Best Investments of 2009

Ok. I know that January is almost over and I'm still talking about 2009 but today as I was washing stuff to be put in the dishwasher I glanced at my rice maker that was dirty from dinner last night. I thought in my head " oh rice maker you've made my life so different". Then I realized that I should really blog about my favorite investments of 2009.

First up, is my little 3 cup rice cooker. Before this I was making rubbery/crunchy/failed rice. I could never figure out what I was doing wrong. You boil water, add rice/oil, cook until done. What could go wrong? I think its the steaming that you get with a rice cooker that turns out perfectly steamed yummy rice everytime.



I picked up this one at CVS for $15. It literally has saved me from throwing away tons of batches of ruined rice. I :heart: you rice maker ( and so does the doggies..b'c now they get yummy brown rice added to their kibbies)

Next is my espresso machine. I know you're probably like "enough already! we are soo sick of hearing about your espresso machine!" but truth be told every morning when I walk in the kitchen I am so happy to see my little machine ready to use.



This bad boy I picked up for around $100 with tax and a 20% off coupon at Bed Bath and Beyond. The stupid part was I had to buy a milk frothing pitcher and a little stamper to push the grounds down. Why not just include those and sell the coffee maker for $110?

I'm looking for some tools that I can add to my kitchen for 2010. So far we bought an electric knife.


Its awesome for slicing homemade bread into normal slices instead of having big old hunks of bread ( which are good but makes the bread go away sooo fast!!) .

One of our big Christmas presents was a kitchen aid food processor.

Which I adore. This weekend I made 2 large batches of homemade soup base ( A potato soup and a broccoli soup) and was able to get 8 pints ( i think..they're about 2 cups worth of soup each). The basic recipe I use involved boiling the veggies and then processing it until its smooth and adding about 1-2c of chunked boiled veggies. At this part I can can them and when we are ready to eat them take them out and thin them with a little bit of milk and cheese. I was really frustrated after going to the grocery store and looking for some canned soups to have on hand and they were $2.50 and up for 2 people. I knew I could make something with way less sodium and tastes better! My other project this weekend was buying a few blocks of cheese and shredding them in the processor. Now I have shredded mozzarella, colby cheese, and cheddar.

Anything else that I should add to my kitchen repertoire?

Cheers-

Raech