The right kitchen utensils can make all the difference in speeding up your cooking time. Spending a long time measuring, mixing, baking, or chopping ingredients for a meal can be frustrating. We’ve narrowed the list to four essential chopping tools for every kitchen.
Paring Knife
Paring knives are small, non-serrated blades that are used for delicate and precise work. They’re great for peeling fruits and vegetables; dicing shallots or garlic cloves; cutting shapes and vents into the dough; scoring designs on food surfaces; and even deveining shrimp.
A paring knife is one of the must-have kitchen chopping tools. They’re much better for peeling than a conventional knife, and they’re also good for delicate, detailed tasks like slicing cheese or mincing tiny ingredients.
They’re usually made of stainless steel, high-carbon stainless steel, or ceramic. The latter can be expensive, but it’s more resistant to corrosion than stainless steel.
Mandolin
Professional chefs use mandolins to achieve smooth, perfectly sliced vegetables and fruits. They’re also an essential tool for home cooks who need to cut a lot of ingredients quickly and uniformly.
These are a blade set on a flat stand that allows you to pass food over it and slice uniformly in seconds. Some models feature interchangeable blades so that you can make different cuts.
Mandolines can be cut into various shapes, including julienne and shaved vegetables. They’re especially useful for making dishes that require a lot of slicing, such as scalloped potatoes or eggplant Parmesan.
Fish Turner
A Fish Turner may not be the most obvious choice for chopping tools, but it’s an essential kitchen item that can be useful in many ways. It’s great for slipping under delicate foods like filets of fish, but it can also be used to transfer items such as pancakes from one hot pan to the next.
Its angled leading edge makes it easy to nudge under food, and the flexible head allows it to slide under even large fish fillets without breaking them. Five slots in the head allow grease to drain, too. The oversized stainless steel head is great for larger fish, and the soft handle offers a comfortable grip.
Peeler
A peeler is a kitchen tool, a distinct type of knife consisting of a metal blade with a slot with a sharp edge attached to a handle, used to remove the outer layer (the “skin” or “peel”) of certain vegetables, usually potatoes and carrots, and fruits such as apples and pears.
It also can be used to remove the skin of hard-shelled vegetables like squash, radishes, and celery. It can be also used to make decorative strips of vegetables or fruit called julienne.
Whether you’re cooking for yourself or your family, a good peeler can save you time and effort. The best peeler should be able to easily cut through tough skin and remove the outer layer of produce while requiring minimal hand movement.
