9 Ina Garten-Approved Kitchen Tools To Have On Hand

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Ina Garten has graced the world with hundreds of recipes and cooking tips through her cookbooks, TV shows, and interviews. The Barefoot Contessa is revered for her cooking style that elevates simple comfort foods with high-quality ingredients, making cooking more enjoyable and accessible for everyone. In addition to sharing her all-time favorite recipes, the celebrity chef also offers suggestions on the kitchen tools and appliances that upgrade your at-home cooking game.

Garten keeps her kitchen stocked with items the average home cook would have in theirs (for the most part), so her recommendations are typically simple staples that aim to elevate a dish (much like her recipe recommendations). In some cases, she suggests particular brands she has used for years. In others, it's just a matter of preference. From simple basics, such as a good set of knives, to appliances that give you the best texture and tools that accelerate the cleanup process, these get the Ina Garten stamp of approval.

One kitchen tool Ina Garten can't live without (and one she thinks every beginner cook needs to elevate their home cooking) is a zester (or rasp) because she loves the zest of citrus fruit. Lemon zest, for instance, can be used in several different ways. You can add it to hummus, pancakes, or pasta to upgrade the flavor with a kick of citrus. The chef also likes to use her zester to finely grate garlic. Gone are the days of incessant chopping until your garlic clove is truly, finely chopped. Specifically, her website recommends a microplane zester. However, in a conversation with Amy Poehler on the "Good Hang" podcast in December 2025 (via YouTube), Garten also states you can't keep the same zester forever. You need to replace this tool every couple of years, depending on how often you use it, because it becomes dull and "you can't sharpen it like a knife."

Ina Garten told Food Network just how integral a Dutch oven is to her cooking and how it should be a staple in every cook's kitchen: "I use my 5.5-quart Le Creuset Dutch oven more often than anything else. It's great for soups, stews, and braising." In fact, her all-time favorite recipe she's written is braised short ribs she makes in her Dutch oven.

In our own ranking of the best Dutch ovens, Le Creuset came in first place. Per Le Creuset's website, it's also the No. 1 recommended by "America's Test Kitchen." Dutch ovens can be on the pricier side because they are typically made from cast iron, but they make a huge difference in your cooking, especially for high-heat recipes. The Dutch oven is your best friend when it comes to bread baking or whipping up a perfectly roasted chicken. You can even deep-fry your very own donuts using this versatile tool.

The temperature of your oven makes a significant difference to your meal. Namely, food temperature is critical for food safety. Raw foods, such as beef and poultry, must be cooked to a minimum internal temperature to be considered safe to eat. Not only is temperature important for food safety, but the temperature of your oven plays a role in the texture and flavor of your food. If you've ever followed a recipe to a T and it still came out of the oven with a funky texture or taste, it might have everything to do with the temperature of your oven.

Ina Garten explains you can't always trust what the oven dial tells you when it comes to temperature. You should always use an oven thermometer to get an accurate temperature. She states (via Food Network) that "no matter what it says on the dial, the temperature in the oven could be totally different."

Cleanup is typically the least enjoyable part of cooking, but, thankfully, Ina Garten has suggestions, product recommendations, and tips for this part of the process. In her years of experience, Garten has picked up some pretty handy tools that help her keep her kitchen clean, one of which is a plastic wrap dispenser. The celebrity chef states (via YouTube) that it's a cleanup tool she "adores" and uses constantly in her own kitchen. This might not be the first tool that comes to mind when you start cooking, but sometimes, the best tools to have in your kitchen are ones that make the cooking process simpler and speedier — especially when it comes to cleanup.

Ina Garten uses the Stretch-Tite Wrap'n Snap, which lets you pull out sheets of plastic and cut them to size without fighting with the serrated edge on the box. Say goodbye to wasteful, tangled balls of plastic messes.

Another convenient tool that helps avoid mess is a pepper mill. For years, Ina Garten's tool of choice to grind her pepper and other spices has been the Peppermate pepper mill. If you've ever watched Ina Garten's Food Network show, "The Barefoot Contessa," you might recognize this tool. Compared to the average pepper grinder, the Peppermate pepper mill can adjust coarseness from extremely fine to more coarse.

Despite the name, the pepper mill can actually be used for any dry spices smaller than the size of a coffee bean. The tool has an easy-to-turn handle on the side that smoothly grinds spices to your desired coarseness. One happy customer on Reddit explains they've been using it for years, appreciating its ease of use despite having weak wrists. Plus, it has a removable bottom that catches the grinds to be tossed in the trash, so no more pepper residue is left all over the counter.

Ina Garten has a couple of cooking tools she keeps on her counter almost always, one of which is a butcher block or cutting board (or several). In a YouTube video for New York Times Cooking, she simply states that "they're really important. I have lots of them and if you take care of them, they last forever." Whether you're a professional chef or an amateur home cook, a high-quality cooking board is a critical tool in the kitchen.

However, when it comes to cutting boards, not all are created equal. Ina Garten uses a Boos Block cutting board from John Boos & Co., which has a reputation for being made from durable, long-lasting wood. Other home cooks and bakers attest to the fact that a high-quality cutting board makes all the difference. Wooden cutting boards are more food-safe since plastic cutting boards can cause small plastic pieces to unintentionally leak into your food when chopping, plus it's more aesthetically pleasing when left on your countertop.

You might be tempted to just eyeball ingredients, but, when it comes to baking, precision matters. Adding a couple extra grams or leaving out a few ounces of certain ingredients can throw off the entire recipe, impacting not only flavor, but consistency. Instead of leaving room for error when measuring out ingredients, Ina Garten recommends keeping a food scale on deck. She explains (via YouTube) that this tool is "not very expensive and you can buy them anywhere," so it's well worth the purchase. While the chef doesn't directly recommend any one brand, the OXO Good Grips kitchen scale is one of the most reliable on the market. Additionally, a food scale is only accurate if used properly; be sure to avoid these common mistakes everyone makes when using a kitchen scale to get the most out of this precision tool.

Professional chefs agree that a good set of knives is one of the most important tools to have in your kitchen. It makes an enormous difference in your prep work, as well as your serving process. According to the Barefoot Contessa, a high-quality knife set should be a staple in any kitchen, and her particular recommendation is for a German brand sold at Williams Sonoma.

The Wüsthof Classic 6-Inch Chef's Knife runs you $135, which is not cheap; however, if you've ever spent any amount of time chopping with a dull, low-quality knife, you might find the price well worth it. Good knives are an investment, but if you take good care of them, they last a long time. One interesting tip Ina Garten shares to make her knives stay sharp longer is to store them in her knife block upside down. This helps prevent the blade from scraping against the knife block when you put it away, which can unintentionally dull your knives more rapidly.

An old-school tool Ina Garten recommends that not everyone may have in their kitchen is a food mill. A food mill is different from a blender in that when it blends food, it leaves it with texture instead of "baby food" consistency, in Garten's words (via YouTube). A food mill is an excellent tool to craft thick soups and sauces without losing texture, which so often happens with strong blenders or food processors. It's also the tool that creates the lightest mashed potatoes.

Garten's website recommends the OXO Food Mill, which costs $65. It has a stainless steel bowl, is dishwasher-safe, and includes three different discs that grind your food into fine, medium, or coarse textures. Whether you prefer your mashed potatoes delicately smooth or super chunky, this kitchen tool has you covered. If you're feeling inspired, whip up some homemade applesauce, a hearty stew, or your own personal salsa.