Registering the Next Generation by Jenn McKinlay

Jenn McKinlay: It’s been a minute since I’ve attended a wedding. Life is like that. You tend to move in your generational circle and minus a few outliers, you get married about the same time as your friends and colleagues, then it’s on to family creation (if you choose to have one), and so begins kid’s birthday parties, graduations, and suddenly, there you are again, attending the weddings of the next generation.

 

My first wedding of the next Gen is my nephew's. How long has it been? Well, I was one of the last of my set to get married and this is my nephew at my wedding — um, where did the interim 23 YEARS go??? Ack!!!

 

Which brings me to the topic of my post, I was scanning the nephew and bride’s registry, which is very Gen Z (glass straws, 

I get the idea and I love you guys, but if you have babies, those have to go, I’m just sayin’). Now, I recently acquired my first Kitchen-Aid mixer, so I’m behind the curve on the trends in culinary appliances, clearly, but when I wandered off their registry (I picked out something super cool – not glass straws — don’t tell) and while out there I fell into the rabbit hole of what people are registering for which was also a "what the heck is that?" and "do I need one?" experience that is the reason why my next book will be late. 

 

So, here are some items that I pondered and marveled at and  thought I’d share just in case anyone else was out in the weeds like me on what’s trending in wedding gifts these days. 

1. Rub-Away

A stainless steel bar that rubs away the smell of onions and garlic and other stuff. I had no idea this existed. Seriously. And judging by the 18K reviews of positivity, it works. Huh. 

Of course depending upon the weight, one wonders if it might make a suitable weapon in a mystery...but I digress.

2. Collapsible Tea Kettle

Not gonna lie, I'm intrigued. It's rocking a 4.5 in the positive reviews but I'm thinking I can just commit to a regular sized kettle. They don't take up that much space.

3. GrillBot

I'm just going to go with a big old "Hell no!" on this. A robot to clean the grill,? Yeah, not before I get the housecleaning robot, thank you very much.

4. Corn Stripper (sounds pervy, doesn't it?)

They had me at these instructions: "Simply pushing a cob through the cornwheel with a twisting motion to remove all delicious kernels effortlessly so as to add the corns to any meal." Not sure if it was the word cornwheel or the adding of the corns to any meal, but go get my wallet!!!

5. The Cookie Dipper

Is this how we know that weed is legal almost everywhere now? 'Cause this certainly feels like the brainchild of someone with powerful munchies who didn't want to get their fingers all milky...just sayin'.

How about it, Reds and Readers, any weird gadgets or gizmos that you've stumbled across lately? 

For the record, none of these items were on the bride and groom's registry, I just got lost out there in registry land...LOL.

More Kitchen Musings by Rhys

 RHYS BOWEN:  Earlier in the week I blogged about my kitchen mincer. I blogged about which of us feature food in our books and whether we cook.

So naturally I should conclude the week with another post about kitchens and food.

I talked about the oldest kitchen appliance I have, but I am married to Mr. Gadget. This is strange as he is not good with his hands and doesn’t like to tinker. But he loves gadgets. He is drawn to gadgets. This is a picture of one of our kitchen counters. See what I mean? 

We now have an air fryer and a toaster oven. What you can’t see hidden in a closet are the bread maker, the bacon slicer, the vegetable juicer, the sausage maker, the hamburger press, the poached egg cooker, the onion cooker—and of course the Cuisinart, the blender, the mixer.

Each of these was bought by said spouse in a fit of enthusiasm. For a couple of months I woke to the smell of bread baking. It was heavenly. Then enthusiasm waned. He made healthy juices until he realized that cleaning the thing was a pain and I wasn’t going to do it. I think we sliced ham a few times but I don’t think we’ve ever actually made sausages. Most of them now reside in the graveyard of dead appliances in the corner cabinet.

Me? I’m all for simplicity. My favorite recipe says “throw everything into a pot and walk away until done.”  Which was why I decided to try one of the meal delivery services. Somehow I pictured a box arriving, tipping the contents into that pan and sauteing for a few minutes before serving.

My friend Charlaine Harris was trying Hello Fresh. She liked it and gifted me with a sample membership. The first box arrived. I read the first recipe:  first peel and chop the carrots, dice the potatoes. Drizzle with oil then bake on a tray in the oven. Pat dry, season, then saute the pork. While the port is sauteing mince the garlic and onion, finely chop the cilantro. Now start to make the sauce. In another pan melt two tablespoons of butter…

Wait. This is supposed to be easier? To save me time? To save me clean up? Actually I had all those ingredients in my refrigerator so I didn’t need to pay you $16 to deliver them.  And in the end I can’t say the dish tasted wonderful. And John objected strongly to being served couscous and faro. So I guess Hello Fresh is a no. And I’m back to square one with my husband asking me, “What had you planned for dinner tonight?”

There may be murder in my future.

So who has tried one of these delivery services? One where I don’t have to peel and chop the carrots and is ready miraculously in five minutes? One that tastes marvelous? Still hopeful.

Rhys

Fry Me Another! by Jenn McKinlay

Jenn McKinlay: Okay, so a million years ago, when dinosaurs roamed the earth -- no, wait, we haven't been married that long! Let me start again, when Hub and I got married, I was told by many girlfriends that appliances as gifts were the kiss of death to romance. They told me that the minute you go from flowers and chocolate to a new iron, your relationship is like a shark that has stopped moving -- dead, deader, deadest. Yes, that's a thing.

Fast forward twenty years and enter middle age, and I still love flowers and chocolate but what I really want, no need, is Rosie, the robot maid, from the Jetsons, but that's a whole other post. Where is my domestic robot? I'm looking at you, Tesla! 

Hanna-Barbera / Everett Collection

In the meantime, I will take any appliance that saves me time, because with everyone moving at the speed of light around here, going in a million different directions, I need all the time savers I can get. So, this Christmas, abandoning all romance, I was surprised with an air fryer. A what dryer, you ask? An air fryer! And, let me just say, I wanted one and it is the bomb! Which is super accurate because it rather looks like one, too.

Jenn's Air Fryer in Action!

So far, I've made Poutine and fried chicken, natch. Next up is empanadas or fried apple slices - I haven't decided yet. Either way, it's so much fun to have something new to utilize in the kitchen

My first attempt: Poutine (French fries with gravy and cheese curds)!

Amazing fried chicken!: Recipe from My Forking Life

Next, I really want one of those thing-a-ma-jobs that vacuums while you sleep. I mean flowers are pretty and candy is dandy, but an extra half hour in my day not spent sweeping up dog and cat hair is the shazam! Good thing my birthday is coming up! 

So, what about you, Reds and Readers, what's on your appliance/gadget want list?

Mr. Gadget Strikes Again!

RHYS: My husband should be called Mr. Gadget. He doesn't cook much but he is fascinated by kitchin gadgets. In one corner cupboard we have what I call the Graveyard of Dead Appliances. The bacon slicer, the bread machine that hasn't made a loaf in years, the sausage stuffer (I'm not making this up). He has tried everything from strawberry hullers to yogurt makers. He just can't resist anything new and fascinating. For two or three weeks he will try recipes on it and then it joins the graveyard of dead appliances.

I'm posting this today because he also loves dollar stores and discount store bargains. So a couple of weeks ago he turned up with ceramic microwave cookers, guaranteed to cook anything from onions to apples, plus a bacon bowl maker. Did you know you could make bacon bowls? Not particularly attractive to me but great if you are a bacon fiend. So we've had mashed potato in bacon bowls, guacamole in bacon bowls. We've cooked onions in the little microwave ceramic cooker--which does what it claims to do, only it is so small that it only cooks about 5 shrimp at a time and is too tiny for an apple.

Here is a random sample from my kitchen drawer. The yellow thing is a lemon squeezer (useful) The black round is the bacon bowl maker (absolutely bloody useless) and the others... I don't even know what some of them are!

I expect they'll lose their appeal soon, to be replaced by the fish boner, or the sweet potato chip maker. So I want a confession, Reds--do you love gadgets? What is the most useful gadget you've got in your kitchen? Our is a circular grinder for cheese/nuts etc that we inherited from John's mother. Or maybe grandmother. Much better than modern cheese graters

LUCY BURDETTE: this isn't very fancy or unusual but it's probably my favorite kitchen gadget. And the sad thing is I've never taught myself to use anything but the basic blade. And yet I use it for everything, chopping, whipping cream, whipping up cakes.

RHYS: Now that is my definition of a useful gadget, Lucy. I do use mine to make pastry, peanut butter, cookies grind meat for Shepherd's pie etc. etc. 

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN:  Here's mine. It's a whisk, which opens and closes. It's Brilliant. I use it all the time. Whisks are so hard to wash, right? Not this one.
I also can't live without kitchen scissors.

RHYS: 

You'll note that Hank has supplies pictures of her complicated gadget both open and closed. Actually we have one of those too. They work well, but I rarely whisk by hand. Usually it's cream and it's done with the mixer.

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Here's a picture of my two favorite gadgets. I had an internal debate about things like my crock-pot, Ross's breadmaker and the toaster oven, all of which we use with great frequency. But I decided those are best described at appliances, rather than gadgets. So:

This is my knife sharpener and the latest in a series of pizza cutters. The sharpener I bought years ago from a friend who was selling Cutco knives; I can testify as to its usefulness and durability. I need a sharpener because my primary kitchen tool is that German steel knife, which I inherited from my grandmother. She may have gotten it from her mother - my grandma wasn't the sort of woman who went out and bought kitchen utensils or dishes.

As the mother of three, I've serves a lot of pizzas over the years.The pizza cutter is one of those items you think you can substitute a knife for - until you find yourself slicing across a pizza with a veritable mozzarella dam building up beneath the blade, dragging the rest of the toppings in its wake. A nice sharp cutter avoids that grief (and messing up your fingers as you try to redistribute the pepperoni equitably.)

RHYS: So do you love gadgets? Please share your most unusual ones with us!