Category Archives: Tools

Holiday Gift Week:
Small-Ticket Items

By Michael Ruhlman | Published: November 25, 2012

A great gift for the season. Photo by Donna Turner Ruhlman.

Kitchen tools need not be expensive to be valuable. The above Benriner mandoline is one of my most valued kitchen tools for uniform slicing, julienning, and making brunoise (a julienne turned into a dice). By far my most valuable electric device in my kitchen is the hand blender—I use Braun that seems to be unavailable, but I bought this Cuisinart version for my mom ($47) and it works well—these devices all do the job of pureeing soups and sauces, easy whisking, quick mayonnaise, and I make vinaigrettes in the cup attachment, which will even emulsify a great Caesar dressing will pureeing the garlic. Every kitchen needs a scale, the most reliable way of measuring, especially if you're baking (which is why more cookbooks are including, if not leading ...

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Also posted in Holiday, Kitchen Tools | Tagged gifts, handblender, holiday, holiday shopping, iGrill, Le Creuset, mandoline, microplane, Pugeot, small tools | Comments closed

Great Kitchen Tools: Scale

By Michael Ruhlman | Published: March 19, 2012

Among the most hopeful signs in cookbook publishing is Artisan's agreeing to lead all recipes in the Bouchon Bakery Cookbook, due out next fall, with metric weights (they will include volume measurements second). It's a baking book after all, and no other culinary craft is more dependent on accuracy of measurement than baking. Another hopeful sign was seeing something similar in The New York Times not too long ago, a recipe for chocolate ganache bars that also lead with grams, not cups or ounces. Scribner published my book Ratio, which which really only works if you have a scale. So when I was hanging out with Todd and Diane talking about great kitchen tools and stupid kitchen tools, I of course had to address the scale. I have four of them at home, two basic kinds, a scale of measuring ...

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Also posted in Video | Tagged Kitchen Tools, scale, something to say, video, white on rice couple | Comments closed

Something To Say: Stupid Kitchen Tools

By Michael Ruhlman | Published: February 22, 2012

Nothing more to say (on this subject, anyway...). Thanks Todd and Diane for your amazing work and of course Amy Scattergood for her reason. If you liked this post on Stupid Kitchen Tools, check out these other links:

Todd and Diane's first Had Something To Say video.
Preview my collection of kitchen tools that include the spanker, bad ass egg spoon, all strain clothes, and more.
To find other interesting products click over to OpenSky.
It is an older post, but look at these off the wall kitchen gadgets.

Also posted in Opinion, Rant, Video | Tagged had something to say, stupid kitchen tools, video rant, white on rice couple | Comments closed

Cooking On the Road (Tools I Traveled With)

By Michael Ruhlman | Published: January 27, 2012

An array of tools I didn't want to be without when I arrived in an unfamiliar kitchen.

If you're on the road and will be cooking in unfamiliar kitchens, what are the essentials you cannot afford to be without? Thomas Keller once told me he always brought three things, kosher salt, string, and his pepper mill. Everything else, a restaurant kitchen was likely to have. But what about when you're traveling to a rental house, as I did last week. A rental house you count on providing you with one crappy non-stick pan, a small plastic cutting board, a cheap pot just big enough to cook a box of spaghetti in, and an array of dull and serrated knives. Donna photographed the tools I brought with me to Key West to cook 9 consecutive dinners for 16 people. A ...

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Also posted in Technique, Travel | Tagged cooking on the road, cooking tools, Travel | Comments closed

The Importance of Sharp Knives

By Michael Ruhlman | Published: April 22, 2011

Photo by Donna Turner Ruhlman

OpenSky's knife sharpener offer to people who follow me there forced me to think about sharp knives (I had to write the copy). Normally, I only think about sharp knives when they aren't. Here's the fact: the biggest problem in home kitchens is dull knives. There is no greater hindrance to the person in the house who does the cooking than dull knives. Almost without fail, every friend's kitchen I go to, there is not a sharp knife to be found. The only kitchens I've been in where there are sharp knives, are the big fancy ones where no one cooks. And my mom's. Because she only uses those crappy ceramic knives, so her nice Wusthofs, used on my once- or twice-a-year visits remain pristine. (OpenSky has ...

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Also posted in Kitchen Tools, Technique, Video | Tagged How to Sharpen a Knife, How to Steel a Knife, knives, Opensky, sharpening stone, technique, video | Comments closed

Category Archives: Tools

Holiday Gift Week:
Small-Ticket Items

Great Kitchen Tools: Scale

Something To Say: Stupid Kitchen Tools

Cooking On the Road (Tools I Traveled With)

The Importance of Sharp Knives

ruhlmanphotography.com

Info on Donna's Ratio Chart and Photography

Kitchen Tools

Recipes