When you're an avid baker there are all sorts of seemingly indispensable toys - heavy-duty mixer, marble rolling pin, pans in fancy shapes.
But there are usually one or two things that truly are indispensable or that you reach for over and over again. We'll be looking at our picks for best baking tools throughout this week but first we want to ask - what's the best tool in your baking arsenal?
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Comments (24)
My KitchenAid mixer.
2nd that--KitchenAid
I love my little lemon zester.
I love my silpat.
toothpicks!
A small, heat resistant spatula that I've had for 10 years. Lots of spatulas have handles that are too big for my hands, or heads that are too wide to get around the bump in the bottom of the KitchenAid bowl. When I'm up to my elbows in meringue, I don't need that kind of drama.
No question - my KitchenAid stand mixer.
I'd be at a loss with baking without my Kitchen Aid mixer. My handheld mixer just does not cut it. I also love this super sturdy spatula from Williams Sonoma I just recieved as a gift. It makes mixing and scraping so much easier, I wish I had ditched my crappy ones years ago. But to mention something no one else has, I find parchament paper handy in so many ways when baking, especially to cut down on messes.
My first thought was parchment paper. It's one of those simple things that everyone can afford that also makes baking a lot easier.
I second the silicone spatula. I had a Pyrex version that I loved, perhaps too hard, since the handle recently snapped. I ordered an OXO version that arrived the other day but the handle is a lot thicker making it unweildy. I will try to break this one faster...
Kitchen Aid Mixer.
My stacked cooling rack from King Arthur (item 4083). I have a small kitchen and this helps me deal with multiple cookie sheets when baking (or drying pasta).
My huge, old fashioned ceramic mixing bowl and big wooden spoon with one side that's worn down. These basics are really the only indispensibles.
cookie cooling racks I got at the Dollar Tree store. They are fantastic and smaller enough to tuck away into a side cabinet.
Silpat mats.
#1 KitchenAid stand mixer
#2 Chef's Knife
My pastry cloth. Second place? French rolling pin.
I love my microplane grater. It's inexpensive and it makes heavenly citrus zest. I happen to use zest quite often in baking. It's also fab for grating hard cheeses like parm. I always used to shred my knuckles on graters, but no more!
silpat and silicon spatulas.
My microplane and chef's knife are very useful kitchen items, but I wouldn't describe them as "baking tools".
a cheap and old rubber spatula that has somehow weathered years of baking and possible overheating. i recently got some new le creuset high heat-resistant silicone spatulas, but i still like my old one because it's thinner and easier to use to clean-scrape bowls.
My oven thermometer. Seriously.
So hard to choose - they're like children. Is that sad?
Anyway. I love my mario batali spatula to pieces, so I'll choose that. Sorry, my lovely kitchenaid and silpat mats...
I'm with you cremarie - too hard to choose. Kitchenaid, parchment paper, the oxo measuring cup you can look down into, remote timer (as I burn too many cookies), the pie guide that I roll out dough on