The following is an incomplete (and growing) list of items I find useful in my cooking endeavors:
Bread Machines
Isn't bread wonderful? Is there anything more pleasant than the smell of fresh bread baking to give a home a warm, inviting air?
Unfortunately, if you're like me, you have neither the time nor the patience to make bread from scratch. And if you're really like me, your loved ones aren't going to like what the kitchen looks like after you've been turned loose with all those dry goods. For some reason, they don't seem to appreciate a fine dusting of flour on all exposed surfaces.
It was for from-scratch klutzes like me that God invented people who would invent the bread machine. I've had one for seven years and I'm more sold on it every day.
A bread machine is basically a mixing motor and a heating element combined with a timer to produce a tiny combination mixer and oven. There are dozens of brands and sizes out there; I use an Hitachi that can make a 1-pound or 1-1/2-pound loaf. It has two speed cycles, the regular one that takes about four and a half hours and a "rapid bread" cycle that takes a little under three hours. I've never tried the "rapid" cycle. It can also make rice, though I've never used it for this.
My point is, these machines are more versatile than the "bread machine" label implies. Take a careful look at the models you're interested in and select the one that offers you the most functions for your areas of interest.
A few thoughts on making bread with bread machines:
The Flour. You cannot use all-purpose flour. Well, you can, but you won't like the outcome. For these machines, you need to use bread flour. It costs the same as all-purpose and you can use it for things other than bread. If you plan to make wheat bread, pay careful attention to the recipe's mixture of wheat and bread flour. Don't even try to make a "whole" wheat bread this way; you'll have a lovely 2-pound rock. Even more unfortunately, you'll have a harder time getting it out of the cooking container than Arthur's competitors did extracting Excalibur.
The Wets and the Drys. Add all the liquid elements first, then the dry elements, starting with the flour. If you try it the other way, you're likely to be disappointed with the product, particularly if you're going to set up the machine at one time but use its timer to bake the loaf at a later time. In the case of the yeast, you cannot afford to let it get wet until you're ready to make the bread. I put the water in first, then the butter or margarine (melted), then the eggs, then the sugar and salt, then the flour, and then put everything else on top of the flour, the yeast last.
Butter. Most recipes call for some amount of butter or margarine. I've found I get a smoother mixture if I pop the butter into the microwave for a few seconds, just long enough to liquify it but not long enough to get it bubbling.
Eggs. Some people like the fluffiness eggs lend to the bread. Others worry about the cholesterol. I've found that most recipes will permit the deletion of the eggs, but check the book to see. Typically, you cannot substitute egg whites for whole eggs; it will change the flavor of the bread. I have used egg substitutes (I prefer Simply Eggs; they aren't pseudo-eggs, they're real eggs, yolk and all, with the cholesterol removed) on occasion.
Yeast. Get bread machine yeast. It works much better. Remember to close the jar and refrigerate it after opening. And keep the yeast dry until you're ready to mix it; the best way is to put it in last, using the several cups of flour as the barrier between it and the water/sugar.
Milk. I find it much easier to use dry milk rather than real milk. Most recipes use measurements of the dry milk, and if you're going to set the machine to cook on its timer, letting whole milk sit for several hours may sour it.
Recipes. There are lots of bread machine recipes out there. My favorite series is The Bread Machine Cookbook, published by Bristol Publishing Enterprises, Inc. At my last count, there were four in the series. I've had better luck with some recipes than others, but no stark disasters at this date.
Can Openers
I've gone through more electric can openers than I can remember. I've given up on them. Instead, I've gone to a hand opener that's actually a pleasure to use.
It's called Safety Can and it's available at most hardware and department stores. Now, there are a number of these on the market and they all work the same way from a safety perspective. Basically, instead of driving a wedge through the top of the can and then forcing a cut around its perimeter--resulting in a jagged edge on both the separated top and the top of the can itself--the Safety Can cuts the top off from the side. I'm as much of a skeptic as you'll ever see and when I saw these devices advertised I thought, "Sure, uh, huh. A can edge you can't cut yourself on. Right."
Well, it's true. The edge of the can--and of the can top--aren't sharp. Oh, you probably could cut yourself if you were determined to, but it won't be easy and it won't be much of a cut.
But the real reason I like the Safety Can is that it's easy to use. It fastens quickly and smoothly around the can, it doesn't require circus strong-man power to open the can, and you can even stop in mid-turn and the can will remain secure in the opener as long as you apply just a little pressure to the handles.
At $19.95, it's a bargain. I highly recommend this little wonder. And it comes with a jar lid opener that actually works, too.
Knives
Let's face it, you need knives. Good ones. Now, I'm no haute chef, and I admit I'll use whatever knife seems to be large enough and sharp enough to do the job, but even a tyro like me understands that if the cutlery isn't good, the food isn't going to be that great, either. I have a nice 18-knife Cutco set with everything from a tiny paring knife to a foot-long serrated slicer, along with the traditional it-can-slice-or-it-can-chop kitchen knife and this thing that looks like a putty knife gone mad that really spreads things on bread nicely. I find that serrated knives do a better job of slicing than non-serrated knives, provided the serrations are done the right way. That is, they need to be sharp and stay sharp. That's what I like about the Cutco knives; they've been tooled so that each serration is actually three separate cutting edges, not simply a rounded bevel on the edge that grows dull along with the rest of the knife and then proves to be impossible to resharpen. Oh, and if you need to resharpen your Cutco knives, the company will do it for you for a grand total of $5.00 for the set.
Lighters
I'm talking here about what you use to light charcoal for your outdoor grilling. Okay, so that really belongs over in the "Outdoor Cooking" section, but I like to give you cross-references. Take a peek at a nifty device to light your coals quickly, cleanly, and with a minimum of fuss.
If you like wine, then you face a problem everytime you want to enjoy it. Unless you have a large--or very thirsty--group of people with you, you usually won't finish a bottle the same evening you open it. But, once you open the bottle, the wine begins to change. I've never had a wine go bad in only a few days--I have had some reds turn to very nice vinegar but that was over a period of a few weeks. Still, wine opened yesterday usually won't taste as good as it did yesterday when you opened it. And simply shoving the cork back in doesn't help because the air you've let in is changing the chemical nature of the beverage inside. Enter the Vacu-Vin. This inexpensive device is simply a hand pump. You insert a rubber stopper into the top of the bottle and put the Vacu-Vin over it, and start pulling the handle. The device pulls the air out of the wine bottle through a hole in the stopper and vents it into the open air. When a vacuum forms inside the bottle, that negative pressure closes the hole and you now have a hermetically sealed bottle of wine. When you're ready to sample more of the wine, squeeze the stopper, opening the hole, and the pressure neutralizes so that you can remove the stopper easily. The Vacu-Vin increases the shelf life of an opened bottle significantly. At less than $5.00 for the Vacu-Vin and one stopper, and with stoppers less than $3.00 a pair, this is something no wine lover should be without.
I welcome your recommendations of cooking appliances and gadgets.