In culinary school, I loved using the silpats in the bakeshop to bake. The silicone mat is nonstick and reusable, making it almost unnecessary to use parchment paper (I still can’t give it up completely).

A traditional Silpat, made in France, is almost $70 a mat! Yikes!

However, a fantastic alternative product for a fraction of the price is MIU Silicone Mats. They do the same thing as Silpat. They’re nonstick, reusable and affordable! The same caution for Silpats should be exercised with MIU Silicone mats: ie, no cutting on them, only hand wash, and bake only up to 450 degrees. I love these things.

This comes in a pack of 3 with one being slightly smaller.

Check out my desserts to see how well these silicone mats work with my baked recipes

We all know of that devil veggie peeler from back in the 80’s that was all metal, super uncomfortable, and would cut you without thinking twice. Yeah, my family had one and I had one in college. I hated this thing, for the reasons mentioned above. Plus the blade would spin around halfway through peeling and it was just a huge mess.

Not anymore! The best peeler I’ve ever worked with is a Kuhn Rikon vegetable peeler. It’s sleek, comfortable, and the blade is fixated in place, so no random spinning around. For just a couple of bucks, this is the last peeler you’ll ever buy in your life.

This tool is especially helpful when you have a recipe that requires a lot of peeling like my Sweet Potato Bake or Italian Loaded Potato Casserole.

Undercooking an item can lead to disaster. Everyone should have a thermometer in their kitchen! It is a super handy tool. Especially if you’re just starting out with cooking.

I still use mine all the time for stuffed meats and rolled loaves of bread.

What I love about this swivel head is that sometimes life can be a little crazy and maybe you’re juggling a lot at the same time, you can just swivel this thermometer head to the angle that your head is at and you’ll be able to read it!

I love it and it comes with a sheath, so you don’t stab yourself with the thermometer. Safety first, kids.

This thermometer helped me make sure that my Lamb Burger Sliders turn out perfectly every time.

I can’t count how many times my spider strainer has saved my cooking! It really is an awesome little tool to have around. You can scoop items out of boiling water or hot oil without having to dump the liquid. I absolutely love this tool!

It comes in handy especially with fried foods like Deep Fried Cod, Fried Mac and Cheese Balls, Fried Risotto Balls, and Roasted Corn Fritters.

I will totally admit that box graters have their place in the kitchen, I use mine pretty often. But for a quick zest or what have you, a Microplane zester is the way to go!

I love that you can get this tool in different “ thicknesses” they have ones for citrus zest, chocolate, and even cheese. I love the citrus one because I use that the most but whatever gets the job done for you, a Microplane zester can do it. It’s also super compact, so you can store it away in an awesome utensil holder.

This useful kitchen gadget comes in super handy when making this Roasted Garlic Quick Alfredo Sauce.

This little devil can be intimidating at first but this baby is a time saver in a kitchen. Why can’t I just use a knife???

One word my friend, consistency. With an adjustable blade, you can control the thickness of your cuts. It also comes with strip attachments so you can cut different thickness of strips of food.

I use this to make my own potato chips for my Deep Fried Cod and was a huge time saver for my Asian Ramen Noodle Cabbage Salad. It does come with a guard, for the faint of heart (I totally use it when I do the strip attachments, no worries). I love this tool and recommend it to everyone!

In most professional kitchens, there will always be some container that the cooks can store their salt in. It makes it super convenient for the salt to be right there where you need it.

I especially love the lid so that no creepy stuff gets into my salt. It’s lightweight and pretty compact with a magnet to keep the lid in a closed position. One of the coolest gifts my hubby has ever given me.

You can always see my raving about this awesome kitchen gadget in most of my Facebook Live videos.

Ok, I know you’re looking at me right now and saying what?! Hear me out though!

These are not for-real cutting surfaces, you can’t get all Gordon-Ramsay on these things and not have them slip around.

I use these as a barrier between meat and my cutting board. I want to keep as much weird and grimy stuff found in uncooked meat away from my cutting board. But sometimes I still need to trim or cut up meat. These plastic cutting sheets really help me out a ton to help keep my food safe to eat!

Be sure to watch this video about my recommendations for cutting boards.

Out of the kitchen wedding gifts we received, when we got married, I probably got the most excited about my melamine mixing bowl set! They’re a hardened plastic which helps to insulate heat, perfect for bread making. And they came with lids! Hello.

I love this set for the reasons mentioned above. They stack perfectly inside each other and the lids fit in a compact way.

They’re my go-to bowls for when I make my Soft Homemade Yeast Dinner Rolls.

The last restaurant I worked at gave me a list of a few things I was expected to come to work with every day. One was this awesome tool. I used this rubber bowl scraper every day for nearly 2 years. 

It’s perfect for scraping things together and leaves very little on the cutting board. If you need to get minced herbs or garlic, for example, from your cutting board to your pan, this scraper will get it all together in a nice and neat manner. You can also use it to scrape out your mixing bowls, it leaves a bowl virtually clean!

This is a perfect tool that helped make this Moroccan Couscous Salad recipe super clean to put together.

So I know that this isn’t as ambiguous as the other items but baking on a pizza stone is really a game-changer! I have mentioned it before in my pizza making post, it crisps up your pizza crust like no other. I also like to bake my bread directly on this stone, as well as my cookies.

A pizza stone helps create an even bake for the items baked on it, so you don’t have random cookies that are underdone and those that are overdone. I love cooking with my pizza stone and you need to have one!

Here are my pizza recipes that you HAVE to try once you get a pizza stone:

How to Make Pizza Dough From Scratch

Shrimp and Asparagus Pizza with Romesco Sauce

Date and Asparagus Pizza

Butternut Squash Pizza with Fig and Cherry Jam