hi guys my name is ming i'm a
professional chef and
major kitchen nerd on this show i'm
going to share with you some of the many
tips and tricks i've learnt over the
years
now before we get into cooking i think
it's essential to talk about
what you need in your kitchen what are
the very essential cooking utensils you
require
what about pots pans powered appliances
i'm going to give you the lowdown on all
this today
right let's talk about pots and pans and
what's essential
in general you only need three
categories something to boil things in
something to stir
things in and something to fry things in
if you cover these three categories
you should be fine first up your boiling
pot
this is the largest pot in your entire
arsenal of pots and pans
you want this to be quite wide and quite
tall generally to hold a fair amount of
liquid you're boiling things in this
you're making soups
stalks porridge next up we have the
sauce pot
now the defining factor here is it's got
a nice long handle
and it's relatively deep because you're
going to be stirring things in this
this is perfect for sauces and ideally
for instant noodles as well as scrambled
eggs
right onto frying pans i have three
frying pans here
of differing types of materials do i
need all three
no you don't this is the first kind this
is a
thin light non-stick frying pan
i don't recommend these pans for some
reasons first they're not actually that
cheap
and number two they don't retain a lot
of heat because they're so thin
when you try and cook in these the heat
from the pan is immediately transferred
to the food
and then you don't get that temperature
difference that colors your food nicely
the only benefit they have going for
them is that they are quite light
the pan i do recommend is the heavy
bottomed non-stick frying pan
hear that that's thicker metal now this
is still a non-stick pan so you got to
treat it with care
pro tip here you can find some very very
good quality heavy bottom non-stick
frying pans
at a certain large furniture store
that has the color scheme of yellow and
blue and finally
the third kind of frying pan it is not
an essential item
but it is extremely useful and i want to
talk about it this is
cast iron this is the heaviest of all
the thick heavy gauge metal
retains a lot of heat so if you are
looking to crisp up a steak sear it
really hard
this is the pan you use to transfer a
good amount of heat into the meat
of the three types of frying pans if i
had to pick one i would always go for a
nice good quality
heavy bottomed non-stick frying pan
splurge on this a little bit it will
last you a long time
if you take care of it properly
these are cleaning sponges and cleaning
things what are the differences between
these
first up yellow and dark green this is
abrasive
never never use this on a non-stick
frying pan
never don't use it don't do it if you do
this is what you get
you end up stripping all of the nonstick
coating and the pan becomes
stick what you do want to use on
non-stick pans
are these these are also slightly
abrasive but they're not made with
materials that are harder than the
non-stick coating
this is basically a plastic brush that
has a little bit more texture
you can use these on non-stick pans just
make sure you're
gentle and you're removing food and not
the surface of the non-stick coating
this is a hokunita house brush when i
was young my dad used to tell me that my
hair was like this
the specific phrase he used was baozhat
which means abalone brush barius hut
is the best brush for a non-stick it
doesn't scratch
but the bristles are nice and heavy duty
so you can really go to town and remove
all sorts of
gunk that is caked up and burnt on your
pen
[Applause]
now when you're first starting out the
kitchen right you don't want to spend
too much money
you don't want to fill it up with
appliances you may or may not use
so these three to me are the most
essential very useful and give you a
whole bunch of fun things you can
already do
this is an air fryer an air fryer is
essentially a small
oven right it heats up a small
compartment it forces it full of very
hot air
and whatever's inside there gets crispy
gets cooked very fast
so this drawer is the compartment and
you've got this little
basket and you put your items there you
can put some fall in it so i love to use
this for things like
reheating fried chicken roasted pork
anything that needs dry heat
this does very well and that's very very
quickly next up
we're talking about rice cookers rice
cookers help you make rice in a perfect
quality
every single time another pro tip with
the rice cooker
is that you can do a whole bunch of
things in it as well as you cook your
rice you can cook meats on top you can
cook vegetables
all the flavor drips into the rice you
can make soups you can make stocks in
this you can make porridge and a rice
cooker
the possibilities are endless right so
the next piece of equipment that i think
is essential crucial this is a little
bit unorthodox but trust me when i say
this is gonna save you so much headache
so much stress
it's gonna make cleanup so much easier
as well the item i'm talking about
is the stick blender right so this stick
blender has
a motor attachment and depending on what
hit you put onto this attachment
gives you a lot of capabilities right
now this is the blender attachment and
if i stuck this into a pot of soup
i could turn this on
and before you know it i got pumpkin
soup i got cream of mushroom soup
i got a roasted tomato soup i got all
sorts of soups
see i didn't want to use just my hands
to whisk up like a whole batch of
meringues or egg whites
this baby i can turn on z
with swiss christmases and i have a nice
fluffy bedroom meringues
in you know like a third of the time so
motorized whisk
and the final attachment that i have
here is this
little container i can connect this jug
to the motor and what i essentially have
here
is a mini food processor blender
attachment
food processor what is the difference
between these two and why are they
essential
blending is essentially taking a solid
and turning that into a liquid you want
gloopy texture you want it soft and
flowy
chopping this is also known as food
processing you want to chop that up very
fine you want to mince it
but you don't want to turn it into soup
so they're two separate things
and this one appliance gives you
these two functions a bit in a rather
basic fashion
essentials for prep before you cook you
gotta prepare stuff
cutting boards what do you need what's
essential i always advocate having at
least
two boards so that you can use one for
raw food and one for cooked food
or fresh vegetables and fruits a small
board is very useful it's easy to clean
and wipe
off and it's very light my favorite
board of all
is a large wood board in a lot of
kitchens this is where a lot of food is
is plated and finished make sure that
your main board
has enough space so that as you're
cutting you don't crowd yourself
main board needs to be big put a hand
down knife down
comfortably if your board is too small
the chance of you cutting yourself
increases a lot more so chef's knife
this does
95 of all my work i have a curved edge
this fits my hand nicely paring knife
small knife for smaller jobs
small cutting and together these two
knives will be about 99
of all you need more prep essentials
as you cook spoons teaspoons and
tablespoons incredibly useful
for all your needs tasting scooping
ingredients
this is called a strainer very
self-explanatory
very useful tongs for handling raw
meats or handling cooked items i like
two types
a more durable heavy duty metal version
and one that has a rubber tip so that
when i'm stirring things in a non-stick
pan i don't scratch it
the whisk very useful for stirring
sauces breaking up bits of things
wooden utensils these are great they
don't scratch things and they're very
durable and hardy
two types here one that has a flat edge
let me scrape a pan better
and another that is a round spoon
see the profiles different usage both
essential
a ladle ladle is always great you need
something to pick up larger amounts of
liquids
one of my favorite pieces of equipment
of all the rubber or silicon spatula
now these can be obtained online very
very affordably and they're incredibly
useful for stirring things without
scratching pans
for mixing things together and for
scraping out bowls because
they conform which means every nook and
cranny is accessible to you
you don't waste anything and clean up is
easier as well general prep essentials
can opener there are many kinds you want
two things look out for the bit
the part that bites into the can to be
metal and you want it to be as sturdy as
possible because cans are these tough
things
peelers obviously you use them for
fruits for vegetables
get a durable one pay a little bit more
this is metal
and it's japanese the last thing on my
prep list is probably the most essential
these are mixing bowls you can come with
plastic ceramic metal
i like metal because they're almost
indestructible the absolute bare minimum
that i recommend
is two sizes small and large
the large ones are great for mixing
things in for tossing salads for
preparing food items the small ones are
great for holding condiments after
you've prepared them
or for sealing and putting things into
the fridge uh to marinate for a while
in total maybe two large bowls and four
or five small bowls
so a lot of you are gonna ask why can't
i just use my regular serving bowls
you can but they're not durable and they
will break eventually
metal bowls on the other hand are
lighter
[Music]
more durable and they don't break
using metal bowls for prep will reduce
the wear and tear on your pretty
gorgeous serving bowls and they help you
organize your cooking too
okay before we end this episode i want
to talk a little bit about single use
items things that you can only use for
one purpose
a lot of these are quite affordable and
they come with videos you see them
online they look kind of compelling they
do pretty amazing things i've got three
of them here we're gonna evaluate
how effective they are what are these
items going up against
they're going up against my trusty knife
so the objective of this watermelon
cutter is to make watermelon cubes
and then the next thing is i take this
and i
oh wow that was actually quite easy
it worked i wouldn't call these cubes
though they're kind of like
watermelon tiles i gotta say this is
quite impressive
it's relatively quick the end piece
looks a little bit misshapen
it's like it's just punching it off the
side of that watermelon so
out of one two three four pieces there's
always one wonky looking piece
but the rest are acceptable but i think
my main problem with this
is there's a fair amount of wastage
because of the curved edge of the
watermelon
i'm gonna have to avoid some sections if
not i will
start to scoop up parts of the appeal of
the watermelon
right let's see how this works out with
a knife
[Music]
to me with a knife a watermelon cube
looks like a cube straight cut edges
nice and clean i haven't sort of juiced
the watermelon by pushing an implement
through it
now i'm not sure if you can see this but
there is an obvious color difference to
me
with the watermelon windmill the slices
of watermelon look a bit darker
you have basically got these juicy raw
edges
and i'm guessing that that's because the
mouth of the tool
is not quite as sharp as a knife it's
just a piece of metal you're pushing
this
little bit of metal through the
watermelon and basically rupturing all
the little watermelon cells
i'm not sure this watermelon will keep
so well because all this is
oxidizing and gonna get soft in a couple
of hours
this is a clear win for the knife don't
buy a watermelon slicer like that please
apple slicer align this bit around the
core of the apple
[Music]
okay and a couple of larger pieces of
apple that have some
core stuck on them but all in all that
was quite quick
check out the amount of wastage this is
the core amount that i took off from the
apple and this is what the
apple slicer took off i'm sure there's a
fair amount of meat here to be had
but i'll give you this okay the apple
slicer was quick
this thing takes up a fair amount of
space and unless you're cutting apples
all day
you might use this once or twice for the
novelty and then get stuck in your
drawer
and then you never see it again our last
item for today
is a garlic press now i've actually used
these before and i find them relatively
effective and i want to show you
why they're actually quite decent to use
take your peeled garlic put it in there
and give it a press so a garlic press is
primarily there to help you mince garlic
quite quickly out comes the unpressed
stuff so there's quite a fair amount of
wastage with the garlic press
all right i'm going to show you how we
would do it with a knife
[Music]
as you can see this is taking a fair bit
more time
than if i were to use the garlic press
too close
about the same size but a lot more yield
i'm using a knife because
there's no wastage everything got sliced
up and cut and if you take a closer look
at the texture of the minced garlic
you'll see a couple of things as well
first with
the minced garlic that was squeezed out
of the garlic press
it's all together more wet and juicy now
this has been pulped almost right so
what that means is a lot of the
aromatics the oils the flavors are
out now and they're apparent so if you
threw that into a stew
or you sauteed that up the flavors of
garlic will be very pungent
very apparent very upfront whereas
because i use my knife which is
considerably sharper
my minced garlic with my knife is much
drier knives are the essential items in
the kitchen
so i would rather level up and get
better using a knife overall
whereas these single-use items are meant
for one thing only
that's all for this episode i hope you
learned something about the essential
equipment that you need to have within
your kitchen
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i'll see you in the next episode