Cutting Archives - Food And Recipe

April 6, 2023

Spring kitchen refresh with culinary expert approved tools from knives to new cutting boards

If you’ve already cleaned the house for spring you may have realized it’s time to spruce up some kitchen essentials. These products have you covered.

“Good Morning America” enlisted the culinary expertise of test kitchen directors, recipe developers, chefs and food bloggers to share their product picks that are fresh for spring and will help you get cooking like a pro.

Chef-approved kitchen tools from knives to cutting boards

Dan Pelosi

The ReBoard from Material Kitchen being used to chop fresh produce.

Ashton Keefe, chef and recipe developer, shared five of her favorites from knives to an essential countertop appliance that make cooking at home breeze.

Trio of Knives with Stand

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Material Trio Cutting Knife Set & Stand

Price: $230.00 • From: West Elm

The set has everything needed to slice, dice and chop. Each knife is crafted from sharp and durable triple-layered Japanese steel and magnetically affix to the solid beech wood stand, which helps keep them from getting dull.

Set includes The Stand, The 8″ Knife, The Serrated 6″ Knife, and The Almost 4″ Knife.

Having a “go-to knife set for the home chef” is an essential for any kitchen. Keefe is of the camp that “you only need three knives, max. Ever. The number one question I’m asked is, ‘What is the best knife?’ Or the question everyone is afraid to ask, ‘How do I sharpen my knife?’ These are cool knives. Japanese steel, delicious handle and a no-brainer/no-fail way to sharpen. Works for a seasoned pro and beginner alike.”

CorningWare French White Cast Aluminum 4-Quart Braiser with Lid

CorningWare, Non-Stick 4 Quart QuickHeat Braiser with Lid

Price: $43.23 • From: Amazon

Spring and summer wedding season is also here and Keefe said this makes a “perfect gift for a newlywed or to add to a registry” because it’s a classic. “Can use on the stovetop, oven or as serving. This screams chic and sophisticated and will last you a lifetime,” she said.

Instant Pot Pro Plus 6-Quart Smart Multi-Cooker

Instant Pot Pro Plus 6-quart Smart Multi-Cooker

Price: $199.95 • From: Amazon

For any home cooks who have yet to hop on the Instant Pot train, the time is now.

Keefe said this fully connected pressure cooker has over 800 plug and play recipes through the accompanying app that can wirelessly start your meal. “I also particularly love this model because it’s light weight and smaller making it do-able for city dwellers or those with smaller kitchens,” she explained.

Pyrex 8×12” Divide Glass Baking Dish

Pyrex Durable high-quality Divided Glass Baking Dish

Price: $16.97 • From: Walmart

Save time and space by cooking and serving two foods at the same time with this versatile divided glass baking dish. Reheating and clean-up are both simple since the Pyrex glass is microwave and dishwasher safe.

Keefe’s pick is “ideal for cooking for one to two [people] and entertaining a crowd,” she said. “I can’t think of anything cooler than being able to bake or roast something in one compartment and then doing something entirely different in the other. Think roast chicken and a few pieces of salmon or vegetables and side of roasted fruit for dessert. When using as a serving dish, elegantly divided compartments keep sauces and dressings separate ensuring the only thing that comingles are your guests.”

Sarah Wharton knows her way around test kitchens and culinary product trials. The senior editor and analyst of the Good Housekeeping Institute shared the following must-have tools.

2-Piece Cutting Board Set

Price: $23.99 • From: OXO

The OXO 2-Piece Cutting Board Set is a dynamic kitchen duo ideal for everyday meal prep.

“Spring vegetables mean lots of prep and veggies need room,” Wharton said. “I love this OXO Good Grips Carving Board. It has tons of space for trimming carrot tops or slicing the first garlic scapes. We also love OXO’s two-piece set with an Everyday Board and Prep Board; it was one of Good Housekeeping’s top picks for cutting boards.”

STOJO Collapsible Bowl – Sage Green

Price: $24.95 • From: Amazon

“These Stojo Bowls from our 2021 Kitchen Gear Awards have become my go-to for lunch salads. They collapse when you’re done, so they take up less space in your bag on the commute home — and in your cabinet at home,” Wharton said. “They’re easy to seal and they come in several pretty pastels that are perfect for spring.”

“I use my Dutch oven year-round. It’s great in spring for asparagus risotto or cooking down fruit for jam,” Wharton said. “And Le Creuset has launched a new shade that’s lovely for the season: olive. It looks like budding trees and tulip leaves. Le Creuset’s enameled cast iron cookware is a fave in the Good Housekeeping Institute Kitchen Appliances Lab, and its Dutch oven was a winner in our 2021 Kitchen Gear Awards as our pick for making hearty stews and soups due to its ability to heat evenly and retain heat well.”

Ninja CREAMi Ice Cream, Gelato & Sorbet Maker

Price: $179.99 • 30{d2b09b03d44633acb673e8080360919f91e60962656af8ade0305d5d8b7e4889} SavingsKohl’s

Original: $259.99

The Ninja CREAMi ice cream maker transforms frozen solid bases into ice cream, sorbets, milkshakes and more with the simple touch of a button. Ninja’s Creamify technology enables the CREAM to break down a uniformly frozen block into an incredibly smooth, creamy texture in minutes.

“This one’s just for fun since the days are getting a little warmer, and it’s another winner from our Kitchen Gear Awards. Our judges were impressed that the ice cream and gelato settings yielded different textures, even with the same recipe. The Ninja Creami comes with pint containers that you can fill with your base, freeze overnight and then churn in about five minutes,” she explained.

The internet’s favorite Italian-American, Brooklyn-based food blogger and recipe developer Dan Pelosi shared some of his top picks.

Sustainable cutting boards

Material reBoard

Price: $35.00 • From: Anthropologie

These colorful BPA-free cutting boards are made entirely of kitchen plastic scraps and renewable sugarcane. One small step for sustainability, one giant leap for kitchengoods.

“I use sustainably made cutting boards and I have them in every color,” Pelosi said of his first pick. “Color is important to me in my home, but so is functionality. When the two are perfectly combined, I am delighted.”

Mikasa Lazy Susan Serving Tray

Price: $79.99 • 11{d2b09b03d44633acb673e8080360919f91e60962656af8ade0305d5d8b7e4889} SavingsKohl’s

Original: $89.99

“I need my go-to cooking ingredients at arm’s length while I am developing recipes, but I don’t want them to run free all over the kitchen,” Pelosi explained. “This countertop lazy susan is very at-home on my counter, spinning around all day as I grab all my go-tos with ease but no mess.”

“The number one question I get from people making my recipes is about cook times. I always ask people: ‘do you have an oven thermometer?’ Recipes are written to accurate oven temperatures and unfortunately almost no oven is the temperature you think it is,” Pelosi advised. “An oven thermometer inside your oven is a must for knowing your oven temperature.”

Bee’s Wrap Reusable Food Wraps

Bee’s Wrap Reusable Beeswax Wraps, Set Of 3

Price: $14.46 • 19{d2b09b03d44633acb673e8080360919f91e60962656af8ade0305d5d8b7e4889} SavingsSur La Table

Original: $18

Whether you’re storing a lemon half, wrapping baked goods or covering a bowl, this assorted set provides you with the essentials for keeping your food fresh. A sustainable, natural alternative to plastic wrap, these beeswax wraps make it easy for you to make the shift away from disposable food storage.

Get sustainable for spring with the these wax wraps “for keeping food fresh and cutting down on waste.”

“I keep my favorite loaves of bread wrapped in these in my cabinet, cut vegetables covered in my counter, and leftovers stored in my fridge,” he said. “They are so versatile, colorful, and last forever.”

Jenna Helwig, “Bare Minimum Dinners” cookbook author and Food Director at Real Simple, shared a few of her favorites for spring and beyond in the kitchen.

Colony Co. Five-Pack Large Reusable Produce Bags

Price: $18.95 • From: Amazon

“Spring means it’s time to resume my weekly trips to the farmer’s market. To reduce my plastic usage, I bring these reusable produce bags,” she shared.

Fortessa Jupiter 13-Inch Cake Stand in Cornflower

Price: $31.99 • 20{d2b09b03d44633acb673e8080360919f91e60962656af8ade0305d5d8b7e4889} SavingsBed Bath & Beyond

Original: $39.99

Get additional savings as a Beyond + member.

“Sure, cake stands are good for cakes, but also for serving muffins, cupcakes, tarts, and pies … basically anything that deserves to be on a literal pedestal,” Helwig said. “If I lived in a bigger apartment I would have a collection of them, including this retro-chic and relatively inexpensive one.”

An earlier version of this story was first published on April 21, 2022.

January 8, 2023

CES’ Best Kitchen Tech: A Fridge Fit for a Party, Smart Cutting Boards and AI Ovens

The kitchen of the future is here. LG released a fascinating, color-changing party fridge this week at CES in Las Vegas, while GE Profile dropped a $1,000 smart stand mixer. And that was just the start of kitchen innovations unveiled at the world’s biggest consumer tech show, which returned in true prepandemic form this year.

Smartphones, TVs
and cars often make the most noise at CES, but there are also always some notable home and kitchen innovations to peruse. This year has been no exception, with updates on some of our favorite kitchen tools and a few new gadgets and gizmos that aim to revolutionize how we all slice, dice, mix, simmer and sear.

Though the mixer’s high price means most of us won’t be rushing out to buy this Wi-Fi-enabled baking buddy, a few very intelligent additions to the mixer — including a genius built-in scale — make it a worthy candidate for best CES kitchen tech for 2023.

Below are all the biggest and best CES smart kitchen and cooking tech announcements so far.

Read more: The most important tech trends we saw at CES 2023.

GE Profile Smart Mixer

A stand mixer with serious smarts

KitchenAid has had the market cornered on stand mixers, but GE Profile’s latest entry into the category has raised more than a few eyebrows. The smart mixer features a built-in scale for nailing recipe measurements. It also has Auto-Sense technology which helps the machine determine when something is finished mixing or needs more oomph, especially when working through a guided recipe.

Speaking of guided recipes, the GE Profile syncs up with the app to help you navigate dozens of recipes from measuring the ingredients all the way through to the mixing part. CNET’s Jessica Dolcourt got to try it and it just might be her favorite thing from all of CES 2023.

Read more about the GE Profile stand mixer here.

LG’s MoodUp Color-Changing Fridge

Finally, a fridge for party people

When 2023 began just days ago, I didn’t know I’d need a fridge that changes colors with the tap of a button and syncs with my music — but here we are. Yes, LG’s MoodUp fridge is flashy, and most of its features are completely superfluous, but not all of them.

Consider Instaview knock-to-view technology, which is not totally new but makes it so one of the front fridge-side panels becomes transparent when you nudge it, letting you see what’s inside without opening. Oh, and the fridge can sense you coming in the middle of the night, and offers some gentle light via one of the panels so you don’t step in the dog’s water while sneaking 2 a.m. bites of cheesecake.

This one will be pricey but, honestly, we’re starting to see the appeal. Read more about the LG MoodUp here.

Samsung

Samsung’s AI Wall Oven

The robots are cooking

Samsung’s new AI Wall Oven, introduced at CES 2023, is equipped with an internal camera and technology that lets you send a view of the inside of your oven straight to social media. The AI Pro Cooking algorithm can recognize up to 80 dishes and recommend an appropriate temperature, time and cooking mode, then send notifications to help prevent your food from burning.

Read more about Samsung’s new AI oven here.

Kaltech

Kaltech Fresh Food Keeper

The end of moldy bread and stale bagels?

Keeping nonrefrigerated fresh food from getting stale and growing mold has always been a problem, and the kitchen innovators at Japan’s Kaltech think they’ve unlocked an answer. The tech-forward breadbox is electric-powered and uses photocatalysis, a chemical procedure sometimes used in the decontamination of water, to keep bread and produce fresh for longer.

We have yet to test the $315 Fresh Food Keeper, which naturally has to be done over a period of a few days, but we’re on it and will report back with findings soon.

Brava

Brava Glass

The pricey smart oven finally gets a glass door

We like the Brava just fine, but its eye-popping price makes it hard to recommend. And this latest drop from Brava will drain even more coin from your bank account.

The new $2,000 Brava Glass, which the company unveiled at CES, has all the trappings of the original $1,300 model, including the ability to air-fry, roast, bake, broil, toast, reheat, slow-cook and warm, with the addition of a glass front door so you can see the food as it cooks. Previously, food sizzling away in the Brava could only be viewed via your phone by way of a camera housed inside the cooking chamber.

Read more about the new Brava Glass smart oven here.

Blok

Smart Cutting Boards

A new smart kitchen category makes its debut

Two smart cutting boards made their CES debuts this year, adding to a long list of kitchen tools that have been smartified.

The Blok is a snazzy and expensive walnut board with a detachable screen meant to beam in live or recorded cooking videos so you can work through dishes without having to look up at a tablet. It’s awfully nice to look at, but we’re not sure it’s worth the $799 upfront cost, plus a $39 monthly subscription.

A more practical version is the Versaware Smart Cutting Board. We don’t have pricing info yet, but we sure hope it will be less than the Blok. This gadget-y cutting board features a smaller, more manageable screen that is fixed to the bottom corner and walks you through recipes, providing useful information about technique, calories and nutrition.

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Read more: Cutting-Edge TVs to Get Excited About at CES

September 29, 2022

7 Kitchen Gadgets That Make Cutting Vegetables Faster and Easier

We’re going to let you in on a little secret: the key to boosting your vegetable intake is always convenience—the easier it is to eat them, the greater the chances that you actually will. For example, you’re far more likely to snack on some carrots if they’re already cut up, or toss some kale into your smoothie if it’s already chopped. That’s why we recommend investing in some kitchen gadgets that make cutting vegetables fast and easy. Not only can they make slicing, dicing, and chopping veggies hassle-free, but in the process, they just may help you to eat more veggies.

With so many kitchen tools available, though, it can be tough to discern which ones are worth your hard-earned money. Fortunately, we rounded up some of our favorites. Whether you’re prepping a one-pan dinner for your family or a quick lunch salad for one, the following essential kitchen gadgets will help you cut up vegetables in a pinch.

Then, for more cooking tips check out The 9 Kitchen Tools Every Beginner Cook Needs.

Spiralizer Seven-Blade Vegetable Slicer

Having trouble getting your kids to eat their veggies? Or just looking for a way to shake up your vegetable prep? Try using a spiralizer. This ultra-versatile slicer comes with a variety of different blades for slicing everything from zucchini and carrots to sweet potatoes and butternut squash into shredded strands, wide ribbons, or long, spaghetti-like noddles.

And using it is super simple, too. Just insert your chosen vegetable into the device and turn the handle to spiralize it.

Need some meal inspo? This product also comes with an e-book filled with nutritious and delicious spiralizer recipes to get you started.

$26.97 at Amazon

Buy Now

Progressive International Zip Slicer

If you’ve ever tried to chop cherry or grape tomatoes, only to get juice squirted into your eye, try this handy gadget for a mess-free alternative.

Just load your tomatoes into the tube, zip the handle, and voilà—all of them will be cleanly sliced in half. As an added safety bonus, there’s a stopper at the end of the device and the blade is protected, meaning you don’t have to worry about your children helping out while you prep dinner.

$20 at Amazon

Buy Now

LENK Vegetable Cutter Shapes Set

Let’s be real, your kids are way more likely to eat something if it comes in a fun shape. That’s where these unique vegetable cutters come in. With a range of heart, star, animal, and flower shapes, they can be used to cut carrots, cucumbers, beets, and so much more. They also double as fruit and cookie cutters, too.

Thanks to the sturdy stainless steel design, they’re super easy to use. Just press one of the molds on your chosen veggie to cut out the desired shape. Plus, they’re reusable, dishwasher-safe, and a breeze to clean.

Don’t be surprised if your kids want to get in on the fun and cut up their own veggies to pack for school lunches. Anything to make your life easier, right?

$9.99 at Amazon

Buy Now

Mueller Multi Blade Adjustable Mandoline

You might be surprised at just how often a mandoline comes in handy—since it allows you to achieve thin, even slices, it’s the key to potatoes gratin, homemade coleslaw, and so much more.

This one stands out for several reasons: it’s fully adjustable, features five interchangeable ultra-sharp stainless steel blades, and is made with non-toxic plastic. Since you can adjust the thickness settings with an easy thumb dial control, it’s versatile enough to serve as a vegetable peeler, onion cutter, and garlic chopper all in one.

$29.97 at Amazon

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Hamilton Beach Electric Vegetable Chopper&Mini Food Processor

A good food processor is an invaluable time saver because it can dice, chop, or even mash veggies in an instant. And if you don’t have the counter space (or the budget) for a full-size version, consider this affordable mini chopper, which is a tad easier to store but still super powerful thanks to a 350-watt motor.

Compact, quick to assemble, and easy to clean with a dishwasher-safe bowl, it’s sure to simplify the process of whipping up any recipe, like when you want to chop an onion without those dreaded tears. You can even use it to quickly mash up some fresh herbs. The best part? It won’t take up a ton of valuable counter space.

$27.99 at Amazon

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YD YD XINHUA Kitchen Food Cutter Chopper Clever Kitchen Knife with Cutting Board

If salads are a staple in your household, this handy two-in-one gadget is a must. It streamlines the process of chopping veggies while also cutting down on how many dishes you’ll have to clean. All you have to do is hold your chosen vegetable against the built-in cutting board and press the blade downward in a scissor-like cutting motion.

This tool is suitable for a wide range of vegetables, from carrots and onions to celery, tomatoes, carrots, and mushrooms. But you can use it for fruit, meat, cheese, and bread, too.

A locking safety hinge helps to prevent accidental cuts, the sturdy stainless steel blade promises easy chopping, and the plastic handle boasts a comfortable grip. You can also save space by hanging this tool on your kitchen wall, or on a hook inside a cabinet. Plus, since it’s small and lightweight, it’s easy to transport for road trips and picnics.

$11.99 at Amazon

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Vidalia Chop Wizard Pro Max

Imagine if you could chop an entire onion or eight garlic cloves in one second flat. Well, with his super versatile tool, that’s totally possible. The Vidalia Chop Wizard Pro Max dices, slices, and chops your veggies with ease, and it comes with three interchangeable blades, depending on how small or large you want to cut your veggies.

Use it to dice peppers and tomatoes for salsas and salads, cut potatoes for homemade French fries, or chop carrots and celery for stews—the possibilities are truly endless. Just place any vegetable (or fruit) onto the blades, close the lid, press down, and watch the chopped veggies empty right into the plastic receptacle that’s attached.

Another benefit is that the container doubles as a measuring cup, and contains an opening for you to easily pour your veggies right into a pan or pot. And when you’re done, the silicone lift tab magically removes any leftover pieces and debris, and the Chop Wizard can be placed right in the dishwasher.

$34.95 at Amazon

Buy Now