These Are a Few of My Favorite Things
I hope those who celebrate Thanksgiving had a wonderful time with the people you love this past week. I’m still eating leftover pies for breakfast. Not a bad thing since pies go better with coffee than muffins do.
Without further ado, here are some of my favorite things.1
3 1/2-qt Le Creuset classic sauteuse oven: Having stayed home longer than I ever had in my adult life these past three years, I’ve come to see clearly what items in my kitchen are useless. After a recent radical culling, my kitchen is pretty bare right now. I don’t see myself parting with this super versatile enameled cast-iron sauteuse oven, though, as I make nearly all of my Thai curries in it. The vessel is as wide as most Dutch ovens at the base and large enough to make 3 to 4 servings of curry (which is how much I usually make when I cook at home and when I test my recipes); however, with it being much shallower than a Dutch oven, you get better evaporation and, therefore, a more concentrated and flavorful curry. The sloped sides also make the frying of the curry paste, i.e., the initial stage of most Thai coconut-based curries, much easier, as it makes the continuous stirring effortless. It’s beautiful enough to be a serving container and, if you know Le Creuset, also durable enough to outlast you. I love this sauteuse to bits.
Saltverk salt: Two layovers didn’t count as a visit to Iceland; they, however, gave me enough time to buy lots of Icelandic salt from various stores at Keflavík International Airport. After my last stash was gone, Saltverk has been my go-to Icelandic finishing salt. I’m sure you have heard people say that sea salt is sea salt no matter what type it is or where it comes from, and I don’t argue with that. However, I have in my kitchen right now at least six different brands of sea salt and fleur de sel from four different countries, including Thailand, and I can tell you my steak has never tasted better than when it’s finished with Saltverk flaky salt.2 Their Arctic thyme salt, especially, is phenomenal; I recommend you try this variety first if you don’t want to commit to the whole set because I think it’s the best (the plain variety and the lava variety tie as the second-best; I like the seaweed variety the least).
When I cook a steak these days, I don’t season the meat at all; I cook it plain, then I finish it at the table with flaky Saltverk salt, crushed between my fingers. This salt has a perfect grain size; anything finer than this often leads to oversalting at the table, and anything larger requires a salt mill. Within the same price point, nothing (except maybe Maldon)—not even the more expensive fleur de sel or the much-lauded Himalayan pink salt (which I don’t get)—has come close to it taste-wise. But this is just my opinion and my taste; take it—pun shamelessly intended—with a grain of salt.
Mighty Bite 5-lb sausage stuffer: I know, I know—a sausage stuffer is not the most holiday-y of holiday gifts, but if you’re an avid home sausage maker or want to become one, you need this workhorse. It’s in an entirely different league from the KitchenAid sausage attachment.
I would argue that the lack of proper tools has prevented people from discovering how easy it is to make sausage at home, which allows them to control what goes into their sausage and be creative with the different flavor combinations. The whole thing about stuffing your sausage with a plastic funnel or a spoon handle may work for those who make, like, a pound or less at a time, but I find the process to be less of a kitchen hack and more of a messy, time-consuming, and often infuriating process. And, to be honest, if you’re going to go through the trouble of sourcing all the sausage essentials, including natural casings, you might as well make at least five pounds, if not ten, at a time and keep the sausage frozen. With a good, solid proper tool, anyone can be a super-duper sausage maker.
I couldn’t have tested and retested and retested the sausage recipes in Flavors of the Southeast Asian Grill without my Mighty Bite sausage stuffer. Go for the stainless-steel tubes; they’re easier to clean and more durable. Also, unlike plastic tubes, steel tubes don’t hold on to odor.
COSORI 10-tray food dehydrator: A thing that dries things as a holiday gift? Well, yes, if it is as versatile and works as well as this dehydrator. I bought this machine on a whim a few months before the beginning of the pandemic, and I can’t tell you how glad I am that I did. It’s so easy to use and so reliable. You set the temperature and the time, and you let it do its thing.
Many batches of neua daet diao, the super delicious fried sun-dried beef, have been made these past three years with the help of this machine. I got my fried beef-sticky rice-jaeo lunch routine down pat now. I soak the rice overnight, cook it in the morning, then keep it warm. I prep and—rain or shine—”sun-dry” the beef in this machine (which works faster than an oven). Then when I’m about to eat, I make a bowl of jaeo sauce, then season and fry up the beef strips. I love this machine so much.3
Euro Cuisine YM80 yogurt maker: To be honest, I don’t know if there are newer or better yogurt makers on the market these days because this yogurt maker has worked so reliably for me for the past fifteen years that I’ve never needed to look for another. I know some people make yogurt in the Instant Pot, and that’s fine. I’ve never done that. I had an IP for a while, didn’t think it gave me back enough to justify the counter space it occupied, and gave it away (we had an it’s-not-you-it’s-me talk). And when I want to make a large batch of yogurt, I know I can make it in an oven, too; it’s a little fussier and not always reliable, but it works for the most part.
However, if you want one portion of homemade yogurt in a glass jar each day, this yogurt maker is your best friend. In the morning, gently and slowly warm up your milk of choice4 to about 115° to 120°F5, stir in your dried culture of choice6, pour the mixture into the glass jar, turn on the machine, put the jars of finished yogurt in the fridge before you go to bed, then wake up to your fresh, creamy homemade yogurt.7 A heavy-bottomed pot with a pour spout is also your best friend.8
Serbian-style cleaver: I have a few Chinese-style cleavers, and I love them. (I also have a 4685/21 Wüsthof cleaver that looks and—weighing in over two pounds—feels in your hand like it would perform great in the kitchen. However, I’ve never used that cleaver because it is a prize from the folks at SAVEUR magazine who gave it to me when my old blog won their best regional food blog award in 2010. The cleaver seems to have been discontinued, but if you can find it, I’d buy it.) That said, this Serbian-style cleaver/knife I bought almost three years ago has impressed the heck out of me.
For everyday cutting and slicing, especially when it comes to Thai cooking, give me a simple santoku and a reliable nikiri, and I’m all set. Really. These two and a paring knife9 and an unfancy boning knife take care of all the essential things I do with knives around here.
However, Thai cooking involves quite a bit of cutting through bone-in pieces of meat—not just at the joints but often right in the middle of, say, a thigh or leg bone. So to avoid breaking hard bones into dangerous shards, I need a sharp and heavy-duty knife like this—one quick, decisive thwack; one clean, shard-free cut. I have loved using my Serbian-style cleaver, and I highly recommend it.
OXO Good Grips food scale: I usually don’t use a food scale when I cook, but I can’t bake without it. A digital food scale makes it so easy to measure things accurately without dirtying up all the measuring cups.
I’m not in love with the aesthetics of this food scale (or anything OXO makes, for that matter). However, you really can’t beat OXO when it comes to functionality. This scale is easy to use and reliable. I love that you can pull out the display panel. This feature, which most scales don’t have, comes in handy when you weigh something in a bowl large enough to keep you from seeing the display. This is the one you want if you’re in the market for a good digital food scale.
That’s pretty much the list! I hope you find it somewhat helpful. Thank you so much for subscribing to The Epestle, which, of course, can be given as a gift to someone who you know will enjoy it.
P.S. if you want to plan ahead for the grilling season next year—or any time of year for those of you who live in a warmer climate—here’s These Are a Few of My Favorite Things: The Grilling Edition, published earlier this year.
Please note that some of these links are affiliate links, meaning I get a tiny amount of money if you buy the items. However, I’m not paid by the manufacturers, and you’re not paying more in any way.
I have tried Jacobsen Salt, Redmond Real Salt, Celtic salt, and many others.
My recipes for steamed sticky rice, fried sun-dried beef, and jaeo sauce are in Simple Thai Food.
Try making homemade sheep’s milk yogurt with this machine. The best.
Here’s a good thermometer for you.
This one is my go-to, but you can also the type that makes Bulgarian-style yogurt or Icelandic skyr or kefir.
A tip: If you follow most yogurt makers’ or yogurt culture starters’ package instructions, you’ll usually end up with softer, runnier yogurt than most commercial yogurts, which typically contain thickeners. I like my yogurt to set thicker and creamier without having to use anything but milk and starter, so I usually stir in 1/2 cup of dried milk powder for every quart of milk before I heat the whole thing to the target temp (if you add the milk powder after, it will bring the temp down). Experiment with both nonfat milk powder and whole milk powder to see which gives you the consistency you like better. I always use whole milk and fortify it with nonfat dry milk; this gives me yogurt with the texture and mouthfeel I like the most.
Something like this is great, especially since it’s nonstick because milk tends to form a sticky brown film at the bottom of a pot which can become little brown bits in your yogurt—or, worse, burnt bits.
If you’re ever around Thai people, notice how they peel things. While most people in the West, based on what I’ve seen, peel things with the blade of the knife turning toward the body, Thais (unless they’re trained by Western chefs) peel things with the blade of the knife turning away from the body, guiding the knife with their index finger pressing firmly on top of the knife blade and the thumb pushing the spine forward. I, too, peel things the way most Thais do; I don’t even know how to peel any other way. In light of this, a paring knife with a sharp corner at the heel of the blade (like what you see in a Wüsthof Classic IKON—otherwise an excellent paring knife for those who peel in the opposite direction) can present an issue. I cut my middle finger the first time I used it, and to avoid future injuries, I have to position my fingers in such a way that feels unnatural to me. Not fun. Those with the same problem I do may prefer a Mercer Culinary M20003 Genesis, which has a cornerless blade that blends right into the handle (similar to most paring knives you’ll find in Thailand).