The Kitchn Archive: Aug 2017

Love to travel but don’t have a companion? No worries. More and more, traveling alone is an active choice, with women leading the way, according to Mary Bond of The Gutsy Traveler. (In fact, when it comes to travel, women are leading the way, period. Bond notes that 75 percent of those taking cultural, adventure, or nature trips are women, while women-only travel companies have increased by 230 percent.

You don’t always have a full day to dedicate to organizing your kitchen, so your best bet is to complete little tasks here and there. The next time you find yourself with an extra 10 minutes on your hands (say, while you wait for the internet to restart or before you have to leave for school pickup), try tackling one of these to-dos. If they’re not already, sticky hooks (we love the ones from Command) should be your BFF. Attach a few to the side of a cabinet.

It’s hard to get motivated to clean the kitchen. There’s Netflix to be watched, and Instagram to be checked, and honestly has anyone ever felt truly inspired to scrub the floor? The problem is, if you procrastinate too much on the cleaning, it turns into a really big chore that can take hours to accomplish. So the key is to figure out a happy medium — the least amount of time you can spend on cleaning to be effective and not get burned out either.

Food waste is a global problem. To spotlight the issue, Anthony Bourdain has a new documentary — Wasted!: The Story of Food Waste — focusing on the matter. Slated to have a theatrical and video-on-demand release on October 13, the 90-minute film is directed by Anna Chai (The Mind of a Chef and The Layover) and Nari Kye (The Mind of a Chef and No Reservations), and produced by the team behind Bourdain’s popular CNN series Parts Unknown.

For no particular reason, I’ve never really worn gloves to wash the dishes. I guess my mom never did, so I didn’t get into the habit, and it’s hard to change habits! But my friends who cook a lot — and clean a lot of dishes — always wear them. Every time they do a dish! I mean, I guess I’ve pulled out a pair for Thanksgiving dinner clean up, but that’s about it. Anyways, I started to wonder if there was something there.

Welcome to a column from The Financial Diet, one of our very favorite sites, dedicated to money and everything it touches. One of the best ways to take charge of your financial life is through food and cooking. This column from TFD founders Chelsea Fagan and Lauren Ver Hage will help you be better with money, thanks to the kitchen. A version of this post originally appeared on The Financial Diet.

Ina Garten is the author of 10 cookbooks (and counting) and has served up recipes for 15 years on the Food Network, so it might come as a surprise to you that the queen of cooking has the same thing for breakfast every day. Yes, the same thing! While she might like to change things up for her dinner parties, Ina says she starts her day the same way every morning.

There’s more than one reason your kitchen is even grosser than your bathroom: You clean it less often; you keep it warm, moist, and full of organic matter; and you drop food stuffs on nearly every surface. As for the worst offender? Well, that just might be the object you use the most: your sponge. “A sponge is bacteria heaven!” says Dr. Chuck Gerba, a professor of microbiology for University of Arizona. “It’s wet, dark, and constantly sucking up food.

Selling in bulk is Costco’s main schtick. And that can certainly be one way to save money on groceries while you’re there. (Congrats on being the new, proud owner of four pounds of peanut butter!) But there are a few other ways to save. Try these tips — even if the resulting haul requires you to turn your coat closet into a bonus pantry.