Recently, Jeanne asked about equipping a tiny, minimalist kitchen. She wrote, “Most recently I’ve been thinking more about my kitchen (talk about minimalist, it’s so so small) and what I’d like to invest in next. Weighing pros and cons of a cast iron pan, but I don’t yet have experience cooking with one. You use one often in your videos, maybe you’d like to weigh in.” And while she asked most specifically about cast iron pans, which I love and use with nearly every meal from roasts to cakes, I thought it might be a good opportunity to address kitchen essentials and must-haves for minimalist kitchens.
So if you’re tight on space, you can skip the food processor for a good knife set, ditch the stand mixer for a mixing bowl and a couple of wooden spoons and settle in with these ten kitchen essentials. Stock pots and sauce pans, a good cutting board and Dutch oven and, of course, a cast iron skillet. Ten simple items for a simple kitchen
 |
A Scaled-down Knife SetSure, it’s easy to fall for inexpensive knife sets (and I have – think 22 pieces for $13.99 at Ross), but if you’re serious about preparing home-cooked real food from scratch (and you are, right? I mean why else would you be reading Nourished Kitchen), then you need a good quality knife set. In reality, while extensive knife collections are fun, you’ll only ever really use a few knifes in set. All you really need is a good chef’s knife, a utility knife, a paring knife which can double for a peeler and a pair of kitchen shears which are particularly helpful in preparing meats for roasting and other tasks where regular scissors just don’t do. Everything else is just fluff.
|
 |
A Cutting BoardAnd if you’re going to get knives, you need to get a good cutting board. I’m partial to a nice, solid bamboo cutting board. We have three actually (my kitchen is most definitely not a minimalist kitchen): a large bamboo cutting board, a very small bamboo cutting board and a teeny bamboo cutting board for our mezzaluna. You really only need one of a decent size. I don’t particularly care for the noisy clink-clink-thud that comes from chopping vegetables or meat on a glass or ceramic cutting board, and I love the feel and heft of a solid wood cutting board and think that bamboo makes an excellent, and very attractive, choice.
|
 |
A Cast-iron SkilletIf there is one piece in my kitchen that gets used more than any other it is, undoubtedly, my 12-inch cast iron skillet (I also have a 15-inch). Seriously, it’s sometimes used three times a day: in the morning for frying pastured eggs and bacon, at noon for grilling a sandwich and at supper for roasting meats or braising vegetables. It is the single-most important piece in my kitchen. I prefer to cook in cast iron (though I also use stainless steel) for many reasons but primarily because it provides superb heat conduction, is easy to clean and can go from the range to the oven without a problem making it remarkably versatile and minimizing dirty dishes. If you can afford enameled cast iron, it certainly makes a superb choice but most of us can get by with plain, old non-enameled cast iron.
|
 |
A Stock PotTraditional cuisines, all across the globe, made heavy use of bones for nutrient- and mineral-rich stocks and broths, and in our kitchen we make a lot of stocks and broths (like chicken feet stock, fresh chicken broth, roast chicken stock and beef stock). In fact we make stock at least weekly and use it daily – and in the winter time, almost at every meal. Stock pots can also be used to prepare pasta, pilafs, stews, soups, curries and other warm, filling and unctuous dishes. I use an 8-gallon stock pot, though you can purchase large or smaller pots.
|
 |
A Sauce PanYou’ll also need a small sauce pot for making sauces, heating soups, making compotes and for preparing cooked vegetables. We make a lot of sauces in our home: reduction sauces and gravies for roast meats, custards for ice cream and other desserts. I use a stainless steel sauce pan and would strongly encourage you to avoid non-stick cookware.
|
 |
A Mixing Bowl SetWhile you can potentially mix ingredients for batter, sauces and egg dishes together in a soup bowl or even a sauce pan, a 3-piece mixing bowl set can make things a lot easier. When preparing elaborate meals, they can also help to organize prepped ingredients. In our home, we have a 8-bowl nested ceramic mixing bowl set that I love, and while 8 individual mixing bowls might be a little too much for a minimalist kitchen, certainly a set of three can help tighten the kitchen. If you purchase ceramic mixing bowls, they can serve the dual purpose of mixing bowl and serving dish.
|
 |
A Couple Wooden SpoonsYou’ll also need a couple of wooden spoons for mixing ingredients and stirring sauces. While at the bare minimum one spoon will do, if you plan to prepare multiple dishes simultaneously as for a Thanksgiving supper, a set of three to five will certainly help. A set of at least two will eliminate the need for salad claws, and we use our wooden spoons in preparing almost every meal. Wooden spoons can vary in price, with the beautifully and richly striated olive wood coming in as the most expensive, followed by bamboo and then by plain wood.
|
 |
A WhiskYou’ll also need a wire whisk for beating eggs, whisking sauces, cream and egg whites for dishes like molasses custard and hollandaise sauce and definitely for making mayonnaise without a blender or food processor.
|
 |
A Clay Baker or Dutch OvenExcellent for roasting chickens (like minimalist roast chicken), stews or even for baking artisan-style sourdough breads, clay bakers and dutch ovens can greatly enhance foods cooked in the oven and, in our kitchen, we rely on these pieces of cookware very heavily. Breads baked in Dutch ovens and clay bakers produce a striking crust and a wonderfully soft crumb; roasted chickens brown beautifully while cassoulets and dishes of roast meat become tender and decadent.
|
 |
A Baking StoneDitch flimsy baking sheets for something more durable like a baking stone which can yield a beautiful crust to pizzas, breads, foccacia as well as baking lovely cookies like whole grain cinnamon molasses cookies. A well-seasoned baking stone has a virtually non-stick surface without the chemical dangers associated with Teflon. We purchased our baking stone used from a pizza joint that was going out of business and we love its reliability. Best of all, they can be stored in the oven itself which helps to maximize space in tiny kitchens.
|
Do you have a suggestion for stocking a minimalist kitchen? What are you favorite tools and essential kitchen items. Or if you have a question for Nourished Kitchen, email me.
THANK you! I’ve been railing against all the appliances ever since I heard a lecture by a very earnest “locavore” promoting no fewer than 9 appliances large and small, 7 of which she owned, to have a “sustainable” menu. *What* are they sustaining, again?
That is very intriguing. Putting together this post really has me thinking about ways I could downsize my own kitchen. I’m not really one for lots of gadgets and just roll my eyes at all the single-use electrical kitchen appliances out there, but after putting this together I realize I could downsize even further.
Thanks for this article! Great resource – now I only wish I had it 6 years ago for my registry!!
Lovely list. I would replace the utility knife (never use one) with a serrated bread knife. It’s hard to believe how much can be done with just one big chef’s knife until you start putting some serious miles on it!
Cast iron: thrift stores, garage sales and even antique stores are excellent sources for less expensive yet top quality pans. I just bought two last week, a 10″ for $10 and a 12″ for $15, both of which have the lovely silky smooth interior of older pans. They were quite ‘gunky’ but my oven needed cleaning anyway so I just threw the skillets in for the self-cleaning cycle and they came out like brand new. Literally.
That is *so* funny. I couldn’t decide whether I should include the bread knife or the utility knife. We use a utility knife more than a bread knife though, and I figured bread could be torn rather than cut, but it was *really* close.
I also love buying secondhand items. In fact, we did the compact for a long, long time – while I was never able to find a cast iron skillet secondhand, I did find loads of other goodies. All my dishes, for example. Why buy new when you can get it secondhand?
When I read over the list I thought, “I dunno, I use my bread knife a lot!” But I don’t think I could trade out one of the other knives for it. I love having the right tools for the job, like cutting a tomato with a tomato knife, however I could live without it.
I know this is going to seem like anti-minimalist, but as a practicing minimalist in my own kitchen, I would have to add a Vitamix to the list. I use mine constantly to do many every day chopping tasks, (and I have a nice set of wustoff knives, just like you shared.) I find that it really does make it easier to do all those tasks that go with the nourished lifestyle. I find it esp helpful in making sprouted grain bread. I use the dry container and can turn it out in no time. Not to mention the smoothies, sauces, salsas, etc that I can quickly whip out to feed my family and guests. And the last thing I will mention is the ability to make gourmet quality frozen desserts that are totally natural and healthy. (and simple!)
I actually don’t have a VitaMix (the price tag makes me want to faint.
), and we hardly use the secondhand blender we do have, but you’ve really got me intrigued. So, it’s really worth the price? I’d pick one up if I *knew* it was worth it, you know?
I keep reading about buying a Vitamix or a Blendtec too. A friend of mine says it is the most used appliance in her home, that she cannot live without. Again, I’m with you. I just cannot get over the price tag. I’m going to go look, but if you haven’t already, I’d love your opinion on appliances in the kitchen, too.
I do use my VitaMix almost daily – sometimes multiple times a day. It beautifully blends bean dips, whips up mayonnaise, churns butter, grinds grain, creates green smoothies with ease… We bought ours when our son was just 2 months old and it has been the most-used item in my kitchen for the past 3 1/2 years. The price tag was a *gulp* – I admit! But I can hardly imagine how much more time I would have spent preparing nourishing foods without it (or the things I wouldn’t have done if I didn’t have it).
I have the blendtec and LOVE it. I wondered if I would get enough use of it, but we use it for so much more than I originally thought we would and it is fabulous to have an industrial blender!
How do you season a baking stone? Since going gluten free, ours gets very little use, and I always used to clean it off after use, so it looks pretty new, even though it lives full time in our oven (for years, lol). Do they season like cast iron and become nonstick the same way?? Suddenly I feel like I might have an unknown treasure in my oven.
They season slowly as you bake greasy things like cookies on them. Or you can speed it up by rubbing in an oil or fat and warming them up in the oven, then wiping them down, just like cast iron.
I love this list! I’m in the stage in my life where I’m slowly, but surely investing in long-lasting, low-tech items for my kitchen, as I can afford them and this is a great checklist of cooking essentials to use as a guide. Thanks for posting it!
I agree with Xan about keeping the appliances to a minimum. However, one that I can’t live without is my toaster oven. 9 times out of 10, it keeps me from having to turn on my oven. It’s like an EasyBake Oven for grown-ups.
Also, I came across my set of three cast iron skillets at Marshalls a few years back at a steal–I think they were about $30 total. Ross, Marshalls, Bells, TJ Maxx–those places require you to sift through lots of useless crap, but I think it’s worth browsing through there at least once a month, when they randomly have a diamond in the rough.
I pretty much need my grain grinder, but in order to make it sustainable, I would probably say that a hand crank one would be good to have.
A cast-iron skillet sounds like something I should get. I’ve never cooked with one, but I’m trying to transition away from non-stick cookware and that would be one step.
I was surprised to see a whisk in the list. I would think that if you’re really trying to pare down, a fork can replace a whisk in a lot of uses, and it’s much much easier to clean. I haven’t used a whisk to beat eggs in years.
You know … I had a hard time deciding whether or not to include a whisk, since, like you wrote, a fork will do in most cases but opted to include it because nothing compares to a whisk for whipping cream or egg whites.
My kitchen is quite tiny so I’ve always kept few appliances. However, I finally broke down and got a full size food processor because there were so many beautiful soup recipes that called for it. Now I’m really glad that I got it. As for smoothies or blended things, a really small one touch blender has been perfect and easily stored.
Thank for the great tips on this one! I love cruisin’ around TJMaxx and Home Goods for kitchen stuff, I have found some great deals there on the very items you discussed. Usually anywhere from 30-75% off. I also like to hit the Le Creuset outlet stores for deals as well. I highly recommend the items you suggested especially the Le Creuset French Oven and although pricy it is well worth the investment. Another good item that I love to make Gumbo or Paella is the Le Creuset Braiser ( copy and paste into your browser) love it for these dishes.
http://www.lecreuset.com/en-us/Products/Enameled-Cast-Iron/Braisers/Braiser-5-qt/
The whisk I love above all others: The WMF flat ball whisk. I also have the round ball whisk which I really don’t like.
http://www.cookswarehouse.com/productcart/pc/WMF-Whisks-10-inch-Flat-Ball-Whisk-187p1352.htm
I’d also advocate a copper bowl if you can find one. It can double as the top half of a double-boiler and is the perfect thing for making mayo.
If you’re going to have good knives you have to have a steel or a sharpening stone.
At the top of my list of electronic gadgets- above the kitchenaid even- is my rice cooker. It has a timer so you can soak then start it automatically, you can have breakfast oatmeal ready when you wake up – it was worth every penny. I think my second blog post ever was an ode to my kitchen gadgets and that one steals the show.
My most-used items: cast-iron skillet, pancake turner, whisk, cutting board, chef’s knife, measuring cup (8-cup), mixing bowls. Next most important: wheat grinder and Bosch mixer (for bread). Moving overseas made me look hard at what I really use.
Another minimalist gadget that I rreally need is a good fat seperator. I like to make stock, etc, and it really makes the process easy.
What a great post, Jenny, thanks! I’m honored that you chose to elaborate on my question. I found my self “seconding” lots of the comments so far, too – from wishing I’d known something more about these essentials before my wedding (10 years ago and counting), to admitting that I too have rejected a lot of gadgets but splurged on others – including a food processor (essentially for veggie purees), a rice cooker, and *gasp* an electric griddle. I love pancakes, but I hate standing at the stove over a small pan while everyone else eats! Talk about a space hog though. There’s an ice cream maker in the cupboard too, for making the BEST raw cream ice cream in the universe. Definitely a keeper. The other things that take up space in my small kitchen include a growing colony of glass jars (they’re responsible for ousting the toaster oven), and Pyrex containers for fridge storage and lunches.
My not-so-secret heart’s desire is to have a professional grade stand mixer. But I haven’t the space in the kitchen, and the dining room is, I think, off limits for such things (I think my DH might have bought me one otherwise
). I imagine my waistline is better off too, given what I’d use it for. So I think I’ll see if I can’t find the space for some cast iron pans and a clay baker. I love baking bread, and a clay baker sounds fabulous!
As for additions to the minimalist short list, I LOVE my bread knife! It was a gift long ago, and now I feel lucky to have one. And I have to say that an immersion blender is on my short list too. Maybe I can wedge one in next to the Pyrex!
I realize this was supposed to be about making my small kitchen LESS crowded (and to be sure, there are things that really should go). But I think the things I keep, crowded as it seems, reflect the recipes and whole foods I love making most, and choices I’ve made about what and how I cook. The next thing to go? Probably the microwave, rarely used anymore, which is (don’t laugh) in the dining room.
Cracker Barrel has nice cast iron skillets for really inexpensive!!!