Find the best cooking tools to save time & energy in the kitchen. Perfect for those who don’t love cooking, but want to get healthful family meals on the dinner table.
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We live in an era where there are tons of gadgets available to make our lives easier. I’m thankful I don’t have to hand wash dishes or hang my clothes to dry outside, and I’m pretty sure you are too!
And while I love to cook, I also utilize cooking tools and kitchen gadgets to help get meals prepared quickly for my family.
Below you’ll find helpful options to get dinner served a little bit easier, a little be faster, and just maybe with more enjoyment!
These cooking tool ideas make great gifts, or simply as a helpful gesture to a loved one who doesn’t want to spend too much time in the kitchen.
14 useful cooking tools to help get dinner served quickly
Crock-Pot Programmable Slow Cooker
What It Does: This 6-quart slow cooker is programmable and has a side locking lid feature to provide an extra seal for on the go dishes.
Why You Need It: You simply add ingredients the night before (or the morning of), and let your meal cook while you’re away. The removable stoneware dish is stylish for carrying from slow cooker to table and can be placed in the dishwasher for easy cleanup. Once your meal is ready, this slow cooker automatically changes to the warm setting.
Recipes To Try: Our favorites include Easy Potato Soup, Slow Cooker Lasagna, or Crock Pot Chicken Thighs.
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Wifi-Enabled Slow Cooker
What It Does: You can adjust cook time & temperature on the unit itself, or by using the WeMo Application from your phone for convenience and peace of mind.
Why You Need It: Just think if you could switch temperatures on your slow cooker from work or the store. With the benefits of cooking all day while you’re away, this gadget comes in handy when something unexpected comes up causing you to return home late. The smart Crock-Pot connects to your Wi-Fi and syncs up with the WeMo app where you can monitor what’s cooking and even control the temperature which helps prevent those favorite slow cooker meals from getting mushy.
Recipes To Try: Mexican Chicken Quinoa Casserole is an amazingly delicious family favorite along with Crock Pot Pasta and Chicken Tortilla Soup.
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Instant Pot Multi-Use Programmable Pressure Cooker
What It Does: The Instant Pot replaces 9 common kitchen appliances including a Pressure Cooker, Slow Cooker, Rice Cooker, Yogurt Maker, Egg Cooker, Sauté, Steamer, Warmer, and Sterilizer.
Why You Need It: And instant pot cooks up to 70% quicker. Simply add the ingredients, choose one of 15 pre-programmed buttons, and take the guess-work out of your cooking, along with quick and tasty meals.
Recipes To Try: How about a 5 Ingredient Mac & Cheese, Instant Pot Chicken Gyros or breakfast foods like Instant Pot Steel Cut Oats.
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T-fal Stainless Steel Nonstick Ceramic Coating Oven Safe Saute Pan
What It Does: A large oven-safe saute pan with ceramic interior withstands cooktop heats up to 570°F for perfect searing.
Why You Need It: A sauté pan has straight sides and a large surface area, which makes it ideal for tasks like searing meat or reducing a pan sauce. It’s also easier to make less of a mess than when using a shorter skillet.
Recipes To Try: Baked Chicken Thighs are a delicious option, along with Sausage Penne Pasta, and Tater Tot Casserole.
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Enameled Cast Iron Dutch Oven
What It Does: This dutch oven is perfect for baking, braising, roasting, and it’s perfect for soups. It’s made of heavy-duty cast iron for thorough, even heating.
Why You Need It: This is a beautiful pan that can be used to marinate, cook and store food. It’s oven safe so you can go from cooktop straight to the oven.
Recipes To Try: This is the perfect pot to cook and then serve Chili. You can sear Pork Chops, then bake them right in this dutch oven or try your hand at this Pork Sausage Mac & Cheese which goes from stovetop to oven all in one pan.
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Ninja Mega Kitchen System
What It Does: This high powered blender is great for blending and food processing. This powerful blender features smart settings and a variety of blades and attachments to give you the nutritious, delicious results you are looking for.
Why You Need It: High-speed blenders are a fantastic way to seamlessly blend nutritious additions to smoothies, soups, or treats without your family ever knowing.
Recipes To Try: Great for blending spinach into a Blueberry Smoothie or prunes into Peanut Butter Energy Bites. This blender works great for coarsely chopping veggies like in this Brussels Sprout, Cranberry, and Almond Salad.
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KitchenAid 5-Speed Immersion Blender
What It Does: This immersion blender comes with two blending arms, 8″ & 13″ which ensure that you can thoroughly blend ingredients in deeper pots or pitchers. It comes with 3 interchangeable blades that allows you to easily crush ice, puree soup, froth milk and much more.
Why You Need It: This blender comes with a whisk attachment what can make pudding or whip eggs quickly. The chopper attachment can be used for chopping herbs, making hummus, or chopping cooked meat right in the chopper bowl. All attachments are top-rack dishwasher safe.
Recipes To Try: Butternut Squash Soup cooks all day in the slow cooker, then is pureed with the immersion blender making a creamy and delicious soup. The chopper attachment works great for Hummus or Pesto.
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Microwave Pasta Cooker
What It Does: A kitchen tool that cooks pasta for your family in the microwave – up to 8 servings of pasta at a time!
Why You Need It: No waiting for a big pot of water to boil. Cook pasta perfectly in the microwave. Saves time and energy.
Recipes To Try: Blue Cheese and Bacon Mac & Cheese is to die for as is Baked Spaghetti and Sausage Pasta.
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Vegetable Chopper & Spiralizer
What It Does: With 4 interchangeable blades, this chopper can julienne, chip, and slice veggies with ease. Built-in chop lid lets you cut foods directly into the tray. Blades snap in and out with ease. Cut potatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots and more.
Why You Need It: This gadget helps you slice, dice, chop and cut fruits and vegetables safely and easily – in half the time. The handy storage container lets you hold the prepared veggies in the unit until you are ready to get cooking – and it’s dishwasher safe.
Recipes To Try: Save time preparing these delicious recipes: Shrimp Ceviche, Tuna Cucumber Salad, or Chicken and Cheese Pinwheels.
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Kizen Instant Read Meat Thermometer
What It Does: This thermometer takes a temperature in a little as 3 seconds. It allows you to get the temperature by voice or bright LCD screen, making it great for grilling outdoors.
Why You Need It: Take out the guesswork and eliminate overdone or undercooked meals. This thermometer also works great for making candy and baking.
Recipes To Try: These recipes will be perfectly cooked each time with the use of a thermometer Philly Cheesesteak Sandwich, Baked Chicken Thighs, or Baked Pork Chops.
Sushi Bazooka Roller and Sushi Slicer
What It Does: This gadget helps get perfectly made sushi prepared easily. Simply add rice and ingredients into the sushi bazooka, push the plunger onto a nori sheet and roll. There’s even a slicer to help cut equally sized sushi rolls – every time.
Why You Need It: This sushi making kit gives you the tools you need to make perfectly round sushi rolls from the comfort of your own home, making for a fun-filled night with your family.
Recipes To Try: Try your hand at homemade sushi with this Tuna Sushi recipe using canned tuna or check out these Simple Sushi Recipes for more ideas.
KitchenAid Stand Mixer
What It Does: This KitchenAid mixer has a strong motor that is powerful enough to handle the heaviest mixtures, and mix large batches easily. It has a tilt-back head for easy access to your mixture and includes a flat beater, dough hook, and wire whip.
Why You Need It: A heavy-duty mixer should last you a lifetime and comes in very handy in the kitchen. From cake mixes to firm cookie dough, the flat beater mixes quickly and thoroughly along with everything from pancakes for breakfast to specialty treats for the holidays.
Recipes To Try: Double Chocolate Brownies, Flourless Chocolate Cake, or check out this post on 12 Creative Ways to Use a Kitchenaid Mixer.
Presto Griddle
What It Does: This griddle has an extra-large cooking surface, making enough for the entire family. IT has a nonstick surface for easy cleaning and a slide-out drip tray to catch any runoff.
Why You Need It: A griddle can be used for every meal. This model is fully immersible for washing and it’s low profile makes it convenient to store.
Recipes To Try: Your kids will love Pumpkin Pancakes or try cooking fish for Fish Tacos on the griddle!
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Panasonic Toaster Oven
What It Does: Featuring the all-new Instant Heat with far infrared heating that cooks the food to perfection. With just the press of a button, you can pick from one of the 6 preset buttons, which automatically calculates the cooking time for a variety of foods
Why You Need It: This toaster over requires no preheating. The double infrared light cooks up to 40% faster than conventional toaster ovens helping get meals on the table quicker.
Recipes To Try: Naan pizza will be done in no time at all along with Black Bean Quesadillas and Baked Taco Cups.
If you enjoyed this post or made any of the recipes, make sure to leave a comment below! Then follow me on social media and tag #createkidsclub. I love seeing what you come up with!
Ethelyn Dietrich says
The most essential cooking ingredients are presented here. I always like a tidy kitchen so I have everything I need to cook. Because I feel so bad when I don’t get what I need to make my recipe. I really needed to present some great information here. I have a particular weakness towards egg recipes in particular.
Knife Sharpening Los Angeles says
Thanks for this helpful guide! I agree that pressure cookers should be in every kitchen since they can be used in many ways. What must-have knives would you recommend?