Simply Gum — All-Natural Chewing Gum
If you like chewing gum but aren’t into artificial sweeteners, preservatives, or synthetic materials like plastic, Simply Gum is right up your alley.
Maverick Leave-in Wireless Thermometer
The Maverick Wireless Thermometer keeps you up-to-date from afar about the temperature of your smoker and the meat within, freeing you up to do other things with your day.
Rip van Wafels
Rip van Wafels are a healthy and tasty snack designed to be paired with a mug of hot coffee. They’re a great way to add a little mindfulness to your coffee breaks.
PlanetBox Rover Lunchbox
The PlanetBox Rover is an awesome little stainless steel lunchbox for kids and adults alike. It has several compartments to keep food items apart, bento-style, while the two included round/lidded containers (one large, one small) are great for dipping sauces and/or yogurt. Its reusable stainless steel construction is both sturdy and eco-friendly. It works perfectly for solid “finger foods” like sandwiches, fruits+veggies,…
Uuni 2 (Sponsor)
Welcome to the wood-fired revolution. Uuni 2 is the definitive tool for your garden or outdoor kitchen this fall. At fraction of the cost of a traditional wood-fired oven, and with it’s compact size, it blows the competition straight out of the water. This is how it works: Light it up, and it’s ready to cook in 10 minutes Prepare your home-made…
Frontier Organic Ground Ceylon Cinnamon
Up until recently, I’ve been happily buying saigon cinnamon to sprinkle on oatmeal and toast (and sometimes my coffee). That is, until I heard that out of all the cinnamon varieties out there, saigon contained by far and away the highest levels of the liver-damaging substance coumarin. Yikes. The type of cinnamon with the least coumarin is known as ceylon—also known as…
Reminder: Our Guide to Backyard Cooking is Awesome
For Tools & Toys readers in the US, Labor Day is just a week away. It’s the perfect time to close out the summer with a great cook out with friends and family. We’ve got a great guide to make sure you have the right gear for all your backyard cooking. Even if you’ve got a great grill already, I highly recommend you…
‘Will It Waffle?’ by Daniel Shumski
If there’s one thing I love in the morning (besides my daily regimen of coffee injections), it’s a good Belgian waffle. So, you’ll understand why I’m more than excited about Daniel Shumski’s upcoming cookbook, Will It Waffle? You’ll learn how to waffle all sorts of stuff: bacon, eggs, hash browns, muffins, French toast, mac & cheese, sweet potato gnocci, potato and cheese…
Zoku Slow Pops — Mini Pop Molds
Summer is already halfway over, but there’s plenty of hot weather left before we move on to more civilized seasons. If you’re still looking for ways to beat the heat, you could do worse than picking up these mini-sized Zoku Slow Pops molds. They let you make up to 9 ice pops at once, which are easily removed from their silicone casings.…
Waring Pro WMK600 Double Belgian-Waffle Maker
I grew up eating (and loving) cheap frozen waffles, so when my wife and I received a Belgian waffle maker as a wedding gift a few years ago, we didn’t expect to use it much. Once we finally tried it though, we knew there was no going back. The only downside is that the process is slow, especially noticeable when we have…
iGrill 2
The iGrill 2 is a Bluetooth-enabled grilling thermometer designed for pros and serious enthusiasts but simple enough for amateur grillers to use. Building on the design and features of the original iGrill, the iGrill 2 has upped its probe capacity from 2 to 4 (though it only comes with two) and can now be magnetically mounted onto the side of your grill…
Witmer Company Peanut Butter Mixer
I only buy peanut butter of the all-natural variety, meaning the only ingredients are roasted peanuts and salt. The stuff is delicious, but it separates in the jar and it can be a pain (sometimes even a mess) to stir it back together. That is, until I discovered this peanut butter mixer. It’s a curved mixing rod that pokes through a “lid”…
Tramontina Prima 12-inch Stainless Steel Fry Pan
After yesterday’s post about the All-Clad 12″ stainless steel fry pan, reader Jake Spurlock wrote in to let us know about a potentially better deal: the Tramontina stainless steel fry pan. “The All-Clad is nice, but this $50 Tramontina is just as good at a third of the price: http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/08/equipment-the-all-clad-vs-tramontina-skillet.html” I don’t have any first-hand experience with the Tramontina but I was…
All-Clad 12-inch Stainless Steel Fry Pan
A common mistake I see people make is overloading their kitchens with skillets of all shapes and sizes. You really only need two to cover your bases, though: a cast iron skillet and a good stainless steel pan. For the latter, the All-Clad 12″ fry pan is my recommendation. You might think I’m crazy for suggesting a $150 pan, but believe me,…
Victorinox Fibrox 8-Inch Chef’s Knife
I’m at the point in my cooking “education” (part self-taught, part watching a lot of YouTube videos) where I’m starting to get fed up with my cheap knife set. Several of the knives are on their way out or were never really good to begin with, and the one knife still worth my time —a Santoku model—isn’t the most versatile tool around.…
Paprika Recipe Manager for iOS
For a long time, my go-to recipe manager was Evernote. Then, it was Basil for iPad. It’s been a while since that switch, but the limitation of Basil being iPad-only (amongst a few other quibbles) has finally started wearing on me, so I’ve been looking for another replacement. I should’ve known that our sister site The Sweet Setup had already compared recipe…
Mercer Hell’s Handle Fish Spatula
As I’ve mentioned in the past, the best tool in my kitchen is my cast iron skillet. My cheap metal spatula kind of sucks though, so I’ve been on the lookout for something better. Thankfully, The Sweethome did the leg work for me by testing a bunch of spatulas and naming the Mercer Hell’s Handle fish spatula ($23) as their top pick.…
Srirachup
On those rare occasions when ketchup gets used in our house—meaning, when we’re feeling too lazy to cook and just toss some frozen corn dogs into the oven—I always mix in a little sriracha to spice things up a bit. I gotta tell you, it’s an addictive combination. With that said, I’m super excited to try this new thing called Srirachup, made…
Zojirushi NS-TSC10 Rice Cooker
Sometimes there’s just nothing better than a simple bowl of steaming, slightly sweet, slightly sticky, Japanese-style short grain rice. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it. It’s possible to make this stuff in a standard stovetop pot (and I have), but it’s a little time-consuming and requires close attention. A good, automated rice cooker like the Zojirushi NS-TSC10 makes the process way…
Lodge’s Pre-Seasoned Cast Iron Skillets
If you ask me, no kitchen is complete without at least one cast iron skillet around — they just cook food so perfectly and only get better with age. The one I own used to belong to my grandma and was given to me after she’d passed away. It has so many years of seasoning on it, I can’t even see the…