Chopping, Slicing, Mmilling, Grating and Grinding
Knives
Stainless steel knives with tightly riveted wooden or plastic handles will last practically forever
without much blunting or discolouration.
Cooks knives with un-serrated fairly short blades and not too sharp at
the points are good for chopping and slicing fruit and veg. You must feel comfortable holding these, they
will be in every day use!
Other knives, one with a fairly long, un-serrated blade for dicing meat etc., another serrated bread
knife. Would be good. I store all mine in a sealed knife block that
stands on a shelf with no blades exposed, please don’t buy the rack that hangs
on the wall, leaving blades uncovered pointing downwards!!
Scissors
A pair of serrated kitchen
scissors, closely riveted with large handles are great for chopping herbs and
attacking those plastic shrink wrap packs that we have to fight with every day,
plus thousands of other tasks! Keep them for kitchen use only for hygiene reasons.
Autochop
An auto chop with its plunger style handle and metal blades, twists and chops veg as finely as you
like. Put it flat on a solid wooden or
toughened plastic chopping board for best results and also ensure that the boards
designed with a pouring channel, then you can tip what you have chopped straight into a pan.
Slicing
If you are looking for a slicer and don’t want to buy a food processor, there are quite a few. A
mandolin, has blades protected by a plastic guard as you move it backwards and
forwards over your onion or potato, to my mind, not always completely safe. Cutter boxes where you slide a handle to and
fro, the angled blade is well out of reach and the box underneath catches the
slices, or, alternatively, just use your small chopping knife.
If you like your herbs finely chopped, then by all means try a mill!
but putting the herbs inside can be fiddly and you often end up with
very little left from your original large quantity.
Pepper mill
Please get a good quality wooden or stainless steel pepper mill.
They can be awkward to fill but just experience the aroma and you’ll be
hooked forever and never want to use ready ground again. The convenience and ease of use can’t be
beaten.
Grating
The traditional, four-sided metal grater with its various textured sides is excellent for most purposes. Stand it on a plate, then hold the handle on
the top to support it and grate away!
Box graters where the perforated metal plate sits on top and all the bits are captured underneath, means very little
clearing up afterwards, that makes them a favourite with me.