The Garbage Bowl Tip That Will Make You A More Organized Home Cook
Who doesn't want to be a more organized cook in the kitchen? Simple hacks can make your life so much easier, and for those who don't enjoy cooking, they can take away some of the toils of the chore. The best kitchen tips are the ones that don't require expensive gadgets and are easy for even novice cooks to employ — the ones that can become a part of how you cook every day.
A simple cooking tip that can make things so much easier for cooks of all experience levels includes two inexpensive tools you may already have in the kitchen. No special culinary skills are needed, yet they can bring your cooking to a new level.
Read on to find out which tool TV chef Rachael Ray swears by — the one she calls a "food mover" — and how pairing it with a simple bowl can change how you cook.
A winning combination
Anyone who's ever tried to fit an entire diced onion on the edge of a knife only to drop pieces all the way from the cutting board to the saucepan will find a metal bench scraper to be an invaluable tool. The wide blade allows you to fit much more than a knife ever can and will prevent the edges of your sharp knives from being dulled.
Not only can bench scrapers be used to move food from the board to the pot, but they can also transport food scraps to a waste bowl. Having a bowl nearby for food scraps can be a game-changer. No more missing the compost container or wastebasket; just push the scraps onto the scraper and deposit them into the bowl, getting all those papery onion skins and carrot tops out of the way as you continue to cook.
While a nifty item like this scrap trap is handy, it's not necessary. All you need is a wide bowl nearby as you move scraps from your cutting board to the bowl. If possible, compost those scraps as food waste creates methane gas when buried in a landfill, per USDA.
A multi-purpose tool
For an inexpensive investment, the handy bench scraper can be used for far more than just moving food from point A to point B. Chef Thomas Keller includes a bench scraper in his list of essential kitchen tools in MasterClass, referring to it as a "pastry card," that he uses to portion bread dough or clean up his pastry board after making a pie. Most metal bench scrapers have measurement marks, so you can be confident that your one-inch dice is, in fact, one inch.
Whether you compost your food scraps or give them a second life as vegetable stock, very few kitchen organization tips are as accessible and straightforward as this one. Once you get into the habit of always having a bench scraper and an empty bowl at your workstation, your kitchen game will level up. Before long, you'll ask, "why didn't I think of that myself?"