We’re going to begin small, because times are rough and we can all use some cheap kitchen gadgets — let’s try under $10, shall we? — to cheer us up. Oh wait, this is a gift-giving guide. You’re under orders to wrap up any presents you buy for yourself. Understood?

Now. Let’s get this show on the road, shall we, with my 10 favorite kitchen gadgets under $10 this year. Most of them I own. A few I want. All of them are awesome.

Chef’n Switchit Silicone Spatula

This spatula looks like it’s changed slightly in design in the few years since I bought one, but it’s basically the same. This narrow 2-ended spatula just comes in handy everywhere your big spatula doesn’t want to go, like in smaller jars. It’s totally smooth so cleaning it is just wiping; nothing sticks and there are no crevices. YAY.

Plus, pretty colors. Comes in apricot, wasabit, cherry, pacific, and arugula.

Or for, you know, normal people, orange, yellow, fuschia, blue, and green. (Mine’s the fuschia.)

The Chef’n Switchit Silicone Spatula is $9.99.

Wilton 3-Tier Cooling Rack

This baby rocks when counter space is at a premium. Or, I would presume so, because I don’t have one. Sis does. I drool every time I drop in at her house and see cookies chillin’ on it.

I want.

The Wilton 3-Tier Cooling Rack is currently $9.99 at Amazon.

Spider Skimmer

I never knew I needed a spider skimmer until I had one. This is one of those utensils whose utility is, at first, inscrutable.

Oh, crap, I’m making use of offensive Asian stereotypes. I’m sorry, I really am.

But it is hard to decipher at first. I mean, it’s a stick with a little basket on the end.

But that little basket is great for scooping things out of water or oil. I use it when frying, which isn’t all that often but it happens. The spider skimmer’s primary use, however, comes up when canning — it’s awesome for getting blanched veggies out of the boiling pot and into the cold water. I even have one of those hole-y baskets that goes in the large pot, and I’d rather use the skimmer.

Helen’s Asian Kitchen 5-Inch Spider Skimmer is about $7.27 at Amazon.

Architec Stretch Cooking Bands

Okay, these are rubber bands for cooking. What would you want rubber bands you can use in cooking for?

How about holding together a bouquet garni? Or, if you aren’t all Frenchy and herby, they work in rotisserie cooking — anything you’d use kitchen twine for, and who keeps that around? Not me, uh uh.

Plus, you can snap them at people.

The Architec Stretch Cooking Bands are $8.05 at Amazon.

Dough Scraper

A dough scraper is another thing you won’t realize you needed until you have it. This one from Oxo has a sharpish blade that can slice and dice in a pinch, but which I usually use for cutting/dividing dough, or scraping up excess dough when done making my mess. It’s got measurements ticked off on it up to 6 inches, and I use this thing a lot when I want to measure dough quickly.

Plus, one reviewer pointed out that it’s handy for fighting ninjas. Always a plus.

The Oxo Pastry Scraper is $6.99.

Peanut Butter Mixer

You heard me. Peanut. Butter. Mixer. I thought these were just gimmicky, but reviews on Amazon imply otherwise. You’d think this wavy metal dealy was the second coming of Saint Peanutbutter, the way they sing its praises.

If you like natural peanut butter, like I do…
If you hate stirring natural peanut butter, like I do…
Try this.

P.S. I want one.

The Witmer Peanut Butter Mixer is $8.43 at Amazon as of this writing.

Kitchen Shears

Every kitchen needs a set of kitchen shears. You don’t want to get your nice scissors all gross in food, do you? I love this thing.

It’s the Swiss army knife of kitchen shears. It’s got a screwdriver, a bottle opener, a sort of jar opener, and one of the blades is great for opening boxes. The blades come apart, making them easy to clean — and they’re easy to put back together.

I cheated a teeny bit — most of these on Amazon are about $11. However, this seller has these Chicago Cutlery Kitchen Shears for only $4.99! I’ve also seen them for about 5 bucks at kitchen stores, but even at 11 dollars they’re a great deal.

French Rolling Pin

Okay, this another thing on my wish list. French rolling pins — basically, a dowel with tapered edges — are supposed to be the bomb. Reviewers say a french rolling pin makes it easy to roll round dough, such as pie crusts, pizza crusts, and tortillas, perfectly round without getting it too thin. I like.

This French rolling pin is $6.99 at Amazon.

Instant Read Thermometer

Does your bread recipe tell you to bake “until the interior temperature is 160°F”? (I’m looking at you, King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking.)

Or if you’re a carnivore, you’re always being asked to stick meats with thermometers to take their temperatures.

There are loads of fancy digital thermometers out now. This is not one of them. It’s analog, and small and pointy, and it does the job, right quick too. I like it. It gets stuck into the belly of lots of loaves of bread. The awesome thing about it is the size. It’s the same dimensions as a very skinny pen when in its little case.

The Taylor Classic Instant-Read Pocket Thermometer is running about $4.72.

BIG Pizza Wheel

My own pizza cutter is from Pampered Chef, but this one is identical, and the same idea: bigger is better. You don’t want some small-circumference pizza cutter, nope! Smaller ones are awkward to use. This one’s 4 inches wide, baby — nice and big.

We don’t do double entendres here, so you can go wash your mind out with soap right now.

The SoftWorks Pizza Wheel is $7.99 at Amazon.

There. I love most of the things on that list. What cheap kitchen gadgets do you like?

I didn’t take my own pictures this time. All images courtesy of Amazon.

Thanks to all of you who voted for Shiny Cooking in round 2 of Foodbuzz’s Project Food Blog challenge. I’ve made it to round 3, whose theme is a “luxury dinner party.” Voting is open until October 7. If you believe my literary dinner party featuring dishes from George R. R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” fantasy series merits a vote, please vote for Shiny Cooking!

The link places your vote and goes to a page where you can easily browse through all the entries in the competition. Everyone gets 100 votes to spend, so I encourage you to keep clicking and check out some of the other amazing dinner party entries and vote for them as well.

No kittens today, just a feast for crows. (They’re starlings, but who’s counting? Alfred Hitchcock, that’s who. Holy mixed cultural references, Batman!)

Another good reason to vote Shiny Cooking through: Challenge 4 is a photo-based post. And you don’t want to miss seeing what I can do with a 3 megapixel Canon point-and-shoot, do you now? Nope, none of that fancy DSLR stuff here! There are some depth-of-field tricks that are impossible to do with my lens, but with some coaxing I think I can get some decent-ish pics out. It’ll be fun to see me try. :p

Please vote now for me to move ahead once more here. The link goes to my post “Off to Iraq! Falafel Sandwich with Tahini Sauce,” in which chickpeas are soaked and September tomatoes from the garden make it into a street food wrap.

Sis and Mom were thrilled with the dinner party. “You can do this anytime,” they cooed conspiratorially, and they began plotting holiday schedules. “Thanksgiving, Christmas…no, Mom will still do Christmas…Easter….”

I hadn’t hosted an event of this magnitude before. A bit over a month ago my sponsor, Foodbuzz, contacted me with the offer to host a pasta and wine-pairing dinner party using free coupons supplied by Buitoni Riserva. That shit’s expensive, so I jumped at the chance.

the asparagus mistake

I picked up 5 packages each of fresh pasta agnolotti, which is is a jumbo half-moon shaped ravioli. One was wild mushroom, and I planned to toss it with roasted asparagus and chives, drizzle it with olive oil, and top it with freshly ground black pepper and goat cheese. Unfortunately, I didn’t consult my sister the asparagus roasting expert, and left it in the oven about 20 minutes instead of the 5 she said was correct, and the asparagus came out limp and mushy.

My aunt, Linda, brought over a bunch of chives she snipped from her patch, some blooming with crunchy-oniony flowers atop them. They were too pretty to ignore, so they got put out on the table.

The guest list: Mom and Dad, Jennifer and Dale Javier (he said he wanted to be called Javier), Mom’s best friend Leeann and her daughter (and my friend) Angie, and Linda. I asked Leeann which wine she wanted to drink. “Oh, I love all white wine,” she said, so I poured her the La Noble chardonnay I’d picked up and a teeny glass of fino. Fino is very dry sherry that I drank a lot in Spain and it always makes me think of briny olives, tapas, dancing sevillanas, and walking home through the Parque de María Luisa at seven in the morning.

Not everyone was into the wine thing, though. Dad and Javier mixed themselves up some massive bloody marys.

Check out this spread! Angie made that vibrant salad, Mom brought the relish tray, and there’s the wild mushroom agnolotti along with the four cheese (Quattro Formaggi) agnolotti, and the red sauce I mixed up for the latter.

where’s my two dollars?

There’s Linda and the view from the other side of the tablecloth. That’s right, tablecloth. Cloth napkins. Frawnch fries. Frawnch bread. Kwissssmassss. Pardon me, I’m channeling Better Off Dead.

The top is the wild mushroom agnolotti with the asparagus/chives/black pepper/olive oil/goat cheese topping I mentioned. The left/bottom is the four cheese agnolotti with a roasted red pepper and kalamata olive sauce, topped with fresh basil. And supposed to have grated parmesan on top, but I forgot to get it on there for the pic. That sauce was the bomb.

Jennifer posed for an action shot! You can see a glass of red wine, which would be the shiraz Angie brought. I’d originally planned on cabernet to pair with the wild mushroom agnolotti, but we ended up breaking that out later. The red paired really well with the four cheese as well. Personally, I drank a little of the chardonnay and the shiraz and liked them both with both pastas. Maybe I’m just easy. Don’t answer that.

Dad warned Javier early on, “You’re not going to be getting any meat here tonight.” Of course they were going through that theater to tease me, but their little plan backfired. They chowed down and made happy noises just as much as everyone else did.

Notice how I ran out of serving dishes and dug into the storage containers. I’m so not prepared for this big party thing.

bring out your desserts

Linda made the coolest. Dessert. Evar. Think peanut butter pound cake. Slice it. Spread with peanut buttercream and blackberry jam. Top with another slice of pound cake.

That’s right. Linda made pound cake pb&j. Awesome.

Jennifer dipped strawberries in chocolate and served them on an appropriately-themed playing cards plate. Did I mention this was dinner and games night?

Mom and Leeann have been best friends for like 40 years, since Leeann moved in next door to Mom and Dad. <suckup>Did I say 40? I meant 20, because they couldn’t be a day over 40 themselves.</suckup>

euchre tournament!

Time to get our game on. With 8 of us present, and everyone liking euchre, we drew numbers, paired up, and had a little euchre tournament. To my chagrin, I was paired with Dale Javier, but he only fucked up once so I didn’t get to yell at him.

Jennifer and Mom were the winning team (never put people with shared DNA on the same team) and suddenly when it was over people began joking, “Where are the prizes?”

“Prizes?” I said, and a light bulb went on. An opportunity to divest myself of some excess goods! I got out some packaged rice/pasta sides I’d been planning to hand off to Linda, some product samples I’d received randomly in the mail, and some decks of playing cards from an estate sale I went to last week. Jennifer chose this lovely rice side dish to take home with her.

For her parting gift, Angie selected “stars of country music” playing cards and some instant coffee samples.

Then we played Perudo, or Liar’s Dice, and after that midnight was approaching, so the parent types and Jennifer and Javier left before they all turned into pumpkins. This left Linda, Angie, Bill, and me, and we broke out the Pictionary.

how to draw siamese twins in pictionary

how not to win at ingenious

Even with the adults gone, the wine kept flowing. We finished the La Noble and the Oak Leaf shiraz. Then we finished the Red Truck varietal red, and broke into the Clos du Bois chardonnay and Ravenswood cabernet, and Linda finished her Funky Llama chardonnay.

Wits and Wagers made an appearance, and then we closed out the night with Ingenious. Angie couldn’t remember if she’d played before and Bill was new to Ingenious, so I played with a handicap — I picked my tiles to play randomly. I got trounced as the newbies quickly picked up on the strategy and scored one Ingenious after another. I’m never believing Cranky Angie again! (Cranky Angie: I don’t think I like this. I don’t know if I want to play this. I know and understand Cranky Angie, because Cranky Amy always makes an appearance with new games too.)

what did i learn from all this?

I can put on a grownup party.

I can sip wine without getting too drunk.

Having smokers around leads to more smoking.

The Buitoni Riserva pastas are really good. The Quattro Formaggi Agnolotti was the hands-down favorite.

Good wine goes with anything.

Euchre needs to be more than a regional game.

roasted red pepper and kalamata olive pasta sauce

This sauce was the hit of the party. Salty, piquant, and complex, it goes well with simple pastas like cheese ravioli or agnolotti. I hesitate to post it as a recipe because it’s so simple, but it’s so good that it must be shared.

1 (28 ounce) jar red pasta sauce, like marinara
1 small (7 ounce) jar roasted red peppers
¼ cup kalamata olives

Purée the roasted red peppers and kalamata olives in a blender. Pour sauce and pepper/olive purée into a 2-quart pan and warm over medium heat. Serve over pasta.

Hello, my pretties. We’ll be quick today in honor of tax season. I have a zillion e-mail records to go through (the bane of online work) and missing 1099s to calculate by hand. My tax preparer, who also happens to be my best friend from grade school, is in 90 degree-plus Virginia this week, so I really can’t say which of us has it worse.

This red wine tomato sauce recipe can be subbed for a jar of any red store-bought pasta sauce. I like to double or triple the recipe and freeze it because hey, if I’m going to the work of making my own sauce, I may as well have some for next time.

But is it really work? Chop an onion, press a few cloves of garlic, open a can of tomatoes, and do some measuring. Twenty minutes on the stove, and it’s done.

There’s a secret to this tomato sauce. Your omnivore friends will think it has meat in it. The trick is fennel. An earthy, tangy spice used to flavor sausage, fennel is the spice that makes us think “meat.”

What do I like to do with this versatile tomato sauce?

• use it in lasagna
• top pasta with it and sprinkle with Parmesan (obvious)
• use it in baked penne (recipe coming, ooh)
• add mushrooms to it
• add soy burger crumbles to it
• add chopped red or green pepper to it
• add soy sausage crumbles to it

I-can’t-believe-it’s-meatless tomato sauce will happily take anything you wish to add to it. Go make it if you have a chance. I have Paypal receipts to sort through.

i-can’t-believe-it’s-meatless tomato sauce

The recipe calls for a large can of whole tomatoes, briefly whirred in a blender. You could instead use a 28-ounce can of tomato puree (make sure it’s made from only tomatoes) or even diced or crushed tomatoes, according to your preference. The latter will be a chunkier sauce. Adapted from Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites: Flavorful Recipes for Healthful Meals.

Time: 45 minutes
Special equipment: blender (optional)

1 tablespoon olive oil (not EVOO)
1 cup finely chopped onion (1 medium onion)
¼ teaspoon salt
2 cloves garlic, minced or pressed
2 teaspoons ground fennel
2 teaspoons Milford’s Buon Appetito Italian seasoning* or 1 teaspoon each dried oregano and dried basil
⅓ cup red wine
3 cups undrained canned tomatoes (28-ounce can)
½ to 1 tablespoon sugar
salt and pepper to taste

In a large saucepan, heat the olive oil on medium heat. Add the onions, sprinkle with salt, and sauté until soft, about 4 to 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.

While the onions are cooking, whirl the tomatoes in a blender until just puréed and set aside.

When onions are soft, add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds.

Add the fennel, oregano and basil* and cook for another minute to coat the onions and garlic in the spices.

Pour in the red wine and bring to a boil. This will happen quickly, so have the puréed tomatoes handy, or have your canned purée, diced, or crushed tomatoes open and ready. Add tomatoes and sugar to the pan and mix well.

Cover and simmer gently for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. Taste and season with salt and pepper to your preference.

* Just want to let you know that Milford Spice, a Michigan company, sent me a free sample of this seasoning. I also happen to dig it a lot.
** If using fresh herbs, use 1 tablespoon each of fresh oregano and basil and add them in the last couple minutes of cooking time.

A few months back, Jodi from the California Strawberry Commission told me they were creating an iPhone app comprised of 50 strawberry recipes, and could she have permission to include my strawberry and feta salad recipe. After I picked myself up off from the floor, I said, go for it.

Well, it’s out now, and I have to say, it’s damn cute, even if I don’t have an iPhone to properly test it. It’s completely free at the iTunes store, and it’s got great reviews. Let me paste a bit from the press release to show you. What, I’m not supposed to admit to pasting from a press release? Pff.

Strawberry Recipe App Features:

Over 50 recipes, categorized by dish type
Share recipes on Twitter, Facebook and email
Access nutrition information
View recipe photos, ingredients and preparation information
Connect with California Strawberry Commission on Facebook, Twitter and the web

Additional info:

Become a fan of California strawberries at www.facebook.com/castrawberries for recipes and interesting facts and information relevant to strawberries and nutrition.
Twitter: Follow the CA Strawberry Commission at http://www.Twitter.com/CAstrawberries.
Visit the California Strawberry Commission to get additional information.

If you’re mad for strawberries, and you have an iPhone or an iPod Touch, you’d be mad (ha ha) not to download this app. If you have it, let me know what you think of it.

someone’s getting a jar of horseradish

Due to the incredible volume of comments interested in the jar of homemade horseradish, I flipped a coin to determine the winner.

And that winner is Soma, from the brilliant eCurry, which at the time of this writing features Apricot, Ginger, & Pistachio Scones on its front page. And they sound really, really amazing. And they’re distracting me, and making me hungry. Curse you, Soma! *shakefist* I mean, congrats, Soma!

Neat, this made Foodie Views of the day! They gave me a pretty button to go with it:

Have I ever mentioned that the last thing I gave up when going vegetarian was bacon? Beef: I never liked it anyway. Nearly the same with chicken. Fish: next to last. I like me some canned tuna.

I’m not going to wax poetic about bacon, though. That’s so 2008. Are you as tired as I am of candied bacon, bacon smoothies, bacon popcorn, and bacon ice cream? I’m sure they’re wonderful, but all of the swooning over bacon is becoming a tad unseemly. Let’s be seemly, shall we?

Suffice to say bacon tastes good and its namesake sandwich, the BLT, is too. The salty bacon, the pretty ruffles of leaf lettuce, the earthy, full flavor of heirloom tomato slices — slap them between a few slices of toast slathered with a condment of your choice, usually mayonnaise, and you have one mother of a sandwich.

Everyone knows how to make a BLT.

But have you ever had one with basil-garlic mayonnaise?

It elevates the humble BLT to a thing of beauty. The fresh basil complements the tomato, the garlic enhances the bacon, and a few drops of hot pepper sauce add little heat but a lot of flavor.

Now, the nice people at Nature’s Pride sent me a couple loaves of bread: 12-grain and 100% whole wheat. Since they sent me free stuff, I’m likely to say nice things about it, so be forewarned. They make their bread with all natural ingredients and no HFCS, which is a big plus for me. When my cousin and I were making the sandwiches, he asked what kind of bread I had, and stipulated, “No whole wheat.” I gacked, because I don’t keep anything but whole wheat around. He had to get whole grains anyway, in the form of the 12-grain loaf.

He survived, and said the 12-grain was really good. Whether he was being polite or not I’m not sure. Either way, I don’t care. My sandwich got validation.

Mine was on whole wheat. It was quite tasty as well. We used Black Krim heirloom tomatoes from my garden, and some really lovely curly generic leaf lettuce from the store. It was quite tasty as well. I have to say that overall, I prefer the bread I make myself, but if I had to buy some, I would choose this Nature’s Pride stuff. Again, remember, I’m predisposed to being nice about the bread though.

basil-garlic mayonnaise

1 cup fresh basil, coarsely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 teaspoon salt
dash or two of tabasco or other hot pepper sauce
3/4 cup mayonnaise

In a food processor, whirl the basil leaves and garlic until the basil is finely chopped. Add salt, hot pepper sauce, and mayonnaise. Pulse until mixed together. Chill 30 minutes to allow flavors to meld.

basil-garlic mayonnaise BLT

Black Krim is a Russian heirloom variety tomato. It’s considered a beefsteak, but the tomatoes are smallish, about 2-1/2 to 3 inches in diameter. They have a rich flavor, not quite as “smoky” as some of the other black varieties, but more robust-tasting than most reds. I love growing them; like Stupice, they’re the perfect size for a sandwich, and they grow perfectly round and nearly blemish-free. They grow well in cooler climates like we have here in Michigan — it’s one of the few varieties I got a good number of tomatoes off of this cold summer.

4 slices whole grain bread, toasted
4 slices of cooked bacon
2 Black Krim tomatoes
2 large leaves curly leaf lettuce
basil-garlic mayonnaise (recipe above)

Slice the Black Krims. You should get 4 slices from each tomato, about 3/8″ thick. Slather basil-garlic mayonnaise on the toast. Build the BLT in layers: first, break the bacon into halves, laying out 4 halves on the bread. Then add the tomato slices, and the leaf lettuce on top of that. This ought to provide some decent protection for the bread from the tomato’s juices.

Top with the other slice of bread, cut sandwich in half, and serve.

Help me win the $250 prize and I’ll buy a neat little cooking gadget to give away!

As I so shamelessly Twittered, please do me a solid and click this link to vote for “whole wheat strawberry buttermilk shortcake” at Mixing Bowl. You have to log in to do it, but you can use your Facebook login without having to undergo a lame signup process.

To refresh your memory, here’s what it looks like:

Remember, this is where you go to vote.

While you’re there, look at the other photos/recipes entered. What do you think of the competition?