Fancy yourself as the next Heston, or just on the hunt for tools to minimise effort (and disaster) in the kitchen? We've listed the best gadgets, all of which should be affordable on a student budget.
Every cook (good or not-so-good) needs the right tools and gadgets to make the magic happen in the kitchen. They don't have to be costly or complicated, but you'll flounder like a dead fish without them.
Although you'll have to stump up some cash to buy these gadgets, they'll almost certainly save you money in the long run. After all, you can and you'll be less tempted by a takeaway if you can cook up a storm in the kitchen.
This list reveals some of the best-kept kitchen secrets...
While not all of these are necessarily the best available version of the gadget, we've gone for the models that we think are the best choice for students based on design and price. And in all instances, we've done our best to find them as cheap as possible.
23 must-have kitchen gadgets
We recommend these affordable kitchen gadgets for students:
Slow cooker
When we ran a poll in our about which kitchen gadgets students most want or use, slow cookers were by far the most popular. And it's easy to see why.
How many times have you got home from a long day – or a short one, for that matter – and thought that you simply couldn't be bothered to cook despite being hungry?
With a slow cooker, you can throw raw ingredients in a pot in the morning, leave it for the day and enjoy a yummy, healthy and cheap meal on your return.
Minimal effort guaranteed – particularly if you're willing to fork out an extra quid for some that mean you have absolutely no washing up to do.
We like this as it costs just £22.50 from Amazon, cooks food evenly and has a glass lid so you can keep an eye on how your meal is doing.
A downside is that it doesn't have a light to indicate when it's on, but for the cost, we think this is a small issue for an overall good slow cooker.
For some food inspiration, check out our delicious which makes use of a slow cooker
Defrost tray
You might be surprised to see a flat board in our list of kitchen gadgets, but this thing is made of some sort of magic material and is arguably the most mindbogglingly amazing step forward in kitchenware since... well, ever.
We all know how annoying it is to come home to make dinner, only to realise you forgot to defrost your chicken. But, you can avoid the temptation of expensive takeaways with a defrost tray. You can get one for under £10, and it will last a lifetime.
We tried out for ourselves, and can confirm that they're just as miraculous as they sound. Although we found that they don't defrost things quite as quickly if your kitchen is cold, they're still infinitely more effective than just leaving things to thaw in a bowl.
In our rather unscientific tests, we found that chicken breasts defrosted in two to two-and-a-half hours, while frozen king prawns thawed in well under an hour (in both cases, turning the food over every 30 minutes or so seemed to help).
Honestly, until you've bought one of these, you won't fully appreciate the importance of modern-day science.
Blender
Feeling healthy? Feeling lazy? Either mood can be easily satisfied if you arm yourself with a blender. Whether you want to whip up some soup or a smoothie, all you need to do is chuck some ingredients in and press the 'on' button.
Blenders also make an amazing addition to house parties, where you can magic up some truly and firmly cement your position as party ruler supreme.
Durable and easy to clean, we like this which you can pick up from Amazon for around £20 (different colours available at slightly different prices).
The container also doubles up as a bottle, so you can save on washing up and get straight to enjoying your smoothies!
Spiralizer
Courgetti Bolognese, anyone? Or how about a stir fry with some butternut squash noodles?
Our beloved spiralizer gets a place on this list, just because we're still so happy someone invented it. Not only do these contraptions make avoiding carbs a walk in the park, but they're also undeniably fun to use.
We tried out a and, as well as giving us a real workout on our biceps, it was perfect for making sweet potato curly fries (seen here with some homemade chicken nuggets we made, too!).
The lid doubles up as a food gripper, which is useful, but as the spikes didn't always grip the potato that well, we found it was easier to just use our hands (although this does mean that you have to waste a large chunk, as the smaller the veg, the greater the risk of spiralizing the tip of your finger).
If you're after something a little bigger (and less demanding on the old arm muscles), you can expect to pay a little more (around £15) for something like t
Or for the super lazy among you, this can be picked up for just shy of £20, and it comes with three blades that produce different shapes and sizes.
Before using the handheld spiralizer, we tried to use the electric one to spiralize some sweet potatoes, and the results weren't great. Essentially, the shape of the product means that it'll only spiralize a long bit of fruit or veg – anything short will just sit in the cone that holds the blade and spin around.
However, when we used it to spiralize a courgette and make courgetti, it was a very different story. Let's put it this way: it was so good and so quick at spiralizing a courgette that half the job was done before we even realised we'd used the wrong blade. If that's not high praise, we don't know what is!
Digital scales
We all like to think we can sail through our culinary lives without having to rely on kitchen scales, but that's a huge mistake to make. Luckily, this is less than a tenner on Amazon.
No more wild guessing as to what five ounces of flour looks like – this bit of kit gives you a much better chance of producing something magical... or even just edible?
The cherry on top? Unlike other scales, this set is just a flat slab, making it a million times easier to store.
Silicone tongs
It's pretty obvious when you think about it, but cooking does make your food kinda hot, and picking it up with your fingers is a surefire way to Burn Central.
Fiddling about with standard cutlery is likely to end the same way, with the added risk of dropping your delights onto the floor AND scraping the surface of your favourite frying pan.
Stop the problems before they start with these (cheap as chips from Wilko).
George Foreman compact grill
It may at first sound like a frivolous expense, but if you can spare about £15, you won't regret investing in this
Aside from being an easy (and healthy) way to grill meat, a George Foreman grill can double up as a sandwich press too. This means you can spice up boring lunches with more adventurous combinations, such as paninis or ciabattas.
Just remember that a grill/sandwich press isn't something that's worth scrimping on. Cheaper models carry a greater fire risk, and you'd have to deal with a faint plastic-y taste tainting everything you cook in it.
Food processor
It's the 21st century, so why sweat over chopping a carrot when you can get a machine to do it for you? And why would you want to make pastry by hand when all it takes is the whizz of a button?
At around £25, this is a real steal. Plus, it's called Ninja, so that's pretty cool.
Just think – you can bake an entire cake that's GBBO-worthy just by chucking in the ingredients and letting the food processor do the hard work.
Air fryer
Everyone loves chips, right? There are, however, three problems:
1. They're overpriced at the chippy
2. They're really hard to make at home
3. They're pretty unhealthy.This comes in at around £50 (or even cheaper if you go for a smaller model) – below the price point of some of the bigger name rivals, but with equally good (if not better!) reviews.
It effortlessly produces incredible chips with a fraction of the oil, and trust us, the chips taste better than the ones from the local kebab joint.
If you don't fancy chopping potatoes up by hand, you can pick up for under £15. But whatever you do, remember to add some seasoning (e.g. salt/pepper/paprika/chicken salt)!
Oh, and just to clarify, air fryers can make loads of different things – not just chips! We tried for ourselves and made some homemade nugz (see ). Plus, it cooks regular oven chips and other oven foods in a fraction of the time it takes an actual oven.
It probably takes a few tries to perfect the Instagrammability of your food, but we can say that the nuggets were delicious and the air fryer is super easy to us
Aeropre
If you like and value your morning coffee, it's time to stop drinking that instant stuff.
At under £30, ss coffee makerthe is a bit of an investment, but one that every coffee lover should consider as the stuff this nifty little gadget churns out is the BEST.
It's easy to use, even easier to clean and the result is just as good as coffee from a £100 coffee machine – every tim
Steamer
If you're keen to at least try to healthy we'd seriously recommend grabbing yourself this
Unlike most steamers, which are usually oval-shaped, this one is basically a perfect circle (hence the "compact" part). However, we'd argue that it's still more than big enough as you can pile up the food within each of the baskets (which are also stackable for easy storage).
Not only can you grab it for under £25, but when we tried one for ourselves, we were delighted to find that it also came with a rice tray included – perfect if you always struggle to make rice that isn't horribly soggy or chewy.
As well as cooking your veg and rice to perfection, you can also use it to steam fish, meat and, as we did, gyozas too!
If you want something even more compact, we're big fans of the Minimal washing up, minimal storage space, minimal effort – ideal.
Or, if you'd like even more versatility, we'd recommend which can be used both in the microwave and on the hob. We opted for the hob and tried cooking both veg and salmon at once on the stacking trays – it worked a treat, with things cooking even faster than we expected.
Pyrex measuring jug
Using cups to guess quantities of liquids can be complicated territory, and it certainly isn't a foolproof method. Allow us to present to you the wonders of the (available in loads of different sizes at Wilko, and all reasonably priced).
What's more, unlike plastic jugs, you can shove a Pyrex in the microwave or oven to heat things up without it melting or the number markings fading away.
Garlic press
Garlic makes everything taste better. That's just a fact.
But unfortunately, if you chop garlic by hand, you run the risk of getting the smell all over your hands (and if you've never done this before, trust us when we say that it's almost impossible to wash off).
This is exactly why garlic presses are such a necessity, and according to (a lot of) the good people of the internet, is the best of the bunch.
We haven't tried out every garlic press going, but we do have one of these and can confirm that it does the job well.
Salad spinner
Yeah, we know. This sounds like the most boring and ridiculous thing ever invented, but you've clearly not experienced the abomination that is
Once you start using one of these babies and realise how nice it is to eat crisp, clean leaves, you'll never doubt us again.
And you can snap one up for under which is about as cheap as you'll ever be able to find them! We love you, IKEA.
Pizza scissors
There's nothing more frustrating than cooking the perfect pizza, then having to maul it into submission with a blunt knife or novelty pizza slicer that's all style and no substance – especially if you've gone to the effort of
The cheap and genius solution is to invest in some pizza scissors instead!
They're angled to suit your pizza-cutting needs, and if you're feeling fancy, even have a pizza-slice server included (with the word 'pizza' carved in). That's totally useful... we guess?
Knife block set
If ever there's an invention just crying out to be made, it's a one-knife-for-every-task-in-the-kitchen knife.
Sadly the multi-purpose knife has yet to materialise, so it's up to us to tell you that you can't cut bread with a vegetable knife.
No, really, you can't. The type of blade a knife has, serrated or smooth for example, makes a big difference when you're chopping up various food types.
This Knife block set can be bagged from Argos for about £20, and includes a sharpener and an additional pair of scissors. The reviews testify that, unlike a lot of cheaper knife block sets, the blades in here are actually sharp enough to do what you bought them for.
What's more, with a knife sharpener at your disposal, they should last you years.
Digital meat thermometer
Dry chicken and overcooked beef are both among the many atrocities in the world. But to be honest, if you're anything like us, overcooking meat is sometimes the only way to make sure you don't catch a nasty bout of food poisoning. Well, not anymore.Digital meat thermometer
This costs around £7 and will transform your cooking habits forever.
If you don't know what the optimum temperature for whatever you're cooking is, a quick Google will help you out.
Soup ladle
Soups, sauces and other liquidy type food can be very tricky to get from pan to bowl without some serious spillages.
That's where this nifty comes in. It's dishwasher safe and pretty cheap compared to a lot of ladles (£2.50 + P&P).
If that's not enough to convince you, here's a rave review from Wilko's site:
Glass oven dish set
Once you've got the Pyrex jug, why stop there? Keep making your life easier with these special dishes that can handle extreme heat. They're perfect for things like lasagne, casseroles and, most importantly, reheating leftovers.
We like this set(£10 from Wilko), which includes a range of sizes and lids (which also double as dishes for smaller culinary exploits).
Toastie bags
If you don't have the cash to splash out on a full-blown grill, grab yourself a pack of these ingenious reusable toaster bags instead.
These bags let you transform your sandwich into a toastie by just popping it in the bag, then putting the bag straight into your toaster.
Once you give this a bash, you'll probably never eat a normal sandwich at home again, and that's ok, because these things are cheap as anything!
Freezable containers
In the spirit of efficiency, saving money and being healthy, it's well worth picking up some of these food loads which you can pick up from Wilko for a little over a quid.
Double up on your portions to save some dollar and whack the rest in the fridge/freezer for a day when you just can't be bothered to cook anything. Easy peasy.
Double-handed oven gloves
And last but not least, we present you with an absolute staple of any good kitchen:
Everything, and we mean everything, in the kitchen is out to get you at some point or another, so make sure to take precautions and cover up your mitts.
You can stop using tea towels to remove things from the oven now.
There are literally hundreds of awesome items that could have made this list, but we chose our top picks based on previous experience in terms of what most student kitchens are missing, great value and general usefulness in making life easier.
