The Minimalist Guide to Kitchen Equipment

Think you need to need a kitchen filled with dozens of gadgets to cook all your favorite meals?

Think again.

I’m all about minimalism when it comes to food and cooking, and I’ve found that a home cook needs needs only eight pieces of equipment in order to start conquering the kitchen.

This is a guide for those of you living in a home or apartment with at least a kitchen stove and a refrigerator. It’s for those of you who are looking to upgrade from flimsy department store sale equipment without breaking the bank.

It’s for those of you that would rather have a kitchen of a few quality pieces of gear than one full of cheap crap.

From soups and stews to roasts and stir-frys. From rice and beans to prime rib.

You can get away with much less “stuff” than you think.

Chef’s Knife

The “Swiss Army Knife” of the kitchen.

It slices, it dices… and you don’t even need to watch late night infomercials to buy one!

A chef’s knife is the most important tool in your kitchen. Hands down. Trying to cook without a chef’s knife is like trying to cut down a tree with only dental floss. Not gonna happen.

Out of the five important cutting skills that a home cook needs to know, a chef’s knife is best for four of them: slicing, dicing, chopping, and mincing.

Chef’s knives can get expensive, but you get what you pay for (up to a point, anyway). Get a cheap one if that’s all you can afford, but feel free to splurge on something nice if you can handle it.

Cutting Board

The no-brainer partner to a chef’s knife. (You don’t really want to cut directly on the countertop, do you?)

Fortunately, many houses and apartments have built-in cutting boards in the kitchen, so you might not need to buy one.

If you need to buy your own, just keep in mind that wood is easier on your knife than either plastic or glass.

Vegetable Peeler

Remember when I said that there is one essential cutting task that chef’s knives fail at?

That would be peeling.

And while most people would suggest you go out and get yourself a paring knife, I say don’t bother.

Get yourself a vegetable peeler instead.

They’re cheap, they’re easy to use, and they are safer than an open blade. Just get one already!

10-Inch Cast Iron Skillet

The workhorse of the kitchen.

A skillet is a large, shallow pan ideally suited for two of the four essential cooking techniques–frying and roasting.

This is one area where there isn’t much of an excuse for cheaping out, and I suggest you go with one made from cast iron.

Cast iron beats out the competition at everything. It’s durable, it’ll last a lifetime, and it has amazing heat retention.

Oh yeah, and it’s cheap.

Not “on-sale bargain at Target cheap,” but you should be able to find a 10-inch skillet for less than $20.

But the biggest reason that cast iron beats out the competition for your one and only pan is because of its versatility. You can fry with it on the stove top, and you can roast with it in the oven.

If you weren’t lucky enough to get one of these passed down to you from your family, your best bet would be looking for a skillet from Lodge. The more adventurous could try to track down a vintage one off eBay.

No need for separate pieces of gear. A cast iron skillet does it all.

Metal Spatula

Spatulas are the ideal tool for mixing, flipping, and turning the food you fry in your skillet.

And since you are using a cast iron pan (right?), you don’t need to worry about the metal spatula scraping off your nonstick material.

In fact, a metal spatula is actually ideal for using with a cast iron skillet, as its hard edges help to smooth out the peaks and valleys over time and use, leaving you with a glassy surface that is more nonstick than any expensive pan you can buy at the store.

If possible, make sure your spatula has a straight front edge and rounded corners to maximize this effect.

6–8 Quart Enameled Dutch Oven

The stealthy ninja of the kitchen.

While a pan is great for frying and roasting, you’ll need something a bit deeper if you want to do the other two important cooking tasks–boiling and steaming.

While you might be tempted to settle for a Plain Jane ol’ pot for this purpose, I suggest you take it up a notch and invest in another multipurpose piece of gear–an enameled Dutch oven.

Like cast iron skillets, Dutch ovens are seriously old-school cooking tools. They are essentially covered pots, but in contrast with those you’ll find at your local department store, these are ideally suited for cooking both on the stovetop and in the oven. So you can make soups, stews, and pot roasts all with the same piece of gear.

The enamel makes cleanup faster and reduces sticking to the pan than the unenameled, and you can find solid values in models made by Lodge and Tramontina.

Wooden Spoon

While a metal spatula might be okay to use with a dutch oven, a wooden spoon is much better.

Since you generally won’t be flipping and turning the soups and stews you make in a dutch oven, the straight and hard edge of a spatula isn’t necessary, and it might even increase your odds of scratching the enamel.

This is where wooden spoons shine.

Wooden spoons are gentle enough to avoid scratching any surfaces, and their long handles make them ideal for stirring. And since wood is such a poor heat conductor, you can use them without fear of burning yourself.

Steamer Basket

My final addition to the list of everything a barebones home kitchen should have is a controversial one. I’ve honestly never seen anyone else hold it in such high esteem, but I suggest you make room for it anyways.

With a steamer basket, you can quickly cook veggies over a small amount of boiling water in your covered dutch oven.

Although steaming isn’t used much in Western cultures, some Asian ones use it extensively for meat, seafood, and rice.

But I think steamers really shine as tools for cooking non-starchy veggies.

It’s a faster process than boiling, and is ideal for weekday dinners when you are looking for a quick way to get a meal on the table.

Good Things Come In Small Packages

If you’re just getting started in the kitchen (or upgrading your current setup), you should focus more on getting a few quality pieces of gear than massive sets of cheap pots, pans, and utensils.

A good chef’s knife with a board to use it on will cover most of your cutting needs, with a vegetable peeler playing a solid supporting role.

On the heating end, you really only need one pot and one pan. A cast iron skillet will take care of all your frying and roasting needs while a dutch oven will cover boiling and steaming. Both these can go either on top of the oven or in it.

Add into the mix a metal spatula and a wooden spoon and you have all the utensils you’ll need to stir, mix, turn, and flip your food as it cooks.

The amount of gear you need to set up a solid kitchen is surprisingly small, and if you focus on quality over quantity you can have a setup that will last you the rest of your life.

So what’s stopping you?