29 September
In my opinion, the best kitchen tools are the ones that make it easier for me to make and eat healthy foods. I’ve always been a minimalist and enjoyed not having a lot of stuff. But after moving from one side of the country to the other 6 times now, Phil and I have become super-minimalists.
One of my best kitchen tools is my sprouter.
For something to have a place in my kitchen, it has to get used a lot, and it has to have a real purpose. I’m much more interested in quality than quantity.
This transcription will have some mistakes because it is partially automated.
Hey guys! This is Heather from HealthyEatingStartsHere.com. Today I wanted to look at some kitchen tools that I think are well worth the money.
There are certain tools that in your kitchen can make the preparation of healthy foods so much easier that it allows you to eat more healthy foods than you probably otherwise would. So to me I think that’s worthwhile.
Now I am quite a minimalist especially after having moved a lot of times. I definitely want the things in my kitchen to be useful to me and to have an actual purpose as to why I have them.
And so for me nutrition is the key so anything that’s gonna make my food healthier or that’s going to make me eat more of the healthy foods I think is worth the investments.
So, number one on my list are some good knives and that’s one of the first things that Phil and I got for our kitchen and Phil was very interesting getting a good quality set of knives which I’m really thankful for now because I can totally tell the difference when I’m travelling and I don’t have a good knife or if I’m using one that’s dull.
Totally makes a difference in how enjoyable it is to prepare your food and also how much control and how fast you can do it.
So good quality knives, very worth the investment! If you don’t have a lot of cash then just get one or two and this is a paring knife and this is the one I use most often and then a chef’s nice would be good as well that’s the big one and it’s good for bigger vegetables especially sweet potatoes and squash. Those can be pretty tough to cut with the paring knife.
Ok! Next on my list is a Sprouter. Phil and I used mason jars for quite awhile and they work fine but we also had one of these which is an easy sprouter and it has drainage at the bottom and the airflow can get in because you can set this up at like that.
So we started noticing that the sprouts that came out of the sprouter were much better quality than the ones in the mason jars because of drainage and airflow and whatever but they just look better, they smell better, they don’t go bad as quickly and also it was a lot easier when we we’re going to rinse them and when you’re doing that two-three times a day, a couple of minutes here and there can add up and just means that you actually get that done more often.
And so there’s this type, there are other types of sprouters that you can find. These ones are fifteen bucks so they’re really affordable especially when you think about how much you can spend when you buy sprouts in the grocery store.
So Phil and I now have three of those that we keep so that we can have a constant supply of fresh sprouts going otherwise you have to wait a couple of days while the sprouts soak and then sprout and then get green and why not. So I think those are well worth the price.
Alright, number three on my list is my blender, the main thing I do in there is are my daily green smoothies and what I do there is I get a little bit of fruit going and then packed in a whole ton of sprouts as well as other greens usually so the benefits there is you can put a lot more greens into smoothies that you probably would eat in a salad.
And when you mix it up with fruits it taste yummy, that’s our afternoon snack and a really great way to do it. So blender can increase the amount of greens that you eat in a day.
It can also be used for making bean dips or other types of dips. I use my food processor more often now but if you don’t have a food processor, blender will work just fine you just might have to make it a little bit thinner.
And then the other thing you can do with the blender is if you put a mason jar onto the base and put some nuts or seeds in there you can grind them up so you can do that with flax seeds or with sunflower seeds or almonds or whatever you like. You can just grind them up really easily.
So those are my top three picks for kitchen tools that are worth the money and I love all of those, I have lot of tools in my kitchen that are really useful but I think those are the most valuable.
So, what do you guys think? What are your favorite kitchen tools? Let me know. Leavem e a comment and I shall see you guys next time.
I think of these tools as investments in my nutrition and health, so it’s all about the value to a healthy eating plan for me. Most tools don’t make food healthier, but they make it easier for me to prepare healthy foods so that I eat more of them.
1 - Good Knives
One of the absolute best kitchen tools I have is a good set of knives. They make such a huge difference in the speed and control I have in food prep. I’m always reminded of that when I travel and have to use cheap and/or dull knives.
Phil researched brands, and found Calphalon to the best value on some really high quality knives. If you take care of them properly, and use them on a wood or bamboo cutting board, they’ll last for a really long time. If you’re short on cash, just buy a paring knife and a chef’s knife - they’re much more useful than a full set of cheap knives.
2 - Sprouting Jars
Sprouts (like alfalfa or clover) are an excellent part of a healthy eating plan, and making your own at home gets you the best nutrition. Phil and I used mason jars for sprouting for a long time. Eventually, we realized that the sprouts we made in our sprouting jar (we use an Easy Sprout) were better quality because they had better drainage and airflow. They also make it a lot easier to rinse, so we’re more likely to do it when we’re supposed to.
The Easy Sprouters only cost $15, and if you compare that to the cost of buying sprouts from the grocery store it’s well worth it. Phil and I now have 3 sprouters, so that we can keep batches going continuously. Go to sprouting.com to find the Easy Sprouter, and you can order sprouting seeds there as well.
3 - Blender
A blender serves a lot of functions in my kitchen, and that makes it really worth the cost (not that they cost much). I use it to make our daily green smoothies, and I pile a ton of fresh sprouts and/or greens (lettuce, kale, chard, etc) in there. We get a lot more greens in our smoothies than we would eat in a salad.
Before I had a food processor, I also used my blender to make dips and bean spreads. If you screw a mason jar onto the base instead of the pitcher, you can grind nuts and seeds. I usually do that for flax, but also if I want to make a sunflower seed cheese, ground almonds for cookies, or grind rolled oats into flour.
So those are just three of my best kitchen tools - the ones that have a lot more value to me than their price tags. What are the kitchen tools you value most? Let me know by leaving a comment below.
© Heather Nauta . heather@healthyeatingstartshere.com
Disclaimer: This website is for educational purposes only, from the research, education and experience of Heather Nauta. It is not intended as medical advice.
Disclaimer: This website is for educational purposes only, from the research, education and experience of Heather Nauta. It is not intended as medical advice.
