Tools in the kitchen

I was looking at my kitchen shelves yesterday, at all the different pans, and serving ware, and tools and gadgets that are on those shelves or that are on little hooks on my walls.  I often do that as I continually review how I'm storing things so that I can re-organize and make my use of space more efficient.  And at the same time, I try to get rid of anything that I really don't use.  It's hard to do that, though.  I find something that I might have used once, something that I originally purchased with the idea that it sounded like a great tool to have around in the kitchen; but in practice, it went unused from the day I bought it.  I look at this tool and I wonder if I will ever use it.  But it's hard to discard it once I've added it to my kitchen arsenal.  

Most people would say that having tools around which are used for multiple functions is the best situation of all.  And I try to do that.  However, I have a garlic press.  I tried out multiple presses over the years before I finally found this one that is my favorite. It's used only for pressing garlic.  I've never used it for anything else.  I always prefer to press my garlic rather than chop or mince it.  This tool is one I would never part with because of that.  Yet it is used for only one thing.  Of course, garlic goes in a lot of different foods, so in reality this tool gets used a lot.  But in principle, it would be much nicer if this one tool performed more than one function.

I suppose most people love gadgets, and it's easy to buy lots of different things just because of our love of gadgets.  Of course, after a while, the room is filled with too many things that take up too much space and are rarely used.  With some gadgets, it's worth it to have a couple different types, though.  I have a normal sized food processor that I frequently use.  And I also have a mini-sized food processor that is perfect for when I need to chop up small quantities of nuts and other foods.  I will always have both sizes of this same gadget.  Both get used very frequently and there advantages when using one versus the other for different food types and different food quantities.

Knife sets usually come with many different sizes of blades.  However, I only use a few in my set.  The others just sit there.  Yet another example of having more choices in tools than are really needed.

It's nice to have the choices, but I also am into minimalism when it makes sense.  And it almost always makes sense.