My Favorite Kitchen Things

Last night I used one of my favorite things. My fancy schmancy new Kitchenaid mixer. Ryan got it for me before he left Whirlpool. (for those of you who don't know, Kitchenaid is a division of Whirlpool, so Ryan used his employee discount to get this baby for me!) I used it to make the pie crust dough for an apple pie. Last year I had to use my ol' hand mixer to do the dirty work of pie crust making. This year it was so much more easy to just dump the ingredients in and flip a little switch and let it do it's thing! Whoo-hoo! I love my Kitchenaid mixer! I think the pie will taste even better too, don't you?! Ryan bought it shortly before we left (yes, taking one last advantage of the blessed employee discount!) I didn't even have time to get it out of the box before we moved. Not that I had a place to put it, our kitchen was severely lacking counter space. But now I have plenty of counter space so it is out where I can set my gaze upon it and dream of making delectable delights! Not to mention that it is chrome and had a purdy stainless bowl. Not hard on the eyes, nope, not hard on the eyes.

One of my other favorite kitchen items is this mini chopper, also made by Kitchenaid. My mother has a similar mini chopper and I used it once when visiting and knew I had to have one. Ryan got this one for me for Christmas last year. Of course he could have saved my mother and I some work in the kitchen had he given it to me a hour earlier when we were getting the stuffing ready for the turkey! Anyway, it has become a 'must have' for me. I use it to chop up onions, nuts, and other vegetables, but mostly I use it to shred cheese. I hate shredding cheese! I have one of those rotating hand dealies and the cheese always gets stuck between the rotating blade and the holder 'thingy'. And to wash the thing is a bother as well. But, the mini chopper takes all the ugliness of shredding cheese away for me. And the job is done in no time at all! It's not difficult to clean either. Do I sound like an infomercial? I could so make some cashola and sell these babies!

I'm not one who loves to spend much time in the kitchen so when I come across something that makes my job easier and faster then I'm all for it! So, there you have it, my two most treasured items in my kitchen (along with the dishwasher, but that's not really mine, it comes with the rental). Now if I could only get one of those replicator things from Star Trek that automatically produces completed entres.......