christine-murphy dot net

A couple of cool kitchen gadgets…

Now, this may not look like a kitchen gadget at first glance. But if you are a fan of Alton Brown and his TV show, Good Eats, you probably do see something from a hardware store as something used in the kitchen.

This is a pair of metal snips, similar to what I have, only the blades on mine are a little longer. Why pay a fortune for a pair of so-called *poultry shears*, when you can get this much more functional item for about ten bucks at Home Depot or Lowe’s?

They do a FAR better job when cutting up chickens and other poultry than those wussy *poultry shears* do.

You can save money by buying whole chickens and dissecting them yourself. An added bonus are the bones, which of course you save and use to make stock. Also, these come in handy if you want to cut apart leg quarters. These often come with a hunk of backbone attached, and these shears make easy work of removing that. The leg quarters are often cheaper than buying separate drumsticks and thighs, sometimes so much cheaper that it is worth it to do a little surgery at home to make them into good serving sizes.

Another item you might find useful is this set of dough presses. You can use them to make all sorts of little pillows filled with tasty stuff…dumplings, ravioli, and even sweet treats. When open, the reverse side serves as a dough cutter, to cut the dough into the exact size you need. Then you place the round of dough on the crimpy side, put in the filling of choice, and fold. And voila! It looks all nice and crimped and sealed completely!

This is something that you can probably find online, as well as in any good kitchen store.  They re very inexpensive…a set like this costs less than ten bucks, and you can do so  much with it!

I’ll be posting more of my favorite cool kitchen gadgets in the future, so stay tuned!