Examples:
Cast-iron skillet - hand-me-down from first roommate Hylton
Le Creuset Braiser - hand-me-down/bribe for helping Hylton move his couch down the stairs.
Everyday sautee pan with glass lid - Christmas gift.
Dutch Oven, 2 Saucepots - Hand-me-down from mom and dad's old t-fal set.
Stockpot - hand-me-down from Hylton again.
All-Clad small saucepot - Hand-me-down from Hylton
Cake tins, pie plates, baking dishes - gifts/hand-me-downs.
I love hand-me-downs. I love dishes that tell a story. But at some point, you have to stop cooking in your mom's old T-Fal and branch out. Someday you deserve a matching set. Or... you start to want a matching set. Which is more to the point.
And someday, because you think you're a bit of a cook, you decide that instead of more non-stick, more special utensils, you want to get stainless. You decide that you want to be able to cook at screaming high heats, and pre-heat your pans to smoking, and generally be a badass, not to mention the novel concept of being able to go stove to oven to table without having to use aluminum foil on the handles of your cookware. And by you, I mean I.
And so you get a little adventurous. You start looking at Amazon, and find the set of your dreams (at least until you can register for a wedding and have people buy you the real set of your dreams..... helloooooo, lover) and you start to think.
Hellooooo, lover.This set is from Cuisinart. I have a soft spot for Cuisinart, since it's the brand of my lovely food processor, and my amazing grind-and-brew coffee maker that you can program to make coffee right as the alarm goes off in the morning. Swoon.
I'm kind of sunk.
This set is very affordable. Has great product reviews.
For a while, I flirted with the idea of the Rachael Ray stainless set.... with its adorable chubby, curvy saucepots, and its cute orange silicon handles. But then I started reading reviews. And the last thing I really need is stainless steel saucepots that leak at the rivets. Because as adorable as this thing is, and honestly if it had cheeks, I'd want to pinch them, I need stuff that will hold up under the demands and stresses of my kitchen. Demands and stresses like, "Shit I forgot to melt the butter, now I have to jack up the heat", or "Shit, I don't know the diference between simmer and boil so I'm going to hope for the best" or things of that nature.These things happen.
So I'm pining. And thinking. About the day that I have a set of brand-new, 18/10, oven-safe no matter what, non-teflon-coated stainless steel cookware. And how the first thing I'm gonna do is go after that medium saucepot with a whisk. Or maybe I'll get myself a metal spatula, and flip a pancake in that big skillet. Hehehehe.
I'm keeping the cast iron, Le Creuset, and the nonstick skillets Gie gave me, though, so keep your paws off. HEAR ME?!?!!?
the teflon on my 2 year old wedding cookware is starting to flake in my food. overuse / well loved or just bad choice of selection. i'm craving stainless, too. until then i'll keep slowly ingesting the bllack flakes of death.
ReplyDelete*LUST*
ReplyDeleteAbout a month after I moved into my studio, my kitchen earned the nickname "Money Pit." (Reasoning should be self-explanatory.)
ReplyDeleteEvery time I think I have enough kitchenware, something else comes up. (I desperately want one of those gorgeous German surgical-steel mandolines. And I keep buying ceramic baking dishes because I never seem to have one that's the right shape/size for whatever it is that I'm cooking.) I occasionally contemplate marriage - for the sake of the wedding registry.
Btw, if you're looking for a nonstick non-Teflon pan, there's a brand (Swiss Diamond) that's apparently coated in diamond dust. It sounds ridiculous, and the pans are expensive, (I have an 8-inch pan, bought on sale for $50), but they're worth every penny. You can use a metal spatula on them, you can clean them with a sponge and detergent, and they are very nonstick - food residue pretty much flakes right off.