I was thinking about how I missed having an indoor thermometer that measures humidity. It’s such a small specific thing, one I’d never think of getting unless pushed to it (which I was by one particularly dry winter). But I like having one now.
What are your small, “random” or “junk drawer” type of gadgets that you actually use or like having around?
It wasn’t a gadget, but we put a grocery bag dispenser on our wedding registry. We ended up getting it, and it was nice to have a good place to put them that was easy to grab them out as needed. Haven’t used it nearly as much now that we are using reusable grocery bags, but it’s still nice when I need to put a bag in my office trash can.
This has been good for us for a different reason. I’m not pathological, but I do have a tendency to keep “useful” things longer than needed. A grocery bag dispenser crammed tight is a decent agreed standard for “we have plenty of grocery bags.”
Also not a gadget in and of itself, but I built a home assistant server and zigbee network with all kinds of automations for time based, motion or event activation. Makes me feel like I live in the future lol. But that wasn’t exactly unexpectedly useful.
but does it dispense grocery bags?
It does not. Haven’t found (or looked for) a gadget to do that for me lol
Microwave plate cover. Don’t have to clean the microwave as often. No wasting saran wrap or trying to use a plate as a cover. I was living with my parents a long time ago when I first heard about these and had to get one. My Dad made fun of it at first but he then admitted how useful it was.
My friend regifted me a milk frother. I use it every morning. Nuke the milk for 30 seconds and whip it up. Add to any coffee for a great treat.
I’ve been loving the spider skimmer my wife got me for christmas.
This! So great when simmering/cooking stuff one has to fish out of a pot. Mine is used almost daily at home!
One of the breville milk frothers: https://www.seriouseats.com/best-milk-frothers-5189329
It’s paid for itself since I make my own chai latte’s at home every morning. Impulse purchase that I’ve used every day for years.
How do you do that? Every chai recipe I’ve looked up has been overly complicated.
I use tea bags, these ones which I find in the international / indian food section of a larger store: https://www.realcanadiansuperstore.ca/tea-masala-chai-bags-special-international-blend-1/p/21050375_EA
I use a big travel mug so I toss 2 tea bags in and fill it about 1/2 way with water. While it steeps I put the milk in the frother and when it’s done, squeeze out the bags + pour the milk in. Add sugar as desired.
I’ve tried various loose leaf chai’s but I personally don’t find the difference in flavor worth the effort / price compared to these bags. Making it from scratch with spices is a lot of work and I’m way too lazy for that.
Me, this morning, making plain old coffee, “Man, my milk could be frothed right now.”
I’m learning I can do it by heating the milk in a saucepan on the stove, then use a whisk to froth the milk until foamy. Maybe I’ll try this next time.
I don’t need my coffee particularly strong. Maybe I’ll try a cafe au lait next time.
Extendo arm. It’s goofy as hell but it’s a god send when there’s a bunch of random crap on the floor. They also have deceivingly good grip strength too.
Hand held vacuum. I don’t think this is that niche anymore but it works really well for cleaning tables, random tight corners and I park it next to my clothes dryer to easily clean the filter. I also use it a TON for sucking up bugs. Buy a corded one since battery operated ones die fast (I went through 2 or 3 of these personally)
Bench scraper. Easily removes 90% of any grime on hard surfaces. Honestly more effective than a rag and detergent. When I bought mine I decided to try it out on my “thoroughly cleaned” kitchen counter and removed a disheartening amount of grime. Afterwards I use some detergent just to sterilize everything.
I clean up my toddler’s mess every day and those extendo arms have saved my back
I use my grabby arm thing constantly because bending over kills my back. Sometimes I’ll dual wield the things lol
bend your legs
Having worked in restaurants I am amazed that more people dont use scrapers to clean counters etc. It does such a better and quicker job than scrubbing.
I bought mine as a paibt scraper at a dollar store. Works just fine.
Yeah, I actually use a cheap kiwi nakiri and flattened the edge 😆
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My ex got the dyson in the breakup. I’m still not over it.
Bitch.
InstaPot. I hate gadgets and things that have limited purpose so when this was gifted to me I planned to regift it. I use it so often I got an upgrade model. Totally worth the counter space!
edit: oops wrong reply
What can you do with those?
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We mostly use ours to make rice, potatoes, and artichokes. Not all at once but I guess we could. Oh, and for hummus we get the perfect chickpeas in like 45 minutes from dried. It’s amazing.
On top of the other two replies: Mine has a setting to make yogurt. You just add milk and about a tablespoon of active culture yogurt
- Put a layer of frozen meatballs on the bottom. I use Trader Joe’s party sized balls.
- Add dry pasta
- Pour sauce over dry pasta.
- Fill sauce jar with water and dump that in.
- Put the lid on set it to go for 8 minutes on high pressure. Wait for it to finish and then release the pressure.
- Yum yum in the tum tum
8 minutes? Damn, it takes me that long just to boil water on the stove
As u/usernameblankface said, 8 minutes is the time it cooks while fully pressurized. It can take anywhere from a little over 5 minutes to a half hour or more to heat up everything inside enough to generate the steam necessary to pressurize.
Setting for 8 minutes means that it will heat up, build pressure, then start the 8 minute timer. It then beeps loudly when the time is up, so no need to set a separate timer or keep track of the thing.
On top of the other reply, soups, chili, ribs, whole chickens, the filling for chicken pot pie, pulled pork, shredded chicken for tacos, and so on.
I bought a griddle scraper thinking it was only for cleaning but it’s become one of my main cooking utensils
Indeed, being Belgian and an adept of the real French fries (double cooked) I was not convinced at all. In the end, I still prefer real fries but I find the air fryer very practical to cook (or warm up quickly - unlike microwave oven it does not make stuff soft) all sort of food.
I’m an American, so I can’t say how they’re cooked in Belgium, but I can say that boiling them in water for ten minutes before frying reduces the workload significantly and produces similar results.
Belgian fries (and any good fries in America) are fried once in low heat for a little while to cook the potato through. Then they are allowed to cool, and they can be frozen to use later, or you can fry them again at higher temp to crisp them up.
I’m aware of the double-fry technique, I’m just saying that similar results can be obtained by boiling in lieu of the first frying step
Came here to share air fryers.
I hate kitchen gadgets. Even toasters.
But I like this!
My kitchen has a solid ban on any product with the word “maker” in the name. They’re all junk that take up space and do a worse job than conventional methods.
An air fryer though. That was money well spent.
I was gifted an air fryer a while back. While it’s generally useful, cleaning if after each use is really obnoxious imo and so I hardly ever use it.
It’s a lot easier to clean a pan I used in the oven because I can just pop it in the dishwasher. I can’t pop the air fryer in the dishwasher. It would destroy it.
You can buy air fryer liners to minimize cleanup.
I recently found out about these and they have been a huge help, but I found that food still manages to make it’s way into the rest of the basket, even if it’s not as much.
Mine came with a little pan or tray that we can line with foil easy peasy. Much less to clean.
Thank you for this knowledge. This will honestly help me eat more chicken instead of less-messy frozen meals.
Small electric fan oven doesn’t sound as magical as air fryer. Good product, great marketing.
We have a pretty nice Cuisinart air fryer/toaster oven (model is TOA-70 I think), and it is the best. I basically use the “real” oven only for proper baking (very rare) and larger frozen stuff (still fairly rare). All leftovers and “heat and eat” stuff goes into the toaster oven. I also use it for toasting, just to keep the popup toaster off the counter, and as an air fryer I like the results from its tray-like basket much better than the icy-center foodballs that come from trying to get a reasonable amount into the deep but otherwise tiny baskets of cheaper air fryers.
For an actual junk drawer item, we have a 50-foot reel of twist tie (with a little guillotine cutter) that has proven invaluable for lost twist ties, torn garbage bag pulls, arts & crafts, and even the occasional picture hanging until we got a proper reel of that wire.
I bought a variety pack of scouring pads and brushes that I can attach to my cordless drill. Super handy for cleaning stuff that would otherwise take some major elbow grease. Probably bad for my drill, but it’s worth it to me.
I made one of these years ago with a round dish brush and a long bolt. One of the most effective cleaning tools in the house. That plus “barkeepers friend” cleaner will take care of any hard-to-scrub grime.
I have a few motion activated lights in my house and really love how convenient those are. One is an in wall light switch and another is a screw in one in a ceiling light socket.
I also use my pour over coffee set daily. And my coffee grinder.
I bought a cheap little wire cutter and keep it in my junk drawer. Great for cutting zip ties and twist ties on packaging.
I keep a water bottle in the fridge. Always have cold water and hardly use glasses. Bring it to the table when you eat.
Lazy Susan on the dining room table for salt, pepper, toothpicks, pencils, sticky notes, etc.
Long plastic dollar store shoehorn by the door.
I get big packs of 3M clean removal hooks from Costco and use them all over the house to hang keys, pants, hats, string lights, jackets, etc.
attaching things to the walls (hooks for jackets, backpacks, pictures, tools, etc) is a game changer.
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My motion switch in the main floor bath also senses light so it does not turn on when it is sunny.
My motion switches in the basement laundry and garage might also be light sensitive but it is always dark there so I always want them to turn on.
I think to do what I think you want, I would investigate X10 or other home automation hardware. That stuff lets you program switches so you could set it to never come on during certain times (for example). X10.com
X10 used to be much cheaper than most other home automation hardware/software.I agree that spending more gets better quality tools but I don’t want or need great quality in my junk drawer. Nor do I want to use expensive tools on packaging. The expensive tools go in my tool bag to get used and abused on “real” work.
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Maybe a bit the other way around: I replaced specialized gadgets with a simpler “tool”
Since I switched from “specialized” clips for food bags to simple clothespins, my life is so much easier.
Clothespins are easier to get on food bags and easier to get off.
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Same, but Aeropress for my coffee. I haven’t yet tried a mocha pot, though I’d like to.
Aeropress coffee was always the best tasting. But I found I just didn’t have the patience for making it that way every morning, especially since I drink four cups at least.
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That’s fair, it works for me because I just have one cup but it would be tedious for multiple cups each morning.
Had a rice cooker in my kitchen for years because my brother brought it. Never really made use of it until I got my second dog because it became super cost effective to make their food, and a big part of it is brown rice.
what recipe do you use for the dog food?
1/4 lb of ground lean turkey
1/2 cup mixed veggies
1/2 cup brown rice
1 tablespoon of high quality finishing olive oil
It’s basically a shepherds pie with no potatoes, seasoning or gravy (though you could make a gravy for it if you wanted to take the time).
I got a Zojirushi at the thrift store and I love it, but then I realized that the pot has a nonstick coating inside, and there doesn’t seem to be a replacement that doesn’t have nonstick. No more rice cooker for me. :(
Did not know that!
