Working in the kitchen is not everybody’s cup of tea and anybody who shies away from this area of the house will be glad to have some useful little hacks at their disposal to make their life easier.
Come to think of it, anyone would. Even those who spend their entire days inside the kitchen purely out of interest would love to have some clever hacks up their sleeve to minimize the workload so they can get done more that much faster.
For that reason, we have here a collection of the best kitchen hacks you could possibly ask for. Enjoy!
1. Egg-peeling hacks
We all know peeling eggs can be a bit of a mess as you often end up with whites that are pitted all over. Not a pretty sight! (especially if you’re making deviled eggs). What you can do is:
- Peel the eggs when they’re freshly boiled. Do try to not refrigerate before you have to peel as that will make for a messy peeling job.
- Strike the egg against a hard surface to break the shell, then roll gently under your hand on the table or between your palms; the pieces will come right off.
- Put the egg in a small tupperware container and shake well. This will make it easier to peel off the broken pieces.
2. Garlic hacks
Garlic can take some time to peel and we don’t always have that. Also, it leaves behind such an odor on one’s hands! Try to:
- Cut the root end of a clove of garlic and then press the clove with the flat side of a chef knife with force. Easy-peasy!
- Put garlic cloves in a jar, secure the lid and shake the thing like there’s no tomorrow. A couple of minutes later you will have a jar-full of garlic peels and beautifully peeled garlic cloves.
- Put an entire bulb of garlic on a plate and microwave for about 20 seconds. Let it cool for a bit and then just break the bulb apart and get peeling. The peel will slide away like butter!
3. Butter hacks
To have some buttery hacks at your disposal is something that you won’t regret.
- If your stick of butter is too hard, microwave a glass of water, throw away the water, and cover the stick with the hot glass. Leave for 15 minutes. Repeat if necessary.
- If you need to re-harden butter that has softened too much for a particular recipe, place the bowl in an ice + water bath for as long as necessary.
- Another too-cold butter hack: grate really cold butter so you get tiny pieces that are easier to spread on toast and are also great for baking, especially pies.
4. Cookie hacks
Baking cookies is fun, even if a trifle challenging to get them to look pretty. Some of our absolute favorite cookie hacks are:
- If you’ve over-baked the bottoms of your cookie to a black crust, just rub them against a hand grater. They’ll be good as new.
- To keep cookies fresh for longer, put a slice of bread in the cookie jar. It will absorb all the moisture.
- If you don’t have a cookie press, simply press down on the top of your cookies with a whisk to make a pretty, flowery pattern.
5. Bread hacks
Bread is a staple food. It is literally used almost everywhere and having some yeasty hacks up your sleeve will not be amiss.
- To make your dough rise well in colder times, pop the bowl in the oven of your cooking range and put a sheet/pan/dish of boiling water underneath. Close the oven door. If you need to give more time to your dough, simply replace the hot water when needed.
- To clean up the powdered remains of broken glass, carefully press a slice of bread on them. Then, with equal care, discard the piece of bread.
- Put some stale bits of bread in the coffee grinder and pulse so the grinds stick to the bread. When you’ll throw away the crumbled bread, it will take away all the coffee for a neat and clean finish.
6. Vegetable hacks
Out of all the gazillion veggie hacks, these few strike the eye like nothing else!
- To wash potatoes thoroughly, put them in the dishwasher, and run a simple rinse cycle (do not add soap!). Your potatoes will come out squeaky clean! You can also do this with other veggies as well.
- Don’t use a peeler to peel ginger as that leads to wastage of a lot of the root. Simply use a spoon to scrape off thin strips of the skin, with no veggie.
- If there’s too much salt in your soup just put in a peeled potato and it will absorb all the extra salt and save your dinner in no time.
7. Fruit hacks
Just like veggies, fruits have some really sweet hacks of their own as well.
- To pit cherries fast, put one on the mouth of a bottle and pass a chopstick through it. The stone will fall right through the fruit into the bottle.
- To remove strawberry leaves without wasting fruit, pass a straw through the end of the strawberry and all the way across the fruit so just the head of leaves tears off. Zero wastage!
- Freeze grapes and use as ice cubes in wine and cocktails. Looks pretty, and doesn’t water down your drink!
Which hack is your favorite? Or do you have some that you would like to share? Don’t forget to leave a comment!
Photo by Becca Tapert on Unsplash
