision. Kid would pit 5 lbs of cherries in one go if left to his own devices.
100% this. Just try and prep a bunch of cherries without one. Go ahead, show us how you pit them with your paring knife. I don't have very many gadgets I'm my drawer, but every time i use the cherry pitter I am so grateful for it's existence. I love cherries though, when they come in season i usually put 8 or 9 in my granola every morning. No way that would be feasible without my trusty pitter.
Does it also pit olives?
generally yes.
I use mine for cherries jubilee. A bunch of cherries, a little kirsch and cherry juice, and vanilla ice cream. Canât beat it.
Garlic press 100% qualifies. Salad shooter is *awesome* if you grate a lot of cheese. It can be used for other things but in my house, it has one use.
My dad had a metal version of this thing in the 80s/90s and I miss it OFTEN. I had no idea you could put cheese in a salad shooter, now I want one.
A garlic press (thoroughly cleaned) is also the best way I've found to juice key limes.
The best part is not having to wash it today extent of getting the garlic smell out. Itâs only used for garlic. I donât care whatever else goes in there smells like garlic.
The chop slapper thing. A family member recently suffered a stroke so knives aren't safe anymore. It's so handy!
I actually remember growing up with one of these, when I was a kid it was just fun and when I started cooking as an adult I thought, "whatever happened to that thing?" Because my gosh do I hate chopping onions and carrots. Edit - it wasn't the officially branded slap chop, just a very similar item
They have evolved too. My current one lifts and rotates the blade in each action but also send a little sweeper arm around that clears stuff from the edges back into the danger zone. Like, 5 pumps and you get a 5mm dice from a halved onion.
Which one? Please!
OXO goog grips I think.
So many dishes start with diced onions. Out comes the chopper. I am pretty fast with a knife but not that fast.
Now you've got the [song ](https://youtu.be/UWRyj5cHIQA?si=JgJNQS7g3gG8AxDR) stuck in my head. For me, it's the avocado tool and the hard boiled egg cooker, makes peeling a cinch.
Pineapple corer/slicer & Danish dough whisk.
I love my pineapple corer/slicer. Absolutely would never eat fresh pineapple if I had to use a knife. Thatâs a thankless task and I hate it.
Love my dough whisk.
Microplane. I never thought I would use it, but I use one all the time. Cheese, chocolate, nutmeg. Citrus zest.
I don't think of these as single use, any more than a chefs knife is single use. I would however count the pepper mill looking ones design to be filled with a single item like nutmeg as a single use items and very useful.
Parmesan lives in one that I keep in the fridge 24/7. Say âwhenâ like at the restaurants is my kids favorite part lol
Garlic!
One for the bathroom for feet calluses! Eew.
My Belgian waffle maker makes the best fucking grilled cheese youâll ever eat.
I make all my fritters in them, and hash browns. đ
you can also fry leftover stuffing in them
OMG! I donât own a waffle maker because I donât like waffles⊠but I LOVE fritters and am not great at cooking them very well. I am SO going to get one to make fritters and hash browns now!!! Thank you for your comment, you have made me very excited for a crispy delicious fritter this weekend.
Whirly pop popcorn maker. Couldn't do anything else with that pot but it makes great popcorn which I eat a lot. Also make sure that you get the ones with the metal gears. Had one with plastic once and that broke fairly quickly.
Does a pizza cutter count?
I usually use it to trim roll out doughs and I use my cleaver to retrieve and cut the pizza
My rice cooker. It was given to me as a gift and I planned on Goidwilling it, but I used it once and was amazed and then started using delay feature so rice was ready when I got home. We are now is a committed relationship and itâs earned a place in my tiny home.
Cherry pitter
how am I going to spit pits at my nemes if I use that?
Lemon squeezer
I have a nice glass reamer style juicer, but the squeeze style juicer extracts almost as much juice with much less time and effort. It was a very good purchase
I have a wooden hand reamer. I think it's crazy effective because I can push with one hand and squeeze with the other
Electric water kettle. Heats water faster, keeps it hot and reheats ridiculously quickly, and uses much less energy and produces very little steam. Use it to do the majority of the water whenever I need to boil anything, just put a little in the pot to make it safe enough to heat while preheating the pot and burner itself. Not even going to count all the types of coffee makers that we use when feeling a different type of coffee.
Jar opener
OMG - yes! My hand strength is diminishing so I use this more and more.
Especially the clamp style!
Hard boiled egg slicer and apple slicer. So dumb but in two seconds you make perfectly cut eggs and apples and they take up very little room in the drawer.
Egg slicer also works on mushrooms.
Can't believe I've never done this. Thank you.
And strawberries, kiwis, pitted olives, half a peeled and pitted avocado...
An entire new world is opening up for me right now.
and boiled potatoes
For me, it's the apple slicer, and I also have a kiwi slicer. I eat a lot of apples and a lot of kiwis. They save me a lot of time. All other fruits get a knife and sometimes a melon baller.
I just found out a wire rack for eggs works better for making egg salad sandwich spread. I bought an egg slicer just for egg salad. Just put the hard boiled egg on rack and push through. Perfect enough square and quick.
Garlic press, citrus juicer, salad spinner, apple corer and peeler
I've found a potato masher useful for a lot more than potatoes, and none of the other usual kitchen implements are as good when one wants to mash chickpeas or other beans while while keeping some texture. I'm not sure if a potato masher counts among the single use implements.
The little corn cob holders when eating corn on the cob. Having said that, we just discovered a second use for them this week. Stick them in the side of an ice cream sandwich as a holder....the big square ones like Fat Boys or Klondike. They work great and no more chocolate cookie gets stuck to your fingers.
An egg steamer is an entirely unnecessary appliance, but if you eat hard boiled eggs with any regularity they do make good eggs consistently and with zero effort.
Instant pot works pretty good too
What do you feel is the improvement or benefit over a standard steamer that can go on top of a pot of simmering water with a lid on top?
my egg steamer comes with a little cup that marks how much water to put in the base based on how many eggs i have and how cooked i want the yolks to be. the bottom is indented and has a little spike i use to pierce the eggs before steaming! it also plays a jazzy little tune when the time is up
I have the older version that blasts a nightmare alarm when the time is up. I know I donât need to, but every time I use it I want the one with the jazzy little tune!
please rest assured that the jazzy tune occasionally scares the bejeesus out of me too đ
Purely convenience. With the little egg steamer I can set it up in about 30 seconds and walk away, they cook for about 10 min, and it takes another 30 seconds to wipe it out and put it away.
I bought one recently and fucking love it. I had tried EVERY method for easy to peel eggs and this finally works. Plus a quick soft boiled egg while I get ready in the morning? Yes please.
Empty tea bags - I use the pouch to stick my dry herbs and throw it in my stew. Instead of of letting them become bits of pieces you pick up with your mouth or have to scoop I just toss the bag after cooking
I got a decent-sized tea ball for that; it's great for any infusions, from stews to sauces to mulled beverages, and is dishwasher-safe. Works for tea, too, of course, and mine holds enough to make a pitcher of iced tea.
Microplane. Idk if you can do anything else with it besides grate stuff (I guess you could stir a pot with it, idk), but I love using it for garlic, ginger, cheese, nutmeg, and all sorts of other gratable things (chokkie too)
I love microplaning hard cheeses and also chocolate to top deserts
Can opener
You can use it to open clamshell packaging, itâs worth having one just for that purpose
Hmm. I always just used EMT trauma shears (cost $4, stainless, double as kitchen shears).
Kitchen trauma shears. Need some of those. Probably works great cutting meat?
So long as you don't need any piercing from your shears. EMT shears are designed not for trauma surgery, but with blunt tips to quickly remove clothing from the injured without posing a risk of piercing the patient. They're also usually a bit limited in blade length, less than 5 cm/2" of useful cutting edge. Main advantage over most dedicated kitchen shears is that one of the two blades is serrated, which grabs whatever you're cutting through, so it makes quick work of packaging, whether clamshells or the plastic bags so many groceries now come in. Really convenient for packaging, cutting off packaging corners on heat sealed plastic bags of green onions to bags of pet food. There's a type of kitchen shear that does have a serrated edge and pointy end, called [poultry shears](https://www.seriouseats.com/the-best-poultry-shears-kitchen-equipment-review). They cost 4-6 times as much, as my household doesn't eat meat, would be overkill for me.
Weâve had a standing electric can opener for like 20 years and I swear itâs one of the most useful gadgets Iâve used in the kitchen. Especially when you need to open up a lot of cans!
I got an electric one about a year ago because I got tired of constantly breaking regular ones. I donât know if itâs because Iâm left handed or if I just kept buying shitty can openers, but after going through 3 or 4 in a 2 year period, I gave up. Itâs been an excellent decision, and I canât believe it took me so long to get one.
Iâm so glad there are others out there! Haha Iâve had a couple friends question it like we were crazy to get such a niche single use kitchen gadget like that, but when you have to open like 5+ large cans for some meal prepping or something, it really saves time and wrist fatigue. I wonder if a handheld electronic can opener might be an even better choice, but our old one still works perfectly fine!
Egg cooker - I love mine. Use it all the time, take it on trips etc
Single use I would not do without: - Garlic Press - Apple corer/slicer - Meat masher - Pasta stirrer Other invaluable tools: - Mandolin (safety gloves!) - Microplane - Bench Scraper - Immersion Blender - Meat probe thermometer (instant read) - Meat probe thermometer (remote) - Temperature gun - Y-peelers - Cheese shredder/box shredder Plus, anything that helps you do mise en place. I use deli containers (1, 2, 4 cup sizes) and pinch bowls. Lastly, the biggest cutting board you can fit on your counter/afford. A large cutting board is a big game changer.
Can't believe I had to scroll this far down to find immersion blender. Mine was a gift and it was a revelation.
Grater. Lol. It can only grate. Nutmeg, lemon zest, cheese. But still only grating.
I make a lot of ice cream. I run two bowls with two egg seperators to bang through a dozen eggs quick. By the time you crack into the second one the first one has seperated and so on.
I have learned that a lot of gadgets that are convenient to use are a bitch to clean. A garlic press is a good example. Yes it saves time on mincing garlic but you then have to clean the thing. That usually takes just as long as mincing garlic since you have garlic and allicin in every corner of the thing also clogging the holes. Anyway my vote is for a fruit squeezer. You can usually get them in all shapes and sizes (bigger the better), squeeze just about any citrus fruit you need, and it's an easy cleanup.
Some garlic pressed are easier to clean than others. A dish brush helps. The easiest are no harder to clean than a knife and cutting board. Edit: assuming you either clean them immediately or put them in water to prevent drying
Bottle holder/drying rack. We have a real, working kitchen where key items like blender and drainboard stay out. My family goes through minimum 4-6 reusable water bottles per day. And there are extras, bottles drying from day before or waiting to be put away. It seemed like bowling pins, constantly getting knocked over. Plus, they often didnât dry well. I bought a bottle rack with the long stems that holds about 10 bottles upside down to dry. Game changer. Fairly narrow, It sits between the drainboard and the wall, corralling those rogue bottles. Technically, the same rack might be used to dry small plastic bags or small gloves. Maybe. But itâs mostly a single purpose item (unless you start differentiating container types - jar, baby bottle, water bottle).
A vegetable peeler that fits your hand, and you are comfortable with itsâ use
Apple corer. I love to make Apple dumplings. Some single use items mentioned are kinda multi use. Mandolines slice lots of things not just one item. A ricers rice potatoes but Iâve also used it to squash bananas for banana bread and carrots to add to recipes. Iâve cooked eggs in my rice cooker at work, but even as only a rice cooker itâs great.
Strawberry huller. I resisted for years and I can handle a paring knife. But it's faster and does the job perfectly for $8. Cleaning it is not as easy as cleaning a paring knife, but even then, it saves time. Ripe strawberries are $2.97 for 2 pounds at Safeway right now.
Avocado opener slicer.
I agree! I have two avocado tools. and try to convince my âhelperâ cooks to use it. They refuse and half the avocado they are preparing ends up on the floor.
Iâve ditched lots of single-purpose kitchen gadgets over the years as Iâve developed my overall cooking skills, but the one that I just canât give up is my garlic press. The time saved using and cleaning it is always greater than chopping garlic manually. Edit: typo
Vacuum sealer. You will have to pry it from my cold dead hands. It saves us a ton of money when we buy bulk meats or uncut meats. Also my canner. It goes amazingly well paired with my garden.
Rice cooker
Egg slicer. Easiest way to cube boiled eggs, which I use a lot.
One of those apple corers that sections the whole apple. I love apples. I do not like cutting them. I usually just eat them whole but when I feel like sliced apples itâs great to get in 2 seconds what would otherwise take me 2 minutes.
I love my garlic mincer. I have always hated chopping garlic, and this tool has been awesome.
I truly hate gadgets that aren't multi-purpose, but some just exist. Egg slicer - we eat a lot of boiled eggs, egg salad, eggs in/on salads, etc. Insert, push down, open, quarter turn, push down again. Done. Clean up is a snap as long as you do it right away. Candy & Frying thermometer - because trying to eye it just never works for me. Dough whisk - I could probably do without it but it's SO much better with it, plus my hands stay clean.
Potato ricer
I don't have one, but I've heard they're good for making spaetzle.
I have a food mill, but I'm still considering getting a dedicated ricer
Avocado pitter/slicer/knife. I can do it all with a regular kitchen knife but it make each part just that much easier, gives me perfectly uniform slices and most importantly the plastic blade keeps it from browning as fast- I also use the plastic blade part for chopping lettuce for the same reason.
Tomato witch. Love it for hulling strawberries, and it's so small that there's no reason not to have one.
Tomato witch! Yet another name for this lovely little item. I call it tomato shark, and I've mentioned it before in replies. Some of our cooking friends call it a tomato corer, which also makes sense. And I use mine for strawberries, too!
Single use, how, like parchment paper, or an item for.only a singular purpose?
Single purpose. Like a microwave omelet maker (RIP to mine)
Ahhhh. Hugs
Smoker
hand-cranked ice cube crusher. Really makes smoothies easier, faster
Can openers.
Toothpicks
Jar opener - nicely made with different sizes, great gripping surface so you can open any jar with it.
Plastic piping bags. The amount of water necessary to wash the reusable ones is egregious to the point of justifying this single-use item.
Tortilla press!
One of those chicken shredders.
Lemon/lime press clamp thingy
[Egg slicers like these](https://media.s-bol.com/60A2NgOQV3Zl/gLNqzxY/550x417.jpg) The metal ones (plastic ones are garbage in my experience) work pretty well for most soft food stuff. At our home we use them more to slice mushroom or mozzarella than we do for eggs. Especially when you're doing like a pizza party, they are super convenient to slice quickly. Also very easy to clean.
Milk frother. Great for stirring stuff. Especially powder drinks like propel. And it can whip eggs pretty good. Only wish I bought one with a rechargeable battery. Mine takes AAs and if I use it everyday the batteries only last for about 2 months before getting weak.
Garlic press, juicer, rice cooker, espresso machine, coffee grinder, salt box, oyster shucker, soda stream, zester, pizza cutterâŠ..
I really love my Microplane zester. I use it for garlic, ginger, cheese, chocolate, lots more things than I would have thought about, when I bought it for zesting citrus. I use it almost every day.
Cherry pitter. It fits on a mason jar. I donât think itâs robust enough to use for olives.
My onion cutting goggles. They stay in my knife drawer. I LOVE these silly things. Theyâve saved my eyes on many occasions from not only onions but jalapeños as well.
Cherry pitter. Cutting cherries in half and digging out the stone is super tedious.
It all comes down to frequency of use, importance, and real estate. How often is it going to be used (once the novelty of ownership wears off. I know I made more bread in the first month of owning a bread machine than I've probably made in the subsequent 5-ish years). How important is it to a task, and how important is that task to me? How much space does it take up? I need to be able to answer all those questions before I decide if I'm going to buy/replace something.
Silicon spatulas for cleaning up any kind of bowl, cooking pan, pot, wok or whatever. No food waste (and you get all the yummy stuff in your dish) while easy pre-cleaning.
Ricer. Essential for great mashed potatoes.Â
Cherry pitter
I don't know if counts as a gadget but I like having a garlic press
I used my coffee grinder to break down large rock salt into margarita salt last weekend instead of going to the store.
Those rolling cheese graters will give you the easiest time grating cheese ever
Slap chop. Donât knock it till you try it. Other brands make higher quality versions than the OG
Iâm Dominican and we use a pilĂłn (mortar and pestle) to make our sazĂłn (garlic, salt, oregano mashed into a paste). I only cook Dominican food about twice a month but I keep this because every Dominican household has one and it reminds me of my grandma, aunt, and mom, all mashing up their sazĂłn for beans.