How to Master Your Kitchen

How was your evening last night? Sean and I met up with our friends, Amber and Logan, for a food truck dinner. I saw the list of trucks for dinner last night and was really excited to see a cupcake truck, Sweet Arlene's, that was on Cupcake Wars and won but the truck wasn't there. Needless to say, I went home a little hungry last night and cupcake less :-( 

If you need a refresher as to why I started this series, it is because I believe that having the right tools in the kitchen will help each of you be a better cook or maybe even want to cook a bit more frequently. You have certain tools at work that you have to make your job a bit easier and functional, I feel the same goes with kitchen tools. This was the inspiration for this series. The previous installments in this series are: whisk, stand mixer, garlic press, tongs, citrus juicer, steamer, zester, food processor, Dutch oven, a box grater, cutting board and a rolling pin.

For the next installment of my Thursday How to Master Your Kitchen series, this tool is another kitchen essential, the colander. A colander is necessary because it helps to drain food. How do you drain the water from the pasta you cooked for dinner? Use a colander! You want to wash the grapes you bought earlier in the store but don't want the grapes sitting in a bowlful of water? Use a colander! Maybe you need to wash some beans before you soak them, well you got it use a colander! A colander is helpful because the holes at the bottom let the water fall right through. A colander can be used to make spaetzle, German noodles.
Colanders are made out of plastic, ceramic or metal. You can buy collapsible colanders that fold up into itself to save space in your cupboards. There will be round or rectangular colanders, large or small colanders.
Need other uses for a colander?
1. Turn the colander upside when frying an egg or burger with fat that splatters. The colander will catch the flying grease but allow the steam to escape.
2. Drain canned foods, just turn the canned food upside into the colander and allow the juice to drain through.
3. Store fragile fruits or vegetables in the colander. The holes in the colander will allow air to circulate, which will cut down on mold growing. The more air berries or mushrooms have circulating around it, the less chance mold has to grow. This will keep your produce longer!
4. If your steamer is in the dishwasher and you need to steam veggies right away, use a colander to steam the veggies. It will work just as well!
5. With summer coming soon, you may want to eat outside more frequently or go on picnics, bring that colander with you. Turn the colander upside down and place it over the food you brought outside with you, it will keep the bugs and flies away from your food.
6. You can quickly make Greek yogurt from regular yogurt, lay a cheesecloth in the bottom of your colander, then pour your regular yogurt into the cheesecloth and let the yogurt drain. As the yogurt drains, it will thicken until you get the consistency of Greek yogurt.

Anyone have any other uses for their colander?

Are you free on June 29, live in the southern California region or maybe willing to travel and want to meet other bloggers? Leeann of Join the Gossip and I are hosting a blogger meet-up at J.Crew Factory. You can register for the meet-up through this link, http://bloggermeetupjcrewfactory.eventbrite.com/