Specialty Cookware for Meal Prep
Like most things in cooking, the different techniques and styles used to prepare food are never ending. When there’s nowhere else to place unique cookware, then they must be a speciality! At least that’s how we see it because these specialty cookware products can still deliver incredible cooking experiences.
Cooking has its unique traits around the world whether it’s indirect smoking that began in the Caribbean to the use of ovens in the west, we create food in our own ways. Sometimes specialty or exotic means less than you would think.
One of our goals at Prep Smart Kitchen is to show that meal prep can be done anywhere in the world. By showcasing specialty cookware from all cultures we can help prove that meaningful ways to save time and money on cooking is possible.
Braiser
Braisers are shallow pots with low sides only high enough for a lid. They are ideal for braising meats, making it easy to sear them before directly transferring them to an oven. Similar to a dutch oven, braisers are great when you need something more wieldy for smaller ingredients.
Braising is most notable in European cuisines where ovens are most common. By searing meats before slowly roasting them in an oven, braisers are able to create crusts and caramelization before tenderizing.
The fatty drippings that collect during stove top cooking also add to the flavor once the pot is transferred to the oven. By mingling with other ingredients directly, the residual oils will add better flavors.
Dutch Oven
Dutch Ovens are long griddle pots. They are flat, oval shaped with high sides meant for holding stews and soups. Perfect for searing ingredients before adding them to a stew and placed in the oven, dutch ovens are essentially the precursor to electric slow cookers.
They are exceptional for low and slow cooking, developing strong flavors due to the thick material. Dutch ovens are usually made with enamelled cast iron, ensuring their ability to hold high heights.
If stews and roasts are your thing, then you’ll want to look into Dutch ovens further. Not only are they great for cooking savory meals, they can also provide large quantities for long term storage, providing home cooks with great value.
Paella Pan
Paella pans are wide, shallow pans with minimal sides and a lid. They originate from Spain and are designed to evaporate as much liquid as possible with its flat surface area. This leads to better browning and caramelization for foods like paella and more.
Paella isn’t the only thing that can be made with these pans though. They are great for cooking shellfish in a manner of styles, evaporating any type of flavorful stock or sauce into your protein. Mushrooms in a cream sauce are another example of how paella pans can be used differently for meal prep.
Due to Spanish colonial history, paella pans are exceptionally common and variations of their design can be found around the world. You’ll find them as far as Luzon where green beans simmered in coconut milk are everywhere. Meal prep can be done anywhere.
Tea Kettle
Tea kettles; simple by design, essential by nature. Heating water might seem simple, but having it on hand can make a world of difference when cooking. Sure, most sink faucets can produce hot water, but it’s difficult to determine its heat as it comes rushing out.
Kettles are commonly reserved for tea, the preferred drink of choice for many in Europe and Asia. But they’re also great for heating up noodles and softening dried ingredients.
There are so many different types of tea kettles out there because of tea’s popularity that the options are endless. But again, just having readily available hot cooking water can create huige advantages when meal prepping.
Wok
Woks are cone shaped pans with high sides and placed over a gas flame. Made with cast iron, they season over time. Woks are designed to let liquids and aromatics simmer at the bottom while leaving workable surface area on its long sides for searing and frying.
Woks are a staple of Asian cuisines and are common throughout the continent. Due to their popularity, household variations have been made for gas stoves that can recreate its unique traits.
While popular in Asia, woks aren’t limited to Asian cuisines. Any ingredient can be cooked in one so long as heat is applied correctly. One common use is for frying which is common in every culture. The deep bottom makes it easy to submerge ingredients and perfect for meal prep.