Who doesn’t love helpful kitchen appliances? The one item your kitchen has to have to reduce your cooking time, increase the flavor in your food, or simply make life easier or help you to present food better. The truth is, there is such an array of kitchen appliances available that can cover our kitchen work surfaces that at some point we can run out of space to even prepare ingredients! (I’m experiencing that now since I received an array of them as wedding gifts last October.) So what kitchen appliances do you actually need? I thought I would share with you six appliances I believe you should consider.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #1: The pressure cooker
Have you ever gotten in from work or a long day out of the home and thought about your evening meal, only to realize that you have a big joint of meat to cook or something that is going to take far too long? We have all been there, and even the most prepared among us can have days where we forget about what we are going to cook. This is when a pressure cooker can really help. If you are ever unsure, then check out some of the pressure cooker reviews you can find online. A pressure cooker can help with reducing the time it takes to cook something, while still maintaining the flavor, the vitamins, and nutrients within the ingredients.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #2: The blender
I love my blenders — I have two of them, a Vitamix and a Nutribullet. The former I use as my basic blender for pretty much everything … I can even “cook” with it. The latter I use for making smoothies on the go because it comes with a handy container and lid.
Blending a sauce or making a smoothie is something many have us have grown accustomed to, so a blender is an essential within your home, wouldn’t you agree? Enabling you to blend up soups, lumpy sauces or even make your favorite fruit (or chocolate, peanut butter and banana — my favorite!) smoothie in the morning.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #3: The juicer
Juicing has become something many of us are into, so there is no surprise that a juicer is becoming one of the must-have kitchen appliances. However, aside from doing the obvious, a cooking technique to try would be to juice a vegetable, and then cook a whole vegetable within the juices of its own kind. It makes for some great flavor within your cooking.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #4: The mixer
Making cakes, kneading bread, creating meringue or simply combining wet and dry ingredients are all made easier with a mixer. This is something that every home cook would like to have in their kitchen cupboards for sure. A hand-held mixer is great to have on hand if you don’t have the space for a standing mixer. But, as I know from experience, a standing mixer makes life so much easier when doing things that require a longer mixing time, such as making whipped cream.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #5: The slow cooker
A slow cooker is something that may be more used in the colder months, but it is a great way to remain organized and have a warm home-cooked meal ready for you at the end of the day. I have two of them, one large and one medium sized. I love the simplicity of cooking with a slow cooker — just load up the pot with your ingredients, switch on the timer and let it cook all day. This works well with anything saucy, cuts of meat, stews, and casseroles. I’ve gotten the tenderest pork this way.
Essential Kitchen Appliance #6: The steamer
Finally, a steamer is a fresh and easy way to prepare vegetables while still maintaining the nutrients and vitamins within them. It can also cook fish and meat, making it a great alternative method of cooking. There are even types of bread you can make in a steamer.
Of course, there are smaller kitchen appliances and gadgets you could have, that you can store away in your cupboards and drawers, but I certainly think the above list can help even the most amateur of cooks create culinary masterpieces.
