Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Unitaskers and the whisk

Jon loves Alton Brown, and one of Alton Brown's "things" is his anti-unitasker stance. (Except in the case of using dried beans as pie weights, but I digress.) In general, Jon and I try to avoid unitaskers, but quite a few have found their way into our kitchen. (Moving seems to be the best cure for unitasker accumulation, and we have lived in the same place for more than two years now, so they've built up a bit.) I find a pastry cutter really useful when making pie dough, but it definitely can't do anything else. We have a coffee maker and a Teavana tea maker (which is surprisingly great). And yes, we have at least one ice cream maker. We let unitaskers in when they make a common kitchen task significantly easier or more successful and don't take up an inordinate amount of space.

Which brings me to the whisk. Are we the only people who feels that a whisk is not only a unitasker but a unitasker that is not very good at its one task? Usually I reach for a fork instead of a whisk because the forks are in a more convenient location in my kitchen. When I do go to the trouble of getting a whisk out, I usually switch to a fork after a few minutes because it is better at whisking. Maybe I'm just bad at using a whisk. I don't know. In any case, I don't think our whisks will be making the next move with us.

What about you? Do you have any favorite or least favorite unitaskers? Any tips for more effective whisking?

5 comments:

mollyjade said...

I agree! Either you want to mix things quickly with a fork (muffin method) or you want to beat the hell out of them with an electric mixer. What good is a whisk?

Jamie said...

I've been thinking about it and my biggest unitasker is the toaster. I wouldn't miss it, but my kids were. As for whisks, I've found them useful occasionally, but for most things, yeah a fork works best.

Queen of the Castle said...

I LOVE my whisk. I don't own a mixer, so it's me and my whisk. There are whisking techniques and different whisks work better for different jobs. I know, I won't convince you, but I'm keeping my whisk and probably going to buy a few more. (Incidentally I think Jamie would use the whisk more if he did more baking.)

Evelyn said...

Hm, Arlynda, maybe I'll come visit sometime, and you can tutor me in the ways of whisking. I must not have the right technique.

Queen of the Castle said...

We would love to have you come whisk, I mean visit us. My whisking techniques aren't anything special, I should focus more on them I could probably get a lot better at it. But I'm totally willing to whisk something up with you!