Like many of you, I have every labor-saving and high-tech cooking device known to man. Come over to my house—assuming any of us will ever be able to come on over to anyone’s house ever again–and you can admire my food processor, plus my slow cooker, hi-speed juice pulverizer, panini griddle, Wolf oven, Viking stovetop, computerized pressure cooker, bar blender, rice cooker, Wolf blitzer, computerized pressure toaster, Sub-Zero refrigerator/freezer, air fryer, Komodo-style grill, air processor, rice oven, charcoal barbeque, stand mixer, water purifier, propane can opener, standing water crusher, microwave oven, electric wok, convection oven, drip coffee press, French filter wok, press coffee drip, charcoal water fryer, Zero-Sub panini opener, bar microwave with convection griddle purifier, and standing Viking with garlic press.
Yes, I have it all—or so I thought. But generous friends and family members managed to surprise me, this holiday season, with an array of kitchen appliances I had, until now, not known existed. Nor had I known how much would come to depend on them after a mere two weeks of their use.
Among my favorites are:
Ajax CZB-14 Bluetooth Citrus Zester
Isn’t zesting citrus horrible? Half the zest gets caught in those little teeth, which then don’t wash out, so you have to poke each one clear with a toothpick and the whole time you’re wondering why you were born. Plus you end up zesting your knuckles, which means fumbling for Band-Aids™ and washing the cutting board and every other goddamn thing.
Kudos, then, to Ajax, for creating the CZB-14 (below), which, via a Bluetooth signal from one’s phone, allows one to zest citrus from across the room, saving one’s precious knuckles. Yes, half the zest still gets caught in the little teeth, but at least while you’re cleaning them you can enjoy, through the unit’s tiny speaker, music, podcasts, or even phone calls.
Benford Bros. SPS-4500 Solar-Powered Poultry Shears
Say good-bye to plug-in, battery-powered, or hydraulic poultry shears. (At last!) Now breaking down a chicken or spatchcocking a turkey is a snap thanks to this sleek, well-engineered device. Simply place it outside, in the sun, for five hours (six, for the larger Large model), and let its solar array charge the unit. Then watch as it practically dismembers the fowl all by itself. Not safe around children or pets.
Enright-Franklin Model 1 All-Ingredient Food Preparation Center
Which of us hasn’t thought, “Wouldn’t it be great if I could just dump all my ingredients—unheated oil, unpeeled garlic, unsliced onions, un-browned meats, un-separated (and uncracked!) eggs, un-poached fish, un-minced parsley, vinegar, wine, herbs, spices, flour, sugar, whatever—into a single compact glass vessel, push a button, and just go do something else for two hours?”
Well, now we can. The Enright-Franklin Model 1 (below), developed in collaboration with the Ecole Polytechnique in world-famous France, comes equipped with heating elements, chopping blades, a liquid ingredient well, an impressive array of temperature sensors, meat probes, and pressurizing valves, all under the persuasive command of an Intel 10th-gen Comet Lake Core H-series processor.
Sound cool? You have no idea.
Simply load the glass carafe with your (pre-measured) ingredients, clamp it shut, plug the probes into their ports and connect them to the jacks on the outside of the unit in accordance with the international hieroglyphic symbol instructions, position the carafe on its Accu-Vibro-Turntable mount, set the correct pitch, yaw, and revolution values, select the mount’s action to Lo, Med, or Hi, gently pour triple-distilled water (tap will erode the sensors) into its outboard well, bring the unit up to the desired pressure, tune in the (digital, of course) Magnetic Field Resonance Correction value for your latitude and longitude, hand-type on the small but adequate keypad the recipe’s instructions, and push Start. Two-to-three hours later, voila!
Photo Credit: Ecole Polytechnique
Kitchenelle WSG9 Waffle Iron/Steam Iron/9 Iron
With the increasing popularity of waffles, wrinkle-free clothes, and golf, comes the world’s first all-in-one iron combination. Now there’s no need to clutter up your kitchen counter, linen closet, and golf bag with one iron each. With the WSG9 (below), make waffles for breakfast, smooth out your golf-wear, and then hit the links with the perfect club for when an 8 is too long and a sand wedge just won’t do. Dishwasher safe and PGA approved.
Napoli Nostra PT-133 “Immolatore” Tabletop Hi-Temp Pizza Oven
Why shouldn’t you be able to flash-bake your own pizza with an oven capable of reaching the temperature at the core of the sun (27,000,000 degrees F)? Weighing in at a user-friendly 6.9 lbs., the PT-133’s clever Smart Duct tubing and Oxi-Blast technology makes hyper-efficient use of all 4.7 gallons of propane in a full tank, all at once. Result: ultra-fast pizzas with that distinctive Neapolitan char and the heady smell, from your own table, of woodsmoke.
Handy features include two silicone cooking mitts, one pair of welder-quality Hi-Brite™ goggles, and a useful if arguably frightening Self-Clean feature: Set it, withdraw the recommended two hundred yards, and watch as the unit vaporizes pretty much everything in the vicinity.
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