Are you deep in Pesach planning?

I’m finally facing up to the fact it’s less than two weeks until our biggest home cooking marathon of the year.

To sweeten the pain of making meal plans, sorting my Seder night and shopping for staples, I’ve been indulging in some (culinary) window shopping.

More than a year since last Passover, it’s the perfect time to add to our kitchen gadgets with minimal guilt.

For me, this year’s haul might be a new knife, a pretty serving dish or perhaps even a new frying pan for may annual matzah brei. My trawl has inspired me to list a few of the most useful buys you might want to make for your Pesach kitchen — and for the bigger ticket items, to enjoy all year. 
 

Stick / immersion blender:

Remember last year’s viral crazy for home-made mayo after the crazy high prices of the jars in the supermarkets? This is the must-have gadget to make it.

Photo: Amazon

I’ve had this Braun model for years and it’s still going strong.

It’s not just for mayo, it’s also fantastic for blitzing the telltale lumps of veg in my ‘hidden veg’ tomato sauce and hoodwink my fussy daughter. An immersion blender is also ideal for soups, salad dressings, milkshakes, matzah meal pancake batter, fruit coulis for pouring over yoghurt/desserts and for smoothies.

If you prefer a budget option this model – with fewer gadgets will also do the job.

Photo: Instant

Air Fryer:
If you’ve already cooked with an air fryer you’ll understand what the fuss has all been about. If you haven’t – now is the time to invest in one. They are essentially mini fan ovens that cook at high temperatures and do it faster because of its diminutive proportions.

They make light work of child favourites like oven chips, breaded/matzah meal coated chicken and potato waffles and are great for fish fillets and for roasting veggies.

For Pesach you’ll find yourself using them for every meal — the SKA approved McCain’s wedges will be ready in minutes and this matzah pizza will be a doddle. 

Photo: Inbal Bar-Oz

If you can afford it, I’d go for one with plenty of capacity like like this Instant Vortex Plus model. You can save money and invest in a smaller one, but be warned that every meal will need to be served in several sittings. And if you fall in love with your Pesach purchase — as I did with mine — you may want to use it all year.

Spiraliser:

Not a new gadget but one I still use frequently. The clunky larger spiralisers are fine but take too long to assemble and clean. This pencil sharpener-style one from Good Grips is easy to use and clean; and can be stored easily for the rest of the year.

Photo: Victoria Prever

It’s great for making vegetable noodles — my courgetti with avocado pesto makes a lovely light lunch – and I’ve even used a spiraliser for creating potato latkes, which are super crisp and crunchy.

Microplane:

Another essential you’ll want in your kitchen toolkit all year. It makes light work of zesting citrus fruits — a sharp tap removes the zest from the grater without all that poking around you end up doing with a box grater.

Use it for making the horseradish gremolata to scatter over Sarah Mann-Yeager’s Best ever brisket, and for the orange zest in Denise Phillips’s orange and hazelnut tart and so many more.

Photo: Inbal Bar-Oz

You can also use it for grating ginger — in curries, salad dressings and soups — nutmeg and even chocolate.

Make sure to buy this style as the ones with removable panels are more tricky to use.

Ice cream/cookie scoops:

I only have one of these but I use it all the time so the whole set would be very welcome.

Photo: Amazon

They are perfect for making sure your cinnamon balls, almond macaroons or matzah balls are equally sized (looks more professional) and the trigger means the mixture generally pops out easily onto the baking tray.

Silvia Nacamulli’s delicious pistachio lemon amaretti biscuits (pictured at the top of this article) are a breeze with them. 

Photo: Victoria Prever

You can also use them for making 1970’s dinner party retro melon balls. Or go completely kitsch with a watermelon frog with its mouth filled with melon balls like my very creative sister-in-law brought us one year.

They’re even pretty great if you just want to scoop ice cream for these fantastic choc chip ice cream cookie sandwiches... I love this set.

Small serrated knife:

This will be one of your most used bits of kit. The knife I bought as part of my kit when I trained as a chef has long since given up — through overuse. It’s great for vegetable cutting — especially cucumbers, peppers and tomatoes — for segmenting oranges and all the fiddly smaller slicing jobs, not to mention for neatly slicing cake.

Photo: Victoria Prever

I segment a LOT of oranges, grapefruit and satsumas over Pesach — they’re one of the few fruits in season over Pesach and make a delicious breakfast topped with thick, creamy Greek yoghurt. If you make a huge batch of sliced citrus fruits they make an easy dessert when you’re finally over all those sugar-filled Pesach bakes.  

I liked this knife.