My friends like to tease me about the sheer quantity of what I call my ‘minor kitchen appliances’ but in reality, they are all part of my frugal lifestyle and money-saving kitchen strategy.
My air fryer, which many think is entirely optional, saves me a lot of money. Not only do I use it to reheat leftovers but it subs in nicely for a toaster and saves a ton of calories because I don’t use oil to fry when I use it. It is also great for defrosting and cooking so many foods quickly and again without oil. My air fryer has a secure spot on my kitchen counter.
My Instapot however, is bulkier so it sits under the island counter although I use it all the time. It makes short work of cooking beans, lentils, and tough meats. I also use it to cook artichokes and many longer cooking vegetables in mere minutes. Once every six weeks or so I pull out the Instapot and cook all variety of beans and lentils. I then cool them and pack them flat in freezer bags for easy additions for most of the meals I make during the week. The Instapot also makes my weekly batch of overnight yogurt which saves me a lot of money over the long term. I use a lot of yougut and Greek yogurt can be pricy, so I simply make my own and drain it to the desired thickness.
I have a little dehydrator that I fondly refer to as, ‘the little dehydrator that could’. I keep it stored under the island counter but especially in the summer when I am harvesting from the garden daily, I use it a lot to make everything from sundried tomatoes, dried vegetables, herbs, etc. I waste nothing this way and the dehydrator does all the work. However, being frugal by nature, I need to also point out that a very low oven setting could do the same job most of the time so if you don’t have a dehydrator, you can usually make do with your oven.
My food processor, which does sit on the kitchen counter, is a very popular workhorse in my kitchen. I use it for everything from simple rough chopping and blending to cutting thin slices of various vegetables. I also use it to make my go-to pie dough recipe. It works as a blender in many cases although I do have a blender as well. I bought mine at a thrift store for $12 and it is vintage which is a nice way of saying it is probably 30 years old, give or take. But it works really well although it has only two speeds which seems to suit my limited blender needs well. I keep it tucked behind my number one minor appliance on the counter, the slow cooker.
With deference to my faithful food processor, my old slow cooker works harder than any other minor appliance in my kitchen. I use it multiple times a week, year-round. It is hot in the summer and that is when I appreciate it the most because I can load a meal in there and forget about it for the rest of the day. I therefore don’t have to slave over a literal hot stove which is always welcome.
Most, if not all, of these appliances can be found at thrift stores for very little money. They are worth the reduced price of purchase nearly every single time. I also have my trusty old KitchenAid mixer on my counter. Mine is more than 15 years old and works fine. I bake a lot, so I find it very useful. Aside from mixing and kneading endless loaves of dough, I use it to mix up cookie dough which I keep frozen in balls in the freezer so I can make a couple of cookies at a moment’s notice when requested. Desserts are also made more easily using my mixer. I prefer to make desserts from scratch because they cost so much less, I can control the amount of sugar used and I can make smaller versions to keep from wasting money.
I don’t have specialty items like a rice cooker although if I cooked rice every day, I would. My minor appliances, however numerous, are in my kitchen to help me save time and money and not necessarily in that order. I buy new minor appliances very sparingly and don’t have anything like a pizza oven, a smoker, an ice cream maker, an immersion blender, etc. I do have a French press coffee maker and a hand crank pasta roller which are specialty items for sure but I use them frequently.
So, before you buy any minor kitchen appliances which are shiny and fun and frankly very tempting, think hard about what you will use frequently. If you can ensure that you will use something on average, a few times a week then that new minor appliance is probably a good idea. If not? Pivot and think about what you already have that can be pressed into service, the way I use my food processor for many tasks that can also be done in a blender. Make sure anything you use in your kitchen saves you both time and money.
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the house behind 