What kitchen gear can you not live without (or at least would miss if it suddenly disappeared?)
Air Fryer, rice cooker/instapot and sharp kitchen knives.
The air fryer is probably the best invention ever for single people. It has pretty much replaced the oven, most instances where I would use a stove top and many uses of frying pans with the exception of eggs and certain pasta dishes.
The instapot/rice cooker has simplified almost everything cooking wise for me.
As for sharp knives, what cook doesn’t need them?
What kitchen gear/gadget you would miss?
Otherwise late open thread/threat!
All of the ones you mentioned are my go to tools. I use the instapot as a slow cooker too quite often. A wok is probably the only other thing I couldn’t live without. Since I am the cook, my family appreciates 1 or 2 pot dinners since I am not doing all the dishes if I just spent hours cooking!
A sharp chef’s knife and a good saute pan will let me do the vast majority of my good cooking. Everything else is negotiable.
…kinda joining the chorus, I guess…like…in terms of “getting by”…I can remember stacking a frying pan on top of a saucepan (with the rolled dips for pouring so it could still vent) to boil the rice while I fried what was going in it…& a pair of chopsticks & a decent paring knife being pretty much all the rest of what I added to the kettle/hotplate combo…so…give or take camp stoves or actual fire…the chopsticks & the paring knife make the cut for outdoor kitchen-ing, too
…& I could likely use an airfryer &/or instapot…but…I get by…get a fair bit of use out of a sits-in-a-pot steamer &/or the stackable bamboo sort…& more out of a wok…which is maybe too big to take camping but the first thing I miss in some kitchen I’m visiting that doesn’t play that way…few different sorts of oven tray/pan/tin & strainer & a sieve…picked up a sort of tiny (3in-ish) cleaver that might be nearly as useful as that paring knife somewhere along the line…can’t really bake without a decent mixing bowl & scales that are at least consistent
…&…I guess the more people you have to feed…sometimes you need a bigger knife…but for a while I guess I’ve been coveting some of the nice japanese ones…santoku get a good press & I get the appeal…but…if money was no object…the bunka ones that are like an inverted tanto shape…one of them & a nice nakiri…I could probably make space in a drawer for those even if I have lived this long without dropping a few hundred to a grand+ for two bits of sharp metal?