Chef-Recommended Kitchen Tools
Kitchen gadgets are meant to make cooking quicker and easier, but not every tool lives up to the hype.
According to executive chef Maeve Rochford, winner of Food Network’s Holiday Baking Championship and owner of Sugar and Scribe in La Jolla, California, some gadgets simply “aren’t worth the drawer space.” Instead, Rochford recommends investing in multitasking tools you’ll reach for again and again rather than filling your kitchen with single-purpose picks. She encourages home cooks to “think of your kitchen as real estate,” keeping everyday essentials within easy reach and making room for tools that truly earn their place.
Ahead, she shares the kitchen tools and gadgets you can skip — and the ones worth buying instead.
Skip: Stand Mixers
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Chef Maeve tells PEOPLE that while she loves the look of a KitchenAid stand mixer, she prefers a quality hand mixer like this Breville model, which she owns herself. She points out that unless you have room to keep a stand mixer on your countertop, it often ends up tucked away in a cabinet, so you’re less likely to pull it out for everyday baking.
“At the end of the day, it is significantly faster and easier to use a great hand mixer,” Rochford says, noting that hand mixers are easier to store, quicker to clean, and can handle nearly everything the average baker makes.
Skip: Food Processors
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If there’s one small appliance Rochford thinks nearly every home cook should own, it’s an immersion blender. She reaches for hers over a bulky food processor to make everything from sauces and homemade mayonnaise to blended soups. “I probably have three at my house,” she says. This immersion blender also comes with multiple attachments, so that you can blend, whisk, and chop without additional appliances.
Pro Tip: Skip the Salad Spinner
According to Chef Maeve, spinning lettuce creates tiny tears in the leaves, causing it to wilt faster instead of staying crisp. She explains, “When you put them in those things, you’re literally beating up on the cells, so it’ll be more wilty. It won’t be as crunchy.”
Skip: Specialty Pasta Gadgets
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Chef Maeve doesn’t hold back when it comes to pasta gadgets. “Anything involving spaghetti is ridiculous,” she tells PEOPLE, calling out everything from spaghetti claws to pasta strainers. Instead, she recommends a pot like this one, which has a built-in strainer so you can drain pasta without grabbing a separate colander.
The nonstick pot also has pour spouts on both sides, making it easy to drain pasta whether you’re left- or right-handed. It’s one less kitchen tool to store, and one less dish to wash.
Skip: Fruit Slicers
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Banana, avocado, and strawberry slicers are a hard pass for Rochford. “These tools legitimately serve no purpose, oftentimes create waste, and they’re not even that functional,” she says. One exception? A cherry pitter, which Rochford calls “worth its weight in gold” for anyone who regularly bakes or cooks with cherries. This OXO version pits up to six cherries at once with little effort, and the comfortable, non-slip grip keeps the process quick and easy.
Pro Tip: Stick With One Vegetable Peeler
“I saw a tomato peeler once, and I died of laughter,” Rochford says. Her advice is simple: Stick with one good peeler that works for everything from carrots and potatoes to cucumbers and apples.
Skip: Cheese Graters
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Skip the bulky box and rotary cheese graters. “What you need to get yourself is a microplane,” Rochford tells PEOPLE. She uses it to grate cheese and zest citrus, while a vegetable peeler handles larger cheese shavings. As for rotary models? Rochford says they take up unnecessary space and all eventually break.
Skip: Digital Meat Thermometers
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Chef Maeve prefers an old-fashioned meat thermometer over digital versions. “The old-school one… you can trust him longer,” she says. She likes that it doesn’t require batteries, holds up well over time, and appreciates that oven-safe analog models can stay in the oven while food cooks. This option lets you monitor the temperature without opening the oven door, keeping heat where it belongs.
Pro Tip: Keep a Spring Whisk in Your Drawer
Rochford swears by a spring whisk for everything from emulsifying salad dressings to whipping eggs. “It will make absolutely the fluffiest scrambled eggs you’ve ever had in your life,” she says.
Skip: A Vitamix Blender
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If smoothies are your main priority, Rochford says you can skip the bulky Vitamix. Unless you’re cooking for more than four people every day, she recommends a personal blender like this Ninja model instead. It blends directly into the included cup, so you can make your smoothie and head out the door without dirtying extra dishes. It’s also handy for homemade dressings and sauces, and small blending jobs that don’t call for a full-size blender.
