Agreed, I'd say I have half the items on that list at the most, and still manage to make good food most nights (admittedly my last soup came out like baby food).
And since it seems somewhat on topic, Hubbub are hiring developers, so if you love both food and technology we'd love to hear from you: http://developers.hubbub.co.uk/.
We provide an online delivery service for local independent food shops, because we love food too much to leave it to the supermarkets.
the quote in the article is "This post lays out the Minimum Viable Kitchen (MVK) for creating gourmet food." - I'm guessing it is equivalent to "the Minimum Viable Garage for race car teams".
Ditch the whisk? A whisk is perfect for controlled aeration of a substance. A fork lacks the necessary dispersion area. What else would you suggest using to cream whites or eggs that is in his list (if you're also getting rid of the stand mixer)?
I didn't know I would need it, and was buying only the very minimum number of things. (For example, I also didn't get a garlic masher which is small and cheap—less useful, but again I didn't know how useful a whisk was yet.)
I have a whisk but I always cream whites with a fork because it works better. Whisks do work better for other things though (e.g. batters, mayonaise). Also, if you're doing any baking then one of those rubbery plastic spatulas are invaluable (and cheap).
I don't know what "creaming egg whites" means, but if you're going to have any electrics, have one that does a good job of whipping egg whites and don't waste time doing it by hand.
I was taking over his terminology, but you're right whipping is the correct term.
It depends on what you need it for. With my electric mixer it's easy to overwhip. It's probably just silly nostalgia and habit though (my grandmother used to whip cream with a fork).
Ditch the whisk? Whisks are almost as important as spatulas. Also, what is wrong with the steel bowls for mixing? What do you call a regular bowl, a rice bowl? I need something that will hold several cups of flour. And I need three because I need to actually to mix different things at the same time.
Also, why get rid of the dutch oven, but keep the cast iron? A dutch oven is cast iron. I am confused.
I'm mostly with you, but I think almost anybody who needs a guide to buy kitchen basics also needs a couple of cookbooks.
Fishing for recipes on the Internet is an advanced skill. You need to know how to cook reasonably well in order to evaluate the recipes and adjust each one to your situation.
In contrast, something like Bittman's "How to Cook Everything" gives a lot of basic advice, has a set of consistent recipes with clear variations, and is carefully designed to avoid confusion.
And for the nerdy, the Bittman book is available in a Kindle version, so it need not take up any physical space.
I agree. The net is quite useful for some very specific things. For instance I once wanted to know how to make a pumpkin pie with heavy cream rather than condensed milk and found a thread on chowhound about how to substitute. Or how much sugar/gelatin/alcohol you need to use to get your sorbet to the right consistency.
But as far as going to AllRecipes and following instructions, you can do it, and you'll end up with something edible, but you're not learning to cook properly doing so.
Bittman's got a bit of a shaky reputation. Good writer. Not super authoritative, though. If you're going to do the "one cookbook only" thing, I strongly recommend the Cooks Illustrated books. One nice thing about them: they publish new ones every year, so you can get one a few years old for very cheap.
If you want to be "interesting" about this: get Ruhlman's Twenty (which is 20 core techniques with sample recipes) and Ratio, and then use the Internet for everything else. If you read Twenty, you'll probably be able to spot bullshit on the Internet.
Cookbooks: he's recommending specific cookbooks which he thinks will make you a better cook. As he says, lots of them are crap, as are lots of the recipes and tutorials on the internet. You're paying for curation here more than the content itself.
Pots: Keep in mind that a "10 piece" pot set is really one 5 pots or pans, which is not that much. Having the correct size pot or pan for the quantity of food that you're heating makes a big difference in how things turn out. (For example, when sauteing onions & vegetables you really want a fairly full single layer.)
Whisk: I'm sorry, but it really is an essential tool
Ice Cream Maker: I completely agree, and I'd be inclined to ditch the whole "desserts" section.
Note, that I think there's some debate about what "minimum viable" means here. The stand mixer falls in this grey area, I think. You can probably get away with a good hand mixer (as he acknowledges) but the stand mixer is more versatile and time saving.
Well, the point was minimum viable kitchen for cooking gourmet food. The way I defined it, I felt I couldn't exclude desserts and a stand mixer and get there, though I'll be honest I didn't go through all 300 pages of the book and count. You certainly could leave those out and still cook most of the stuff in the book.
Also internet recipes are a minefield for someone learning to actually cook. I'd say at least 90% of them are garbage, and I might be spotting them a 9.
> You don't need cookbooks. The internet is better in terms of 'MVK', and the best cookbook is the one you make yourself.
You're talking about recipe collections, not cookbooks, and for those you are probably right.
But a good cookbook doesn't just contain recipes, it contains basic cooking knowledge, it contains general recipes that you can use to make actual meals. And you'll be using those guidelines over and over again when cooking.
Maybe it's because I'm confused about what a "regular bowl" is (I assume you mean salad/cereal bowl), but I don't understand how you can cook without mixing bowls. I use mixing bowls for all kinds of things from pancake batter to tossing veggies for roasting to putting stuff in as I prepare it. I also sometimes use it as sort of a crappy double boiler for melting stuff at low temperatures. I would want at least two so I can do more than one thing, and really three so I can have a couple different sizes.
If you've ever spent some time reading some of the really good cookbooks you'll realize just how valuable they can be. While a 'minimum viable kitchen' may be a misleading title, the author is focusing an audience interested in more gourmet, high quality cooking. The difference between the recipes found in a cookbook by say Thomas Keller or David Chang and those found at recipes.com or even foodnetwork.com are significant for the 'foodie' cooks.
I also think a standing mixer is a luxury, but I've upvoted everyone who's said you cannot ditch the whisk. Whisks are important. Enough said.
Many comments on this thread have been about knives. I've owned quite a few knives over the span of years of professional cooking. A really good chef knife will really only be appreciated by those who cook either professionally or really seriously as a hobby. A soccer mom who chops onions once or twice a week to cook dinner very likely won't know/feel the difference between a 50$ Whustoff or Henckel vs a $250 Shun.
The other important thing to know about knives is if you do decide to spring for a good quality blade, maintaining it is really important. Sharpening with a whetstone with the appropriate grit and honing the blade before each use will keep your sharp edge for much longer.
All in all the article is good. All-clad is hands down the best quality and most durable cookwear out there. Although I don't think using a dutch oven to make sauces is a great idea.
FWIW, the lid of the Lodge dutch oven functions as a 10" pan if you flip it... I'd guess that would work with any dutch oven with a flat top (and for all I know it's commonplace).
* The Internet is full of terrible cooking information, and if you don't have any authoritative sources at all, it's hard to separate the good from the bad. You should have one trustworthy cookbook.
* You will be unhappy if your only cooking surface is cast iron. I agree that you can do without the dutch oven but it is the "pan you can do without" that is the most valuable; it is the immediate runner up to the the "list of must-have pans".
* Strong disagree on your mixing bowl point. You need lots of mixing bowls. I have 8 and wish I had more. For instance: muffins and pancakes both want two mixing bowls at a minimum, and three if you don't want to use a service bowl to separate eggs. Sautees want a mixing bowl for proteins and mixing bowl for prepped vegetables. Dinner prep usually wants one mixing bowl just to throw onion skins and wrappers in. Mixing bowls are lightweight, stackable, cheap, and supremely useful, and it makes no sense to chintz on them.
* I don't even know how to respond to "ditch the whisk" unless you're one of those old French guys who can make a hollandaise with a fork. You need a whisk.
> The Internet is full of terrible cooking information, and if you don't have any authoritative sources at all, it's hard to separate the good from the bad.
The internet is full of terrible information in general. That's why PageRank was invented. Is there something unique about cooking information that means PageRank won't work with it?
YES. Recipes are a long-tail topic. The sites that do best in PageRank are the ones with the most recipes. The sites with the most recipes tend to either be overtly user-generated or slyly repackaged UGC. Moreover, as Patrick will explain, most people who search for prepared dishes aren't actually going to prepare them, which means Google has little incentive to ensure the tops of the SERPs are good.
I'll find the eHow "how to cook a steak" that was pegged to the top of a SERP in a bit.
Another counterexample to your belief about the miracle of PageRank: try searching for symptoms some time.
There are many (non-tech) long-tail topics that I've successfully searched for using Google, so I don't think this is a generalizable statement.
> The sites with the most recipes tend to either be overtly user-generated or slyly repackaged UGC.
I can't speak as to the average user, but I am usually able to easily ignore/sift through such sites. They pop up frequently in all kinds of searches these days, and is one of the clearest signs of Google's results going downhill.
That said, I have no personal experience looking for recipes online, as my cooking knowledge was largely learned from my mom, and I've had no reason to turn to any other sources so far.
> Another counterexample to your belief about the miracle of PageRank: try searching for symptoms some time.
When did I suggest that I believe that PageRank is miraculous? It has its pitfalls, just like any other algorithm.
And I've actually searched for symptoms several times and successfully self-diagnosed (confirmed later during a doctor's visit). So this example of yours doesn't hold up. My success there may have been swayed by my professional biomedical knowledge though.
I had a cold a few weeks back, and a coworker found me a search term that prominently featured cerebrospinal fluid leakage as a possible cause for runny nose. Just to establish how far apart you and I are on the usability of the Internet for this.
Oh, it's definitely possible to find all kinds of wacky and incorrect theories at the top of a SERP. Remember that PageRank depends on internet users being (mostly) correct. And oftentimes users are not. Take any political topic as an example. But this is generally solvable by phrasing your query correctly.
But you can still sometimes see this problem with medical topics because heavy-handed government regulation has largely stifled innovation in the medical industry. New technology adoption in the industry is extremely slow, and from my own professional experience, I can tell you that getting doctors to do something as simple as type their notes (so they're available to patients online) instead of handwriting them is akin to pulling teeth.
The protectionism that has resulted from constant lobbying by the AMA has resulted in lots of doctors being able to avoid the adoption of new technology, so discussion of medical topics online by knowledgeable individuals is rarer than in other fields. Perhaps this will change as baby boomers age and medical costs skyrocket, but I'm definitely not holding my breath.
Also, there is of course the issue of most people searching for this stuff not being very knowledgeable, so it creates some confusion on the part of the searcher, what with all the new vocabulary. As for your cerebrospinal fluid example, it's very possible that I see those sorts of results, but I just tune them out due to how absurd they are.
Edit: you were probably talking about CSF rhinorrhea[0]. As it says:
> Most cases of CSF rhinorrhea occur after major accidents where the bones of the face and skull experience significant trauma.
Ergo, if you haven't been in a major accident recently, disregard. Doesn't seem that complicated to me.
There's a couple of issues specific to cooking and recipes that I feel are worse than other general information. Lots of home cooks and unvetted recipes use unsafe cooking practices--not cooking meat long enough or getting it hot enough (or storing things cold enough), it's common to gloss over or skip important steps, online recipes they can often leave out important details that would be caught by an editor. I recipe I made the other day just asked for 2 cans of tomato puree--didn't specify the size of the cans. My mom has a few excellent recipes that just list the ingredients and you mix the amounts to taste.
None of these are problems for people comfortable enough with cooking and know what you're attempting to make, but if you're trying to learn best practices I think it's easiest to find a reputable cookbook for reference. I agree with that the author said, many cookbooks are terrible. I think it's going to get worse with self-publishing and ebooks (I'm definitely not knocking them--but I think in this case it's going to lower the quality).
To your specific point, I agree with the sibling comment about it being an aggregate for the whole site and people linking to stuff they have no intention of making.
Wow do I ever disagree on undercooking. American cooks have exactly the opposite problem, and the literature suggests our guidelines are way out of whack too.
Yes you can. You just need to run the fork wide in the bowl (with firmness) and pour the oil VERY SLOW. It helps if someone else pours the oil so that you have one hand left to hold the bowl still.
I'm late to the party, but wholeheartedly agree. My most read cookbooks are:
The Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum. Had it since graduating college 25 years ago and every page has butter/chocolate/etc stains.
The Dean & Deluca Cookbook David Rosengarten. Simple recipes, good explanations.
Classic Home Desserts Richard Sax. Amazing collection of sweets over the last 200 years.
Rick Bayless' Mexican Kitchen A lot of people think he's a blowhard. Whatever, the food's great.
I have lots more, but those are probably the most thumbed-through.
OK, one more :-)
The Village Baker's Wife too lazy to get up and look up the author, but it's a fair to good pastry book.
The really important thing about the above books is that they build a knowledge base. Once you have that, along with some experience, it's much easier to evaluate online recipes and see if they even have a chance of being good.
The only part he got right imo is the one most people get wrong; knives. Lots of my friends have tons of them, I have 3, a good chefs knife and a good flexible knife for boning and filleting and then a throwaway paring knife (ie it is so cheap that if I feel like it's not sharpening up well after a few months I throw it away).
Lots of other stuff I've never had... I mean an ice cream making as minimum? And a stand mixer? Elbow grease costs nothing, as someone probably rightly once said.
The takeaway possibly is that minimum viable anything is relative to the expectations of the observer. Also that over-thinking things can lead to excess.
You'd be surprised at the crap knives people buy. Not only do cheap knives dull quickly, they also are composed of multiple pieces. Dull knives lead to scarring injuries (whereas sharp knives lead to a clean cut that most likely won't scar) and knives that have multiple pieces will be harder to clean and therefore contain more bacteria.
If anyone needs a recommendation, I swear by Global [1] knives. They are sharp as...well, anything I've ever seen. They also stay sharp for a long time. Yes, they will cost you a lot of money (but they're usually on sale somewhere out there) but over the long term you are saving money by not having to buy so many knives.
I respectfully disagree with having a throw-away knife because a knife is a sharp cutting instrument that is supposed to be an extension of your arm/hand. If you are always purchasing new knives, you are changing the feel of the knife and you will change how you unconsciously use it (also known as muscle memory). Especially with a paring knife, use the same one because the 'paring' action usually involves you cutting towards your wrist and you want to make sure that you don't accidentally suicide yourself.
One other key piece of advice for knives: cutting boards. NEVER NEVER NEVER use glass cutting boards. Tempered glass is very strong and you are just damaging the blade by cutting on it. Use wood (and clean it well) or, at the very least, plastic.
I use Global Pros (and have ~20 of them), but I'd recommend the $20 Victorinox chef's knife (http://www.amazon.com/Victorinox-Swiss-8-Inch-Fibrox-Straigh... -- get the 8 or 10 inch), and a smaller knife (like the matching one). I have some $4 Cold Steel VG-10 serrated knives which I love, since they're super super tough, too (I use them for opening coconuts, etc.
You know I almost recommended the 10" Global chef's knife because I know a ton of professional chefs use them, but it was a budget exercise and I think most home chefs can just sharpen the Fibrox every couple months.
$25 for a cutting board? A $40 digital scale is overkill.
True MVP/MVK should be using stuff that's truly necessary. ie: A knife honer - just use the bottom of a ceramic bowl - worked for chefs for millennium.
This article is horribly titled (not the HN one, the article's actual title). The full quote from the article (Minimum Viable Kitchen (MVK) for creating gourmet food) would have been better.
The thesis statement is also helpful to understand what he is trying to achieve:
I define the Minimum Viable Kitchen as one that can
allow you to create over 75% of the recipes that are
in what I consider to be the best cookbooks for
home chefs.
I get that, but also i'm going to echo the points of the other folks up here that MV is totally an "eye of the beholder" metric.
For cooking most western foods, for example, i think he totally misses the mark in the pots/pans section. Having worked in a 'new american' kitchen, i can confidently say that buying cheap aluminum/stainless 8", 10" sautee pans, an 8" nonstick, a 1pt saucepan, a 2qt pot, (~$9 ea at fsw or whatever) and a cheap $30 dutch oven covers the vast majority of of cooking needs if you throw in a few pieces of steel wool and let the sheet tray pass for whatever baking.
the notion that heavy pans for 'even heat distribution' are essential is true at some echelon of gourmet cuisine, but getting to know how your pan behaves on your stove is infinitely more valuable and cost effective than buying a set of all-clads. case in point, buy a cast-iron fry pan and discover its 'even heat' characteristic still includes a hotspot right under the burner.
75% of all recipes don't require all that much, though, it's the 25% that add much of the weird equipment overhead (i'm looking at you, spring form pan!)
I disagree. We cook anything for a family of 5 with virtually nothing. Two stainless pans, a roasting tray, frying pan, 2 knives, 2x wooden spoon, metal strainer spoon, peeler, a whisk, a pyrex jug and a couple of forks.
Probably cost us < $100 as most of it was free. Same with our bone china crockery + cutlery (both were $20).
Less to wash up as well and we haven't cooked any ready meals for 10 years - we only cook from basic ingredients.
Recipe books - we own one and it's the Mary Berry baking bible because it's so easy to fuck up when baking and she does 100% bullet proof recipes.
These days I do have a lot of random appliances, mostly from loyalty rewards. They're handy, but the only one I regularly use is my electric mixer. No need to a stand mixer!
The Lansky system has metal guides that maintain the right honing angle for you, so you can easily get a decent edge by just following the directions in their video. So long as you treat your knives right, you should just have to do that twice a year. (No dishwasher, and don't let them bash against silverware in the drying rack and in the drawer.)
As for a knife, get something with a real high carbon steel blade. Most stainless is too soft and loses its edge.
Chicago Cutlery used to be good, but I see now they've cheaped-out on their design. (If you have the good fortune to find an older Walnut Traditions knife, make a "boat" with aluminum foil and soak the handles in mineral oil, then don't wash them so much. Oil soaked wood doesn't need too much washing.)
Seconded, I have that Lansky set and it's the best sharpening system I've used, and very fast and accurate, whether you're grinding a blade to a new angle or touching up an existing edge.
The fundamental rule I have is "don't buy sets -- buy individual items as you find uses for them". I bought a lot of really expensive stuff on eBay (Staub, Demeyere) and in Japan (Global Pro knives), and I actually only use a few of each.
A cast iron enameled wok, though, is awesome. I got mine from the Wok Shop in SF for $30 with spatula/etc.
I mostly agree. I just recommended the pots and pans set because they're cheap that way, and you really will use everything you find in a 10 piece set (which, btw, usually counts at least 3 lids as pieces). Knives on the other hand... I got a set as a gift long ago and have at least 5 I've not touched.
The main benefit for me in having two knife blocks of knives is being a able to do meat vs. veg prep with different instances of the same model knives and not wash anything until it is done, but now my kitchen is too small to do that.
I cook quite a bit and have a lot of friends who own commercial kitchens.
- Victorinox Fibrox knives are by far the best value you will get. They are inexpensive and are quite the workhorse.
- I agree for the most part about the pots and pans except cast iron should be #1 on the list. The one thing you will learn very quickly as a cook is that cast iron is your friend. It also lasts forever.
- Someone said something about ditching whisk. Are you freaking kidding me? A whisk costs under $5 and it is invaluable for lots of dishes.
- Desserts are generally hard and require specialized gear. I'd drop the whole damn category.
- I'd add a bamboo steamer to the list. You can pick one up at a asian grocery store. Put it over a large pan of water.
I like cast iron, and have a couple pieces. The problem is I feel like it's an addition since there are things you can't do in them and didn't fit with the minimum viable gourmet kitchen. Cooking with tomatoes would be probably the most frequent thing I need non-cast iron for.
Unless you're talking about enameled cast iron (Le Creuset, Staub), then acidic ingredients like tomatoes will remove the seasoning from your pan. It shouldn't hurt your sauce, but re-seasoning your gear is a pain in the ass.
Not really, in my experience. I had a rusted pan I pulled out of the basement, spent 20 minutes scrubbing and rinsing, a couple of rounds in and out of the oven with vegetable shortening, and was non-stick enough already to easily cook eggs. Am I missing a step I should be doing?
Wow, you +1 for teaching me something new. I've been using stupid vegetable oil on a cloth all these years to season my cast iron, and it's the biggest pain in the ass. I never even thought to use shortening.
You know, I've always read that cast iron (even properly seasoned) reacts with acid and as a result is bad for both your food and the iron, but to be honest I haven't tried it. Googling around some people say their food tastes metallic. Some say it's fine.
Isn't it the opposite? Doesn't seasoning of cast iron allow you to cook acid foods? Washing your pan is what breaks down seasoning, but also, seasoning is easy to fetishize. Just wipe the pan down with canola and stick it in a fast oven. Seasoning cast iron is even easier than sharpening a knife.
I find cast iron very easy to take care of -- much easier than non-stick (but perhaps we use our non-stick for only messy things). Dump out the food, wipe it out, put back on the still-warm burner, put in some oil.
If something particularly hard to clean was in there, I do what scouts do on a campout: put an inch of water (with a little oil) in and set it to boil, then go back to the "wipe it out" step above.
Correct. A properly seasoned pan creates a barrier between the food and the iron. How do you know if your pan is properly seasoned? If you can't soak it overnight in water and/or air dry it without seeing rust, it's not seasoned properly.
Thank you! Turns out my skillet has lost some of its seasoning. Whether this is because or in spite of how we use it for spaghetti sauce so much remains to be seen.
One caveat that people rarely discuss about Victorinox Fibrox knives is that the don't hold an edge very long. They're a great starter knife and a great long-term knife if you don't mind sharpening it fairly frequently.
For example, at the rate I cook, I had to buy three separate fibrox chef's knives to go a solid month without needing to resharpen. And then I'd need to resharpen all three. I decided to upgrade to a slightly more pricey knife that was made of a harder metal. I can now go between 6 and 9 months between sharpening that knife.
So if you do go for the victorinox knives, they will arrive super sharp. But be prepared to resharpen them frequently depending on how much you use them.
Do you steel every time you use the knife? That seems to be what pro's do. Obviously there's a difference between "dull" and "out of true", and if the only problem is "easy to get out of true", well, that's not a big deal.
Yeah, I use a smooth steel. These knives get truly dull. I sharpen them myself with wet stones and I've tried various angles on the blades. I have 5 victorinox chef's knives of various size. And two victorinox filet knives that I use for cutting fish and breaking down large cuts of meat. The filet knives last a long time because they very rarely touch the cutting board. But for the most part I use a MAC chef's knife.
In about 9 months time I will have dulled all 5 victorinox chef's knives and the one MAC knife I own. And the MAC gets more than half of the load during that time.
To all those pointing to cast iron, have you tried using carbon steel pans? I hear that they have many of the same properties as cast iron pans (they're seasoned the same way) but weigh less and heat up/down more quickly. I have been thinking of picking up a carbon steel skillet or wok as my next kitchen addition.
I think I picked one of these up at a garage sale and thought they were regular steel. Mine kept rusting and didn't think to season it. I threw it out, figuring the 3 bucks I spent on it was wasted on a bad product, but I guess I just wasted it in general, lol.
I feel that cast iron pans are overrated. Stainless steel is easier to clean, lets you build fond, lets you cook acidic pan sauces, and are lighter so you can be more aggressive about pan flipping. The only advantage cast iron has is heat retention and there are few cases where that's useful (like deep frying for example, or baking bread). Iron is actually a relatively poor conductor of heat also and a good tri-ply pan will heat up faster.
Cast iron dutch ovens are another story because you will frequently use them in ovens where the heat retention properties are useful.
I find my cast iron to be a pain, and after trying hard to use it well for years. Slow to heat, slow to recover, touchy to season, and heavy as all hell. I've gone back to either stainless or nonstick, depending.
It's kind of like driving an old F350 as a daily driver. Sometimes its just what you need, most of the time it's a heavy, ponderous maintenance nightmare.
The thing about cast iron pans is they're dirt cheap, so it's hard to overrate them.
I guess I agree with you: if you have a high-quality stainless skillet, you don't need the cast-iron pan. Things we do in cast-iron that we don't do in the All Clad pan: make cornbread, sear steaks, grill vegetables outdoors.
The Victorinox Fibrox that he recommends is indeed a great knife for general cooking. I have a lower-middle range gyuto but I usually use the Fibrox because it's easier to take care of. While I cook mostly vegetables, a friend of mine who is a much more talented cook uses the Fibrox for everything.
In terms of pots and pans, I recommend getting a carbon steel wok. A carbon steel wok requires a bit of TLC but pays off in terms of delicious quick meals and the ability to use much less oil. Unfortunately when most people use a wok (often stainless or non-stick) they never actually stir fry but only end up sauteing or braising/steaming the food in its own juices. A zucchini and onion stir fry should only take about 4 or 5 minutes to stir fry, if even that. A wok is great for meals for two -- for larger meals you will have to cook in batches, if what is being made in the wok is the main course.
A good book for learning how to use a wok is "Wok Fast," which teaches you the techniques behind the wok, gives you a variety of sauces, and a bunch of recipes. By learning why a certain thing is done (such as why you should steam broccoli a bit before stir frying) instead of just following recipes, you can be more creative when cooking. The book is out of print but Amazon lists some other sellers.
Just be aware that most carbon steel woks come with a protective coating that must first be removed prior to seasoning and using it; find some instructions online or else you will end up with strange translucent stuff in your food. :) The coating has to come off as it is the interaction of oils with the carbon steel that cause a wok to develop its non-stick patina.
What would you use to get the Wok Hot enough for Stir-Fry. My biggest hindrance to using a Wok is the lack of a proper burner. I imagine there are lots of people in my situation.
I use a cast iron enameled flat-bottom wok on a glass-top electric range (maybe 14k BTU?) I know it gets hot because I IR thermometer it (450-550F!), and because once I left it empty on the range, left the range on, and got distracted. The glass top of the range had actually melted to the wok (um, wow), meaning it was in the 950F+ area. I had to buy a new $200 glass top and replace it (and the $20 wok). Annoying, but not as expensive as appliance repair or replacement would have been, and fortunately no actual fire.
I think this shows electric ranges can get suitably hot with the right wok. I'd still like one of the 50A 3-phase induction woks used at high end restaurants, or an outdoor turkey fryer gas burner (40k BTU), though.
Well, even when I was in a cheapo apartment with a rather poor electric stove I was able to stir fry as long as I paid attention to how much I cooked at once. Wok Fast teaches a technique that works pretty well for cooking meat + vegetable dishes. I'm writing this from memory, so it might be off by a bit, but the key is to cook at the most two cups of ingredients at a time.
1. Wait until the wok surface is hot enough to vaporize a sprinkling of water instantly.
2. Add the oil + onions and/or garlic and stir fry for 30 seconds. Coat the wok with the oil as you do this.
3. Add the meat, let it sit on the wok until it is seared (at which point it will "unstick" from the wok) and stir fry about two minutes. Remove the meat, which is not yet fully cooked, and set it aside.
4. Wait for the wok to heat up again, but be careful about using the water droplet technique as that can cause the oil to splash. Add the vegetables and stir fry until they brighten, about two minutes.
5. If the wok is still pretty hot at this point you can just add the meat and cook another two minutes, then add the sauce and cook a final two minutes. If it seems like it isn't hot enough, remove the vegetables and let it heat up a bit before adding everything.
It's definitely more effort than just being able to add the meat, stir fry, then add the vegetables, but it does work, and only takes 8-10 minutes for meat + vegetables. If you are cooking only vegetables, the water doesn't need to instantly vaporize -- it should sit for about 2 or 3 seconds before vaporizing.
As I said, I'm recalling this from memory and I don't generally cook meat, so the instructions might be off (please don't eat undercooked meat!) But what I wanted to convey was that I found it possible to stir fry for two even with a low end electric stove. Maybe there are some stoves even worse than what I had, though! :)
I like that the article is attempting to encourage people to cook more, but the premise is flawed. You don't take someone who's interested in food and tell them to read the French Laundry Cookbook. You tell them to start with Julia Child, or the Joy of Cooking, or Cooks Illustrated, or Mark Bittman. Crawl, then walk, then run.
Similarly, you don't tell a novice to spend $1000 on equipment they might never use. I've cooked "gourmet" for over a decade and I've never owned a stand mixer. You tell them to buy a good chef's knife, a good paring knife. A stock pot, a frying pan, maybe a saucepan. I have a cast iron pan but i use my nonstick pans much more often.
The difficulty in learning to cook is not in getting the right tools. It's in getting someone to overcome their fear of it. You just need to show them that it's actually not a difficult thing, that you can screw up a recipe multiple times and still have a delicious result. Make a pot of spaghetti, then a simple soup or stew, roast a chicken, fry a steak. Then go nuts making Keller's Oysters and Pearls. But only after.
The people who would find use out of many of the items listed are the same people who know what they need, anyway.
This is certainly not a "minimum viable kitchen" by any stretch, but it is a reasonable list of equipment necessary to make a certain type of recipe (from-scratch French-inspired New American cooking that involves baked components).
Personally, the single piece of equipment that I would recommend to the home chef* would be a good pressure cooker. Vegetables, stews, beans, and grains cook better and much, much faster, and the stocks you can make in a pressure cooker will blow away stovetop stocks.
*: I would consider a home chef to be someone who wants to spend time cooking. I know many people who don't and I don't grudge them that -- but for me, cooking is a true hobby (as in, something where I negatively value my own time -- the longer it takes, the more satisfaction I derive from it).
I'd go for a food processor (~$100) over a stand mixer, but I don't make a lot of deserts. For making bread and pizza dough, I got a cheap bread maker for $50, and it was well-spent. The food processor comes in handy quite often; I'd hate to make bread crumbs, sliced or shredded vegetables, fresh salsa and a bunch of other things without one. Also, for those who are (like me) too lazy to keep their steel knives in proper working sharpness at all times, a ceramic knife is pretty handy for preparing veggies.
I'd highly recommend adding kitchen shears and butcher twine to this list. Both items have a ton of uses and I've found them to be indispensable to have around.
Definitely should have put "for gourmet cooking" or something to that effect in the title, as that was the intended purpose. Half the comments here are "you can cook with less than that" with which I agree. You just can't cook a high percentage of the stuff in a cookbook written by a guy with Michelin stars.
To be fair to the author, he's talking capital K kitchen. Like, you take food as a serious hobby and want to have a reasonable chance of recreating dishes from Top Chef or in culinary magazines. I don't think he's trying to make a "Minimum Viable Food Preperation System".
Mark Bittman wrote a nice column about outfitting a "no-frills kitchen" over at the NYT. I came across it via a review of knives over at the wirecutter. I can recommend both.
I love that Bittman article! I think it's much closer to the idea of a 'minimum viable kitchen' for someone whose just starting cooking than this article. And it has the much more approachable cost of "under $300," as opposed to the OP's "under $1000."
There are a few cases on there where they mention something as the undisputed best in the high end, but you should get the cheaper thing, and they got the cheaper thing right 100% of the time, but either neglected another top option (which may be better in many ways), or actually didn't pick the top option. e.g. Demeyere is objectively better than All-Clad in every way except advertising spending. Shun Ken Onion is only mid-range for knives (but very good); MAC, Global, and a variety of both cheaper and more expensive Japanese options are better for Japanese, and there's a style argument for Japanese (sharper, harder) vs. European (tougher). Staub > Le Creuset, although the lodge or tramontina is 95% as good for 20% of the cost, and unglazed cast iron from lodge (or old stuff from Griswold, etc.) is just fine for $20-30 (but unglazed cast iron is fundamentally different from glazed).
Vitamix and Blend-Tec are both on par; I'd take either. (slight preference for vitamix, maybe?) I've never owned either, although I've used a vitamix at a military hospital; it was nice.
Demeyere is unquestionably better than All-Clad. It just has no distribution in the US (at least not until recently). All-Clad outspends everyone in sponsorships and marketing. "All-Clad is like Starbucks" comes up often.
Staub vs. Le Creuset has come up a bunch. Staub is certainly more durable (interior glaze, color change). Le Creuset has more colors outside, and more range. I have both (and Lodge), and agree about Staub > Le Creuset generally. Also, the stoneware crap from Le Creuset = hate. I hate it when premium brands come up with lower end stuff which is hard to distinguish. The worst is probably Kitchen-Aid; they had a bunch of Wal-Mart stand mixers which were visually indistinguishable and sucked.
I've either purchased or influenced the purchase of at least ten copies of Ad Hoc. It has a lot of tips throughout and the recipes are simple enough for most cooks while showy enough for dinner parties.
Oh, and a good set of tongs are my must have in the kitchen.
I feel like there is lots missing from this list that a really functional kitchen needs.
Supplies I'd add to a MVK:
Dry measuring cups/spoons, liquid measures, rubber jar opener, bottle opener, plastic wrap, aluminum foil, digital timer, oven mitts, soap (I also like Lysol wipes for quick sanitizing)
Ingredients to keep in stock:
Fridge: butter (salted for cooking, unsalted for baking), lemon, lime, whole milk or cream, eggs, soy, Worcestershire
Pantry: cooking wine, vinegar, olive and vegetable oils, salt, black pepper (peppercorns in grinder preferably), dried spices (oregano, basil, parsley, cilantro, mint, chive, dill, cumin, coriander, chili powder, red pepper, garlic powder, dried onion, or at the very least some "cheater" mixes like Adobo, Jane's Krazy, Old Bay), vanilla, nuts and nut butters, shortening
Dry ingredients: white flour, white sugar (brown optional), baking powder, baking soda, cornstarch, chocolate, breadcrumbs (or make them)
Also keep around: fresh garlic, onions, quick starches (rice, couscous, pasta, potato), bread, liquid stocks (really you can make these), cheeses, other alcohols
I think you can probably get everything on my list for less than the price of the ice cream maker.
People focus a lot of the equipment, but a properly stocked pantry will get you further.
Find a canned "quick" item that is super luxurious. Keep it always stocked. It makes the simple life awesome. Mine are "elysee gherkins". Eat a sandwich? Add gherkins. Any kind of appetizer? put a small bowl of gherkins out.
208 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 250 ms ] threadAnd since it seems somewhat on topic, Hubbub are hiring developers, so if you love both food and technology we'd love to hear from you: http://developers.hubbub.co.uk/.
We provide an online delivery service for local independent food shops, because we love food too much to leave it to the supermarkets.
- You don't need cookbooks. The internet is better in terms of 'MVK', and the best cookbook is the one you make yourself.
- Get rid of half of the pots and the dutch oven. Cast iron is indeed the greatest.
- A stand mixer is nice, but by no means is it Minimum Viable.
- If you insist on getting a mixing bowl that isn't a regular bowl, don't get three of them.
- Ditch the whisk.
- Saying an ice cream maker is part of an MVK is like saying cool t-shirts is part of a startup's MVP.
That being said, I really like this article.
It depends on what you need it for. With my electric mixer it's easy to overwhip. It's probably just silly nostalgia and habit though (my grandmother used to whip cream with a fork).
There's way more to meringue than I realized.
Also, why get rid of the dutch oven, but keep the cast iron? A dutch oven is cast iron. I am confused.
Fishing for recipes on the Internet is an advanced skill. You need to know how to cook reasonably well in order to evaluate the recipes and adjust each one to your situation.
In contrast, something like Bittman's "How to Cook Everything" gives a lot of basic advice, has a set of consistent recipes with clear variations, and is carefully designed to avoid confusion.
And for the nerdy, the Bittman book is available in a Kindle version, so it need not take up any physical space.
But as far as going to AllRecipes and following instructions, you can do it, and you'll end up with something edible, but you're not learning to cook properly doing so.
If you want to be "interesting" about this: get Ruhlman's Twenty (which is 20 core techniques with sample recipes) and Ratio, and then use the Internet for everything else. If you read Twenty, you'll probably be able to spot bullshit on the Internet.
Cookbooks: he's recommending specific cookbooks which he thinks will make you a better cook. As he says, lots of them are crap, as are lots of the recipes and tutorials on the internet. You're paying for curation here more than the content itself.
Pots: Keep in mind that a "10 piece" pot set is really one 5 pots or pans, which is not that much. Having the correct size pot or pan for the quantity of food that you're heating makes a big difference in how things turn out. (For example, when sauteing onions & vegetables you really want a fairly full single layer.)
Whisk: I'm sorry, but it really is an essential tool
Ice Cream Maker: I completely agree, and I'd be inclined to ditch the whole "desserts" section.
Note, that I think there's some debate about what "minimum viable" means here. The stand mixer falls in this grey area, I think. You can probably get away with a good hand mixer (as he acknowledges) but the stand mixer is more versatile and time saving.
Also internet recipes are a minefield for someone learning to actually cook. I'd say at least 90% of them are garbage, and I might be spotting them a 9.
You're talking about recipe collections, not cookbooks, and for those you are probably right.
But a good cookbook doesn't just contain recipes, it contains basic cooking knowledge, it contains general recipes that you can use to make actual meals. And you'll be using those guidelines over and over again when cooking.
I also think a standing mixer is a luxury, but I've upvoted everyone who's said you cannot ditch the whisk. Whisks are important. Enough said.
Many comments on this thread have been about knives. I've owned quite a few knives over the span of years of professional cooking. A really good chef knife will really only be appreciated by those who cook either professionally or really seriously as a hobby. A soccer mom who chops onions once or twice a week to cook dinner very likely won't know/feel the difference between a 50$ Whustoff or Henckel vs a $250 Shun.
The other important thing to know about knives is if you do decide to spring for a good quality blade, maintaining it is really important. Sharpening with a whetstone with the appropriate grit and honing the blade before each use will keep your sharp edge for much longer.
All in all the article is good. All-clad is hands down the best quality and most durable cookwear out there. Although I don't think using a dutch oven to make sauces is a great idea.
* You will be unhappy if your only cooking surface is cast iron. I agree that you can do without the dutch oven but it is the "pan you can do without" that is the most valuable; it is the immediate runner up to the the "list of must-have pans".
* Strong disagree on your mixing bowl point. You need lots of mixing bowls. I have 8 and wish I had more. For instance: muffins and pancakes both want two mixing bowls at a minimum, and three if you don't want to use a service bowl to separate eggs. Sautees want a mixing bowl for proteins and mixing bowl for prepped vegetables. Dinner prep usually wants one mixing bowl just to throw onion skins and wrappers in. Mixing bowls are lightweight, stackable, cheap, and supremely useful, and it makes no sense to chintz on them.
* I don't even know how to respond to "ditch the whisk" unless you're one of those old French guys who can make a hollandaise with a fork. You need a whisk.
The internet is full of terrible information in general. That's why PageRank was invented. Is there something unique about cooking information that means PageRank won't work with it?
I'll find the eHow "how to cook a steak" that was pegged to the top of a SERP in a bit.
Another counterexample to your belief about the miracle of PageRank: try searching for symptoms some time.
> most people who search for prepared dishes aren't actually going to prepare them
There are many (non-tech) long-tail topics that I've successfully searched for using Google, so I don't think this is a generalizable statement.
> The sites with the most recipes tend to either be overtly user-generated or slyly repackaged UGC.
I can't speak as to the average user, but I am usually able to easily ignore/sift through such sites. They pop up frequently in all kinds of searches these days, and is one of the clearest signs of Google's results going downhill.
That said, I have no personal experience looking for recipes online, as my cooking knowledge was largely learned from my mom, and I've had no reason to turn to any other sources so far.
> Another counterexample to your belief about the miracle of PageRank: try searching for symptoms some time.
When did I suggest that I believe that PageRank is miraculous? It has its pitfalls, just like any other algorithm.
And I've actually searched for symptoms several times and successfully self-diagnosed (confirmed later during a doctor's visit). So this example of yours doesn't hold up. My success there may have been swayed by my professional biomedical knowledge though.
But you can still sometimes see this problem with medical topics because heavy-handed government regulation has largely stifled innovation in the medical industry. New technology adoption in the industry is extremely slow, and from my own professional experience, I can tell you that getting doctors to do something as simple as type their notes (so they're available to patients online) instead of handwriting them is akin to pulling teeth.
The protectionism that has resulted from constant lobbying by the AMA has resulted in lots of doctors being able to avoid the adoption of new technology, so discussion of medical topics online by knowledgeable individuals is rarer than in other fields. Perhaps this will change as baby boomers age and medical costs skyrocket, but I'm definitely not holding my breath.
Also, there is of course the issue of most people searching for this stuff not being very knowledgeable, so it creates some confusion on the part of the searcher, what with all the new vocabulary. As for your cerebrospinal fluid example, it's very possible that I see those sorts of results, but I just tune them out due to how absurd they are.
Edit: you were probably talking about CSF rhinorrhea[0]. As it says:
> Most cases of CSF rhinorrhea occur after major accidents where the bones of the face and skull experience significant trauma.
Ergo, if you haven't been in a major accident recently, disregard. Doesn't seem that complicated to me.
0: http://uvahealth.com/services/skull-base-program/conditions-...
None of these are problems for people comfortable enough with cooking and know what you're attempting to make, but if you're trying to learn best practices I think it's easiest to find a reputable cookbook for reference. I agree with that the author said, many cookbooks are terrible. I think it's going to get worse with self-publishing and ebooks (I'm definitely not knocking them--but I think in this case it's going to lower the quality).
To your specific point, I agree with the sibling comment about it being an aggregate for the whole site and people linking to stuff they have no intention of making.
My mom is 81. She can make oeufs en neige with a fork. That I can't.
The difference is speed. Mayo doesn't need speed. It's just about fat molecules being elongated.
Yes you can. You just need to run the fork wide in the bowl (with firmness) and pour the oil VERY SLOW. It helps if someone else pours the oil so that you have one hand left to hold the bowl still.
I'm late to the party, but wholeheartedly agree. My most read cookbooks are:
The Cake Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum. Had it since graduating college 25 years ago and every page has butter/chocolate/etc stains.
The Dean & Deluca Cookbook David Rosengarten. Simple recipes, good explanations.
Classic Home Desserts Richard Sax. Amazing collection of sweets over the last 200 years.
Rick Bayless' Mexican Kitchen A lot of people think he's a blowhard. Whatever, the food's great.
I have lots more, but those are probably the most thumbed-through.
OK, one more :-)
The Village Baker's Wife too lazy to get up and look up the author, but it's a fair to good pastry book.
The really important thing about the above books is that they build a knowledge base. Once you have that, along with some experience, it's much easier to evaluate online recipes and see if they even have a chance of being good.
The takeaway possibly is that minimum viable anything is relative to the expectations of the observer. Also that over-thinking things can lead to excess.
You'd be surprised at the crap knives people buy. Not only do cheap knives dull quickly, they also are composed of multiple pieces. Dull knives lead to scarring injuries (whereas sharp knives lead to a clean cut that most likely won't scar) and knives that have multiple pieces will be harder to clean and therefore contain more bacteria.
If anyone needs a recommendation, I swear by Global [1] knives. They are sharp as...well, anything I've ever seen. They also stay sharp for a long time. Yes, they will cost you a lot of money (but they're usually on sale somewhere out there) but over the long term you are saving money by not having to buy so many knives.
I respectfully disagree with having a throw-away knife because a knife is a sharp cutting instrument that is supposed to be an extension of your arm/hand. If you are always purchasing new knives, you are changing the feel of the knife and you will change how you unconsciously use it (also known as muscle memory). Especially with a paring knife, use the same one because the 'paring' action usually involves you cutting towards your wrist and you want to make sure that you don't accidentally suicide yourself.
My goto knives are:
- G-4: Oriental cook's knife (http://www.global-knife.com/products/g/product_g-4.html)
- GSF-49: utility knife [I use it as a paring knife] (http://www.global-knife.com/products/gs/product_gsf-49.html)
One other key piece of advice for knives: cutting boards. NEVER NEVER NEVER use glass cutting boards. Tempered glass is very strong and you are just damaging the blade by cutting on it. Use wood (and clean it well) or, at the very least, plastic.
[1] http://www.global-knife.com/
Also, get a great pair of shears (which come apart for cleaning), such as http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0002IMMEW
$25 for a cutting board? A $40 digital scale is overkill.
True MVP/MVK should be using stuff that's truly necessary. ie: A knife honer - just use the bottom of a ceramic bowl - worked for chefs for millennium.
The thesis statement is also helpful to understand what he is trying to achieve:
For cooking most western foods, for example, i think he totally misses the mark in the pots/pans section. Having worked in a 'new american' kitchen, i can confidently say that buying cheap aluminum/stainless 8", 10" sautee pans, an 8" nonstick, a 1pt saucepan, a 2qt pot, (~$9 ea at fsw or whatever) and a cheap $30 dutch oven covers the vast majority of of cooking needs if you throw in a few pieces of steel wool and let the sheet tray pass for whatever baking.
the notion that heavy pans for 'even heat distribution' are essential is true at some echelon of gourmet cuisine, but getting to know how your pan behaves on your stove is infinitely more valuable and cost effective than buying a set of all-clads. case in point, buy a cast-iron fry pan and discover its 'even heat' characteristic still includes a hotspot right under the burner.
75% of all recipes don't require all that much, though, it's the 25% that add much of the weird equipment overhead (i'm looking at you, spring form pan!)
My 12" allclad fry on the other hand, not so donut shaped.
Probably cost us < $100 as most of it was free. Same with our bone china crockery + cutlery (both were $20).
Less to wash up as well and we haven't cooked any ready meals for 10 years - we only cook from basic ingredients.
Recipe books - we own one and it's the Mary Berry baking bible because it's so easy to fuck up when baking and she does 100% bullet proof recipes.
These days I do have a lot of random appliances, mostly from loyalty rewards. They're handy, but the only one I regularly use is my electric mixer. No need to a stand mixer!
We make bread by hand (only takes ten mins) and everything that comes out of a microwave tastes like shit.
Actual bread takes 10 minutes of attention and about 2 hours of wall time.
Things I could do without (I just don't bake much): -stand mixer -ice cream maker -rolling pin -cooling rack
Some things I would spend a little more on: -knives -thermometer
Additions: -can opener
Without that (expensive) component, you can greatly pare down this list to about ~400ish
Buy that, plus the "Ultra Fine" stone: http://amzn.com/B000B8L6MC
The Lansky system has metal guides that maintain the right honing angle for you, so you can easily get a decent edge by just following the directions in their video. So long as you treat your knives right, you should just have to do that twice a year. (No dishwasher, and don't let them bash against silverware in the drying rack and in the drawer.)
As for a knife, get something with a real high carbon steel blade. Most stainless is too soft and loses its edge.
Chicago Cutlery used to be good, but I see now they've cheaped-out on their design. (If you have the good fortune to find an older Walnut Traditions knife, make a "boat" with aluminum foil and soak the handles in mineral oil, then don't wash them so much. Oil soaked wood doesn't need too much washing.)
This one looks promising: http://amzn.com/B0000CFDD5
A cast iron enameled wok, though, is awesome. I got mine from the Wok Shop in SF for $30 with spatula/etc.
http://refer.ly/cooking_tools/c/59d5b57c118b11e2a4ec22000a1d... is what I came up with a while ago.
- Victorinox Fibrox knives are by far the best value you will get. They are inexpensive and are quite the workhorse.
- I agree for the most part about the pots and pans except cast iron should be #1 on the list. The one thing you will learn very quickly as a cook is that cast iron is your friend. It also lasts forever.
- Someone said something about ditching whisk. Are you freaking kidding me? A whisk costs under $5 and it is invaluable for lots of dishes.
- Desserts are generally hard and require specialized gear. I'd drop the whole damn category.
- I'd add a bamboo steamer to the list. You can pick one up at a asian grocery store. Put it over a large pan of water.
And yeah, I laughed at the whisk thing too.
http://www.seriouseats.com/talk/2010/03/cast-iron-and-tomato...
In any case, the result isn't bad for you -- it just tastes bad.
If something particularly hard to clean was in there, I do what scouts do on a campout: put an inch of water (with a little oil) in and set it to boil, then go back to the "wipe it out" step above.
For example, at the rate I cook, I had to buy three separate fibrox chef's knives to go a solid month without needing to resharpen. And then I'd need to resharpen all three. I decided to upgrade to a slightly more pricey knife that was made of a harder metal. I can now go between 6 and 9 months between sharpening that knife.
So if you do go for the victorinox knives, they will arrive super sharp. But be prepared to resharpen them frequently depending on how much you use them.
In about 9 months time I will have dulled all 5 victorinox chef's knives and the one MAC knife I own. And the MAC gets more than half of the load during that time.
Cast iron dutch ovens are another story because you will frequently use them in ovens where the heat retention properties are useful.
It's kind of like driving an old F350 as a daily driver. Sometimes its just what you need, most of the time it's a heavy, ponderous maintenance nightmare.
I guess I agree with you: if you have a high-quality stainless skillet, you don't need the cast-iron pan. Things we do in cast-iron that we don't do in the All Clad pan: make cornbread, sear steaks, grill vegetables outdoors.
In terms of pots and pans, I recommend getting a carbon steel wok. A carbon steel wok requires a bit of TLC but pays off in terms of delicious quick meals and the ability to use much less oil. Unfortunately when most people use a wok (often stainless or non-stick) they never actually stir fry but only end up sauteing or braising/steaming the food in its own juices. A zucchini and onion stir fry should only take about 4 or 5 minutes to stir fry, if even that. A wok is great for meals for two -- for larger meals you will have to cook in batches, if what is being made in the wok is the main course.
A good book for learning how to use a wok is "Wok Fast," which teaches you the techniques behind the wok, gives you a variety of sauces, and a bunch of recipes. By learning why a certain thing is done (such as why you should steam broccoli a bit before stir frying) instead of just following recipes, you can be more creative when cooking. The book is out of print but Amazon lists some other sellers.
Just be aware that most carbon steel woks come with a protective coating that must first be removed prior to seasoning and using it; find some instructions online or else you will end up with strange translucent stuff in your food. :) The coating has to come off as it is the interaction of oils with the carbon steel that cause a wok to develop its non-stick patina.
I think this shows electric ranges can get suitably hot with the right wok. I'd still like one of the 50A 3-phase induction woks used at high end restaurants, or an outdoor turkey fryer gas burner (40k BTU), though.
1. Wait until the wok surface is hot enough to vaporize a sprinkling of water instantly.
2. Add the oil + onions and/or garlic and stir fry for 30 seconds. Coat the wok with the oil as you do this.
3. Add the meat, let it sit on the wok until it is seared (at which point it will "unstick" from the wok) and stir fry about two minutes. Remove the meat, which is not yet fully cooked, and set it aside.
4. Wait for the wok to heat up again, but be careful about using the water droplet technique as that can cause the oil to splash. Add the vegetables and stir fry until they brighten, about two minutes.
5. If the wok is still pretty hot at this point you can just add the meat and cook another two minutes, then add the sauce and cook a final two minutes. If it seems like it isn't hot enough, remove the vegetables and let it heat up a bit before adding everything.
It's definitely more effort than just being able to add the meat, stir fry, then add the vegetables, but it does work, and only takes 8-10 minutes for meat + vegetables. If you are cooking only vegetables, the water doesn't need to instantly vaporize -- it should sit for about 2 or 3 seconds before vaporizing.
As I said, I'm recalling this from memory and I don't generally cook meat, so the instructions might be off (please don't eat undercooked meat!) But what I wanted to convey was that I found it possible to stir fry for two even with a low end electric stove. Maybe there are some stoves even worse than what I had, though! :)
Similarly, you don't tell a novice to spend $1000 on equipment they might never use. I've cooked "gourmet" for over a decade and I've never owned a stand mixer. You tell them to buy a good chef's knife, a good paring knife. A stock pot, a frying pan, maybe a saucepan. I have a cast iron pan but i use my nonstick pans much more often.
The difficulty in learning to cook is not in getting the right tools. It's in getting someone to overcome their fear of it. You just need to show them that it's actually not a difficult thing, that you can screw up a recipe multiple times and still have a delicious result. Make a pot of spaghetti, then a simple soup or stew, roast a chicken, fry a steak. Then go nuts making Keller's Oysters and Pearls. But only after.
The people who would find use out of many of the items listed are the same people who know what they need, anyway.
1: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/features/diningandwine/columns...
Personally, the single piece of equipment that I would recommend to the home chef* would be a good pressure cooker. Vegetables, stews, beans, and grains cook better and much, much faster, and the stocks you can make in a pressure cooker will blow away stovetop stocks.
*: I would consider a home chef to be someone who wants to spend time cooking. I know many people who don't and I don't grudge them that -- but for me, cooking is a true hobby (as in, something where I negatively value my own time -- the longer it takes, the more satisfaction I derive from it).
Go and live in a developing country for a few years, see and taste the phenomenal food, then double check if you need to spend a fraction of $971
NYT article: <http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/09/dining/09mini.html?_r=1...;
The Wirecutter review: <http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/a-great-chefs-knife/>;
Vitamix and Blend-Tec are both on par; I'd take either. (slight preference for vitamix, maybe?) I've never owned either, although I've used a vitamix at a military hospital; it was nice.
Demeyere is unquestionably better than All-Clad. It just has no distribution in the US (at least not until recently). All-Clad outspends everyone in sponsorships and marketing. "All-Clad is like Starbucks" comes up often.
Staub vs. Le Creuset has come up a bunch. Staub is certainly more durable (interior glaze, color change). Le Creuset has more colors outside, and more range. I have both (and Lodge), and agree about Staub > Le Creuset generally. Also, the stoneware crap from Le Creuset = hate. I hate it when premium brands come up with lower end stuff which is hard to distinguish. The worst is probably Kitchen-Aid; they had a bunch of Wal-Mart stand mixers which were visually indistinguishable and sucked.
Oh, and a good set of tongs are my must have in the kitchen.
Supplies I'd add to a MVK:
Dry measuring cups/spoons, liquid measures, rubber jar opener, bottle opener, plastic wrap, aluminum foil, digital timer, oven mitts, soap (I also like Lysol wipes for quick sanitizing)
Ingredients to keep in stock:
Fridge: butter (salted for cooking, unsalted for baking), lemon, lime, whole milk or cream, eggs, soy, Worcestershire
Pantry: cooking wine, vinegar, olive and vegetable oils, salt, black pepper (peppercorns in grinder preferably), dried spices (oregano, basil, parsley, cilantro, mint, chive, dill, cumin, coriander, chili powder, red pepper, garlic powder, dried onion, or at the very least some "cheater" mixes like Adobo, Jane's Krazy, Old Bay), vanilla, nuts and nut butters, shortening
Dry ingredients: white flour, white sugar (brown optional), baking powder, baking soda, cornstarch, chocolate, breadcrumbs (or make them)
Also keep around: fresh garlic, onions, quick starches (rice, couscous, pasta, potato), bread, liquid stocks (really you can make these), cheeses, other alcohols
I think you can probably get everything on my list for less than the price of the ice cream maker.
I agree that measuring cups & spoons and oven mitts are a big oversight though, and the inclusion of the ice cream maker is just strange.
People focus a lot of the equipment, but a properly stocked pantry will get you further.
Find a canned "quick" item that is super luxurious. Keep it always stocked. It makes the simple life awesome. Mine are "elysee gherkins". Eat a sandwich? Add gherkins. Any kind of appetizer? put a small bowl of gherkins out.
My secret luxurious dessert ingredient is speculoos. I saw it on Chopped so now I have to pick it up every time I'm at Trader Joe's.