Cooking gadget meme

[starlady]

In honor of the fact that I spent about 12 hours over two days making this delicious, delicious lamb stew that I'm eating…

Bold the ones you have and use at least once a year, italicize the ones you have and don't use, strike through the ones you have had but got rid of.

I wonder how many pasta machines, breadmakers, juicers, blenders, deep fat fryers, egg boilers, melon ballers, sandwich makers, pastry brushes, cheese knives, electric woks, miniature salad spinners, griddle pans, jam funnels, meat thermometers, filleting knives, egg poachers, cake stands, garlic presses, margarita glasses, tea strainers, bamboo steamers, pizza stones, coffee grinders, milk frothers, piping bags, banana stands, fluted pastry wheels, tagine dishes, conical strainers, rice cookers, steam cookers, pressure cookers, slow cookers, spaetzle makers, cookie presses, gravy strainers, double boilers (bains marie), sukiyaki stoves, food processors, ice cream makers, takoyaki makers, and fondue sets languish dustily at the back of the nation's cupboards.

I used to have a rice cooker; I need another one like burning. Electric woks are the devil. What's a pastry brush? I want a spice grinder for Christmas. Pizza stones are nice but not necessary. My roommate just acquired tagine dishes, but I haven't used them yet. I should note that the stuff I'm bolding is both here in California and at my dad's house in New Jersey; I don't have all of these things here with me (here on the West Coast, for example, I have to improvise a double boiler every time I melt chocolate). I'm assuming that the juicers are the non-electric kind, which is what I have. Mechanical, that's the word for it.

…I still think of myself as fairly low-gadget, though. A lot of these are multi-purpose, which is how I justify them. Other things aren't multi-purpose, but are just so handy (banana stands; melon ballers) that having them makes an appreciable difference. And indeed, since my roommate S moved out and took most of the specialized equipment with her, I've become a lot better at improvising, to the point where yesterday my roommate B was joking that I should write a book: Baking for Badasses.

Comments

[cofax7]

A pastry brush is what you use to brush egg white on your apple pie topping so it comes out all brown and sparkly. Or you use it to brush your phillo dough with melted butter, or oil your chicken for roasting. That sort of thing. They're very useful.

[starlady]

Yeah, I googled and I was like, "Huh. I never heard it called that." But I do have one, in lime-green silicone.

[rushthatspeaks]

What have you heard it called?

*still missing the one I had to leave with my housemates in the last move, because when you need one of those they're really very useful*

[starlady]

Brush...thingy? Basting brush? Just definitely not "pastry brush."