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ginger can be a pain, we do a lot of indian cooking in our house and ginger is prominent in many recipies, sometimes 2-3 tablespoons, which the larger half of those minuscule 4.25 oz jars most stores carry. My tip is to go to an indian or other asian market/grocery store and see if the carry the large jars of minced ginger. I have 32 oz jar of ginger in my fridge and it was only about $16. Which really is not bad for the convenience and how long it lasts. Plus the jar is a great size to save and reuse for other things!

I like to use the fresh ginger root when I can as the flavor is better and fresher but the jar stuff is great for quick weeknight meals.

I too love ginger and have my limits. So I grate it instead of mincing! The flavor is even more potently gingery. Plus, if you want to avoid the stringy fibers, just use a ginger grater. (If you want them for some reason, use a microplane.)

Cook's Illustrated had a good article on this very point. http://www.cooksillustrated.com/equipment/overview.asp?docid=10440

I'm with you on washing lettuce. I also don't like peeling citrus fruits, although I love eating them.

I have never thought of wasing lettuce as a pain. I LOVE spinners, too. Here is what I do. I put the chopped, unwashed lettuce in the spinner, fill it halfway with water. Swish with my hands. Dump the water from the spinner, rince with some clean water and then spin.

As for it being 1 use - i use it as a colander to wash/rinse all my produce, so a spinner isn't really unitasker for me. It does take up a lot of space.

As for what I dread - I HATE HATE HATE touching poultry. The texture of raw meat is disgusting, but chicken is the worst. and then I get all scared about the bacteria and germs. I was my hands so much they get chapped. I also hate cleaning the sink strainer after washing dishes. GAG

I really hate fine-dicing anything - especially carrots. I keep my knives sharp and know *how*, I just cut myself every single time.

This might just be me being a baby, but I always dread garlic, which sucks because I use it all the time and will never avoid it because I love it so much. And I know all the tricks, it's just that I have to choose between racking my nerves as I mince with a knife trying to avoid mincing my fingers or getting garlic flying all over the place while making sure it's all an even texture OR pushing it through a garlic press which is just as onerous to clean.

Definitely grate the ginger instead of mincing - and graters come in all sizes and widths, so you can pretty close to minced ginger. Coming from an Indian family that cooks Indian food most night, grating ginger (and using a mortar and pestle for garlic) is the only way to go!

Frying and deep frying.

Cleaning up after things like frying and deep frying.

Vegetables that need a lot of prep-work (salads definitely count in this!)

Washing lettuce, hands-down.

You can also put ginger in a garlic press instead of mincing it.

Ratzen fratzen frickin neffen getting the dirt out of all the tiny itsy bitsy teeny corners of morels.

I'm off favas. Not worth it. And I'm another ginger microplaner.

Holy God, I thought I was the only one who had a weird pet peeve about cleaning lettuce.

I also hated cleaning lettuce, and used to never make salads at home--until I got a salad spinner! One of my most worthwhile kitchen purchases. And as someone else noted above, it's useful for other produce-washing. I find it especially handy for cleaning leeks, which are SO dirty--I cut them up first and then run them through the spinner. Now I use leeks all the time, which I never would have in the past.

the salad spinner is not a unitasker!

it is also a salad storer!!! i swear, my lettuce lasts hella long if i store it in the spinner.

so, two purposes in the spinner's life :)

cleaning the cast iron skillets without washing off the patina. they are heavy and annoying.
But they cook SO WELL, so I deal.

Also have no problems with ginger or daily salads- I use the microplane for ginger and the spinner for salad, herbs and drying desalted eggplant.

But I hate rasping parmesan- the microplane makes it less horrible but still no fun. Oh, and boiling premade ravioli because I've never managed to do it right.

I hate nibbing gooseberries, removing the stem and blossom from each end of the berry. I do it only when making apricot/gooseberry jam for my mother and only as a labor of love. Otherwise, i skip gooseberry recipes.

Do dishes count? I hate doing dishes.

I hate cooking rice too. I'm not sure why, I just hate doing it.

Waiting!! I hate waiting on stuff in the oven. Oatmeal raisin cookies that take 12 minutes to bake? You better believe I'm drooling all over the oven door that whole time.

Also, yes, cleaning up after myself in the kitchen...oops. I hate sticking my hands into dirty dishwater, especially at the end to drain the sink. Ick.

I hate hate HATE deveining shrimp. It almost makes me not want to eat them after I'm done...GAG I'm also with "chusmabilly" on the chicken. I'm not a clean freak, but there is something about all that raw chicken juice getting on what seems like EVERYTHING, when I'm cutting up a chicken.

UUGHH. I agree. I detest washing lettuce! I am also not a fan of dicing onions.

Like said above, just use a microplane for the ginger. You'll never dread it again!

I like washing lettuce, but it seems like that makes me weird. And I totally second the statement that lettuce keeps for a really long time if you store it in the spinner. If you're already using a big bowl for washing your lettuce, you've got something that takes up the same amount of space as a spinner. I wash my lettuce by filling up the bowl of the spinner, soaking/swishing the lettuce in it for a while (especially good if the lettuce is slightly wilted.. cold water works wonders), then pulling the lettuce out of the water and putting it in the spinner basket, dump the water and then spin. Store the lettuce in the spinner in the fridge with the lid on.

I eat salad a lot, so even if you think of the spinner as a "uni-tasker", mine still gets used about 3 or 4 times a week, which is more than I can say for many other kitchen tools. The salad spinner is definitely worth the price of its kitchen real estate.

The things I dread in the kitchen are cleaning the sieves, grating almond paste, tipping green beans, skimming the foam from stock, and rolling pastry dough.

chopping onions and preparing beets. i can avoid beets easily so that isn't a problem. but onions, now that's problematic and i'm usually too lazy to involve the mini chopper.

WON
http://whatsonmyplate.wordpress.com

getting the stupid shells off the stupid chick peas. hate. that. job.

but the homemade hummos is so worth it.

oh yeah, ginger microplaner here too.

Grating cheese.

The chore of preparing the Thanksgiving turkey for the oven, checking for those revolting feathers and handling the sickeningly baby sized bird, getting out those wrapped things inside, yuck yuck yuck.

I really dread chopping large amounts of chocolate. I had to chop pounds and pounds a couple times for ganache or truffles, and just...ick. Smeary chocolate everywhere, the shards flying, messy.

i hate washing and then chopping cilantro. having to pick the leaves off is a pain (although now i use parts of the stems) and then you have to get all the dirt out. and then the little leaf pieces stick your fingers when your cutting it. i make my husband do it or threaten to just go without cilantro garnish on indian food.

I don't mind doing dishes or touching chicken but oh how I dread making pie crust, it NEVER comes out right for me, crumbles all over the place or sticks when I'm rolling it out. I'm also not a fan of washing lettuce lately. I used to wash a bunch at the beggining of the week and then store it in a plastic bag with a paper towel which worked well but I'll have to try keeping in my spinner as suggested.

Wiping out the fridge is also something I don't like to do - thank goodness for my housekeeper! She's truely amazing.

Washing lettuce and peeling butternut squash.

Trader Joe's sells minced frozen herbs in ice cube tray-like packs, and they have ginger! I've only tried basil and cilantro, but they were really good.

SUPERGAIJIN (and anyone else who hates dicing or anything else with a knife)- I saw this handy gadget on Williams Sonoma the other day, I haven't tried it myself but the reviews look good... Maybe worth checking out?
http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/7956477/index.cfm?clg=92&orderid=0&skus=7956477&cm%5Fsrc=E%3Arel&action=editpip&shipto=You&showsku=7956477&lineid=2

Doing dishes is mine easily. That and for some reason cutting up raw chicken. I cook it all the time but sometimes I need it diced or cut to save time and I can't stand having to pull out a separate cutting board and getting the slimy chicken all over it.

For me, peeling and deveining shrimp (or any shellfish for that matter) - I only ever eat it when we go out.... and even then, no Maryland crabs. Not worth the effort!

Washing out the food processor, hands down. Lots of times I'll think about using it (pizza dough, biscuits, pestos, dressings, grinding canned tomatoes) and...will do things by hand because I *hate* washing out the blade and all the nooks and crannies in the spout. Plus it's scary because once I cut off a nice chunk of the tip of my finger on that blade, and the blade gets slick if you puree anything with any fats in it, so trying to hold onto it to wash it is dangerous at best.

(I'm with you on the lettuce, too. It's on my organics box "no list" because I'm too lazy to really get the grit out of good organic lettuce, and end up with gritty awful salads that I have to throw away. Supposedly David Tanis washes his greens in a big bowl of water like leeks, letting sediment settle, then just rolls the greens up in a towel and throws them in the fridge. I read that yesterday and thought it sounds *almost* doable but not quite.)

Ginger doesn't bother me because I don't mind the smell on my hands (I have a ginger inspired perfume!), and because you can peel it with a veggie peeler easily.

But GARLIC--ick, ick, ick. I can't stand the smell on my hands. It stays there for days. And the smell of sauteed onions, which sticks in hair and clothes. It sounds trite, but I feel like I smell like gross B.O. when I cook lots of garlic and onions, even though I love them both.

RAW CHICKEN.

The ginger trick that I love is to peel it with the edge of a spoon. The skin comes off easily and you don't lose a ton of ginger. I like the grating idea, and I also sometimes just squeeze it through the garlic press.

I also HATE the smell of garlic on my hands, but I just discovered a trick (thanks to good-old Mr. Bittman) that totally works: After you touch garlic, wash your hands, then rub them on something metal (I use the faucet). Voila, the smell is gone!

the prospect of slicing, salting and draining eggplant has kept me from ever making eggplant parmesan, even though i love it. and i hate remembering to move my teakettle before frying things almost as much as having to clean it off afterwards if i don't. but cleaning the icky stuff out of the sink after washing dishes is absolutely my most dreaded kitchen job.

chantrelles and morels are high maintenance!
At least with greens a person can fill a sink and let them soak.
Cleaning greens is like diving into a pristine cold lake on a
dusty summer afternoon.

peeling and cutting beets.. stains the hands and cutting board
destemming cilantro or parsley
chopping really fresh garlic, cause it's super sticky
washing greens from the garden.. piece by piece
peeling citrus, or on that note supreming an orange
making vinagrettes without a blender.. whisk, whisk, whisk 'till my arm falls off.

I hate deveining shrimp and that is why I hardly ever do it (is that gross? so be it...), I'd like to say I'm off of favas as well but always succumb to their allure every spring (although after 2 consecutive weeks of them, I think I've done enough shelling and peeling until next year), but I do hate peeling onions and garlic. I don't mind chopping them but hate getting through the peels that are always stick to everything and anything (hands, knife, cutting board) and the wayward peels that get airborne and land all over the place. And I love to make a batch of hummus in teh food processor but it really sticks to the crevice of the bowl and makes it a pain to clean.

Cleaning Cilantro. Then trying to use it fast enough for it to not go bad. Usually I throw it into a smoothie, but without a Vitamix it is necessary to separate all the stems. I also don't like peeling grapefruits.

The worst though.... cleaning dishes after making a multi-part meal!

In my experience what salad spinner you are using makes a big difference. I have the cheapest possible one (from the dollar store) and it is easy to clean and use-- no spring-loaded spinners, just turn the crank as fast as possible. My mother-in-law has a fancy OXO one that I detest-- you pump it forever but it never spins fast enough to really dry the greens, and the lid is impossible to clean or dry.

My deal-breaker is pureeing soups. There are one or two pureed soups I love, but I hate doing it so much I never eat them. The noise drives me crazy. Plus, I seem to break all motorized kitchen devices!

I have the same problem with ginger and garlic, both heavy demand items in my predominantly indian food kitchen. What i do is that i buy a bag of peeled garlic and regular ginger each and i grind them up without adding water. It stinks up the kitchen for a while but put them into small bottles (one for each) with tightly closing lids and there is no change in colour or taste for ages... with the garlic as one reaches for the dregs in the bottle the colour deepens and the taste becomes a little stronger and canned like but not significantly so compared to an actual store bought puree or paste for instance

-Rinsing quinoa
-Washing out the muffin tins
-Scooping the 'gunk' from the drain into the garbage

This may be sacrilege, but for those of you out there that hate hate hate preparing fresh ginger, garlic, or cilantro, buy it frozen. It lasts forever and you don't have to do anything except pop the frozen little cubes out of the container.

Trader Joe's usually has all of the aforementioned as well as basil!

I also hate washing lettuce, but you've just about convinced me to try a salad spinner. As for ginger, I keep it in the freezer. Frozen ginger is so much easier to grate and chop without all the stringiness.

I completely avoid recipes that require frying- I can't stand the resulting mess and stale smell around the range hood. I also resist recipes that tell me to cook a certain food, remove it from the pan, drain on paper towels, and then add it back in with other ingredients later. If I've already put it in the pan, I'd just like for it to stay there.