Kitchen Equipment Pre-Start Up List
- A few key tools will get your kitchen running.kitchen image by Gina Smith from Fotolia.com
When you're about to move into your first home, consider your kitchen shopping list carefully. The right equipment will save you headaches when trying out new recipes or just throwing together a simple weeknight meal of more than one course. You can always expand your tool supply as the need arises. But when you're just starting out, you'll be well off with nine essential items, many of which can serve more than one purpose. - Bakers will find an electric mixer invaluable in the kitchen; if you don't bake, a mixer has several other uses. Use it to mash potatoes, whisk salad dressings and sauces, or blend soup if you don't have a blender. The ultimate is a stand mixer, such as those made by Kitchenaid, but a hand-held mixer works just fine in most cases.
- With a set of nice mixing bowls you can combine ingredients without having to re-wash after every use, and they work well as serving bowls too. The Bon Appétit website recommends stainless steel bowls because "they're inexpensive, lightweight and stackable, and stainless steel does not react with food."
- A strainer or sieve comes in handy.sieb image by Bine from Fotolia.com
Strain sauces and other liquid-based foods with a sieve. If confronted with the choice of wide holes or a fine-mesh strainer, opt for the fine mesh because it will be useful more often. - A metal baking pan can also serve as a roasting pan. A good roasting pan will have handles, but oven mitts work if you've just roasted a heavy cut of meat. Bake cookies, rolls, biscuits or almost anything on an 11- by 18-inch pan. Epicurious.com advises buying "a rimmed, heavy-duty, commercial-weight aluminum or aluminum-coated steel pan" of light-colored metal.
- A saute pan is not just for sauteing. This handy pan with straight sides will also work as a skillet for frying eggs, meat or veggies. If you don't have a wok, use a saute pan in its place. Nonstick coating makes for easier clean-up, but an aluminum- or copper-bottomed pan will allow you to brown ingredients.
- Buy at least two or three saucepans, because you'll likely use more than one during prep for a meal. Smaller (four- to six-cup) pans will heat sauces and melt butter, and larger (three- to four-quart) pans are useful for cooking a few servings of soup or making stews.
- Cooking doesn't always require precise measurements, but baking invariably does. Purchase measuring spoons, which are usually sold in four or five sizes as a set, and a two-cup glass measuring cup, and most of your measuring needs in the kitchen will be covered.
- Use a wooden spoon rather than metal.wooden spoon image by Kovac from Fotolia.com
If you can only have one long-handled spoon for stirring sauces, mixing stir-fries or basting a turkey, make it wooden. Wood won't scrape the surface off a non-stick pan. - Don't buy the cheapest one on the market, but a simple, inexpensive can opener will serve you well.
