4 Kitchen Hacks That Work Like Magic

Working in the kitchen, when you have free time and space, can be one of the most enjoyable things you do around the house. Working in the kitchen when you don’t have these things, and it feels like you’re in the middle of a furnace, can be the very opposite. If you’ve ever worked in the kitchen at a restaurant or busy hotel, you’ll know how quickly tempers can get frayed. Feeling pressured and stressed is never good, but it’s even worse when you’re handling knives and working with hot liquids and surfaces. So it’s good to have a few kitchen hacks at hand which make kitchen life easier. Below, we’ll look at a few such hacks that could be essential for you.

Kitchen Hacks that Will Change Your Life

Softening hard butter

Real butter tastes better, and is better for you, than margarine spreads. However, everyone who likes butter has had the experience of forgetting to take it out of the fridge in order to soften ahead of use and therefore ended up ripping bread to pieces. This mess can be avoided by cutting the butter into smaller blocks and leaving them in a warmer area for a few minutes.

Also, there is the best microwave food cover that can help soften the butter without melting it completely, making it easier to use. Butter softens on the surface first, so by creating more surface area, you speed up the softening process. If you warm a microwave-safe dish in the microwave for a short while, it works even better.

Butter softens on the surface first, so by creating more surface area, you speed up the softening process. If you warm a microwave-safe dish in the microwave for a short while, it works even better.

Use an old container as a kitchen trashcan

If you’ve used the last of something that came in a plastic container – like ice cream or dishwasher salt – don’t throw the container away. Instead, keep it around to throw away little bits of debris that are created while cooking. At the end of the cooking process, you can dispose of the debris in your outside garbage, and you won’t need to keep a trashcan in your kitchen – which is good news from a space standpoint and for household hygiene (especially in summer).

Open liquid containers over the sink

When you’ve worked with a custom kitchen contractor to give you the perfect surfaces and cleanest lines, it sometimes feels like a shame to cook around those surfaces, because cooking always means spills. You can’t avoid every spill, but you can limit their impact by making sure as many as possible happen away from the surface. If you’re opening tinned tomatoes, double cream, or anything liquid for the first time, do it while standing over the sink. If they’re going to spill – and we all know they are – it’s better that these containers spill somewhere with a water supply and excellent drainage.

Use Ziploc bags hands-free

Ziploc bags are a real boon in a kitchen, as they allow you to throw away old packaging and keep everything neater. However, we’ve all been in the situation where we want to empty a container into a Ziploc and realize: “I’m holding the container in one hand, and the bag in another hand, and how do I hold the bag open? I’m out of hands here!”. The solution is simple enough – just push the sides of the bag down around itself (imagine you’re turning up a trouser leg and you’ve got a general idea). This will reinforce the sides and allow the bag to stay upright and open under its own steam – meaning all you need to do is handle the initial container.