{"id":1229,"date":"2010-12-16T11:21:00","date_gmt":"2010-12-16T16:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/?p=1229"},"modified":"2010-12-21T18:10:51","modified_gmt":"2010-12-21T23:10:51","slug":"christmas-presents-past-and-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/2010\/12\/christmas-presents-past-and-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Christmas Presents Past and Future"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Today I made up an imaginary friend named Shorty. I was writing a head note for a recipe (one that involves short-grain brown rice) and was fresh out of clever things to say. This is what happens when you agree to write a book quickly\u2014your creativity gets taxed mightily. So much so, in fact, that no new recipe blog is coming forth from me today.<\/p>\n

Instead I decided to write (quickly) about the other thing that is very much on my mind\u2014Christmas shopping. I have, in fact, barely done any yet, which is Not Good. I can\u2019t do much about that right this minute, but I thought maybe I could help you, since probably you have an equivalent of a book deadline hanging over you and are behind with your own efforts. Or maybe some wonderful friend or your husband or your mother wants to know what you<\/em> want for Christmas.<\/p>\n

Here are five ideas. They just happen to be some of my favorite kitchen tools. People often ask me about kitchen equipment. Sometimes the questions are real stumpers, like whether they should buy the newest combined microwave-convection-infrared-lightspeed-oven, whereupon I stare at them blankly since I haven\u2019t been in the market for a new stove in 10 years. But when it comes to simple kitchen tools, I can babble on (my specialty).<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>My very favorite thing is a pink-handled knife from Kyocera<\/a>. Well, honestly, it\u2019s not the color of the handle that did it for me (yes, pink is my favorite color), though I do love the fact that every purchase of this knife sends $5 to the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation<\/a>. It\u2019s the ceramic blade\u2014so darn sharp, and it has been that way every day that I\u2019ve used it for the past five years (which is almost every day). The Santoku-shaped blade is only 5 1\/2 inches long, so this isn\u2019t your big chopping knife; I think of it more as a utility knife. I use it for thin-slicing potatoes, cutting up broccoli florets, slivering garlic, halving Brussels sprouts, trimming green beans\u2026lotsa things.<\/p>\n

The tool I use most in the kitchen\u2014maybe even more than my ceramic knife\u2014is a pair of OXO tongs<\/a>. Three pairs, actually (two 9-inchers, one 12-incher.) I think I first got attached to tongs when I worked in restaurant kitchens, where pot holders don\u2019t exist. (Come to think of it, neither do most common kitchen utensils.) You can use tongs to pull out hot oven racks and sheet trays, turn over delicate veggies or meats while saut\u00e9ing, move anything around in a pan, or, of course, to handle anything on the grill. I particularly like the grip and the locking mechanism on the OXO Good Grips tongs.<\/p>\n

I eat and cook with a lot of eggs, so I\u2019ve messed around with many whisks. The silicone-coated balloon whisk from Le Creuset<\/a> is the most efficient whisk I\u2019ve ever used. I flick it around a few times and voila, my eggs are perfectly mixed. It\u2019s a little bottom-heavy so occasionally it does fall out of a bowl, but I love it (and its color) nonetheless.\u00a0 I probably don\u2019t need to say anything about silicone spatulas<\/a> other than, if you only have one or two\u2014buy more! I have them in a rainbow of colors and sizes (I like a spoonula shaped one, too) from both OXO and Le Creuset. I still have my wooden spoons, but they spend more time looking good in an old ceramic baked-bean jar than my silicone spatulas, which hit the pans (especially nonstick ones) every day.<\/p>\n

Lastly, I don\u2019t know what I ever did without a Microplane\u00ae zester<\/a> for zesting lemons, limes, and oranges. I love to use zest as a flavor booster in pan sauces, rice dishes, salad dressings, flavored butters\u2026and this tool just makes getting that feathery zest (minus the bitter pith) a breeze. Use it for finely grating Parmigiano, too. I like my funky original one so much that I haven\u2019t invested in one of the many newer ones with comfortable handles, but you could.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>One last Christmas idea: Buy a goat! No, I haven\u2019t completely lost it\u2014yet. I just happen to love this idea: Instead of (or in addition to) giving an actual material gift to one of your friends, \u00a0OXFAM America<\/a> will let you \u201cbuy\u201d (make a donation in a certain amount) a gift (in your friend\u2019s name) for a community in need. ($25 will buy a school lunch program for one child, $30 a vegetable garden for one family. The goat\u2014a great source of milk, fertilizer and food in hardscrabble areas, is $50!) Your friend will get a Christmas card letting him or her know the donation has been made. I\u2019m not saying you need to skip the kitchen goodies\u2014just that one of these cards tucked next to the spatulas in a Christmas stocking might be in the true spirit of things.<\/p>\n

Wherever your gift buying or gift giving leads you this holiday season, I hope you can keep that true spirit close by. Spend time with your friends\u2014and not just the imaginary ones!<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>P.S. \u00a0Oops, I almost forgot. I know this is really not in the true spirit of Christmas (blatant self promotion\u2014I don\u2019t think so), but remember that Fast, Fresh & Green<\/em> <\/a>makes a great Christmas present, too! Be sure to try and patronize your local bookstore this season if you can.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today I made up an imaginary friend named Shorty. I was writing a head note for a recipe (one that involves short-grain brown rice) and was fresh out of clever things to say. This is what happens when you agree to write a book quickly\u2014your creativity gets taxed mightily. So much so, in fact, that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[22,4,1],"tags":[43],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1229"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1240,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1229\/revisions\/1240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sixburnersue.com\/cooking-fresh-eating-green\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}