Untitled Quiz

Kitchen Tools & Equipment

• Kitchen tools and equipment are crucial for food preparation.
• Food equipment can be dangerous.
• All models of equipment are not alike.
• Cleaning is an essential part of operating procedures.
• Energy conservation is important.
• Proper hand skills are key in using kitchen equipment.

Cooking Equipment: Range Tops

• The range top is a vital cooking tool, though other tools (steamers, steam kettles) often take over some functions.

Cooking Equipment: Cook Tops

• Open elements (burners) are either electric coils or gas flames.
• Open elements heat quickly and can be turned off quickly.
• Cooktop space is limited to one pot per burner.
• Flattop or hot top (lightweight): burners with a steel plate, offering more cook space, support moderately heavy weights.

Cooking Equipment: Cook Tops - Heavy-Duty Flattop

• Burners are covered with heavy cast steel; designed to support heavy pots.
• A thick top requires longer preheating.
• Adjust cooking heat by moving pots on the top.

Cooking Equipment: Cook Tops - Induction Cooktops

• Induction units do not get hot.
• Induction units work by using magnetism to heat the molecules in steel or iron cookware.

Range Installation Style: Free-Standing Range

• Free-standing ranges are most common.
• They are finished on both sides.
• Ranges can be installed with cabinetry on one side, both sides, or completely stand-alone.

Range Installation Style: Slide-In Range

• Slide-in ranges are comparable in width to free-standing ranges.
• They sit on the floor, but must be installed between cabinets.
• The cooktops of slide-in ranges extend slightly on the sides and back, overlapping the countertop to create a built-in look.

Cooking Equipment: Do's & Don'ts

• Ensure gas pilots are lit before turning on burners.
• If burners don't light, turn off the gas, ventilate and try again.
• For maximum heat, adjust air intake for the blue flame with a white tip.
• Don't use high heat on a flattop range unless items are being cooked over the area.

Cooking Equipment: Oven

• Ovens are typically enclosed spaces used to cook food.
• Often combined with range tops in the kitchen.
• Food can be heated in ovens using hot air, microwaves, or infrared radiation.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Holding Ovens or Warmers

• Holding ovens (or warmers) are used to maintain temperature for many foods for extended periods.
• They don't dry out or overcook the food.
• Some ovens first cook food, then automatically shift to holding temperature.
• High-volume roll-in ovens are big, with large doors and rolling carts that are loaded with food trays.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Commercial Roll-In Ovens

• Commercial roll-in ovens are designed for maximum production and are meant to be mobile.
• Used in busy commercial kitchens to optimize food prep stations.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Conventional Ovens

• Conventional ovens work by simply heating air within a contained space.
• Stack ovens have individual shelves or decks.
• Food is directly placed onto the oven deck, not wire shelves.
• Temperatures are adjustable for each deck.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Convection Ovens

• Convection ovens use fans to circulate air and distribute heat throughout.
• Forced air speeds up cooking times.
• Foods cooked in convection ovens take less time.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Microwave Ovens

• Microwave ovens use radiation to agitate water molecules in foods internally.
• Agitation creates heat, cooking the food.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Combination Steamer Ovens

• Combination steamer ovens, aka Combi ovens, can cook and hold food.
• Can operate as convection or convection steamers.
• Introducing moisture during roasting helps to avoid shrinkage.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Barbecue Ovens or Smoke Ovens

• Barbecue ovens are conventional ovens with additional wood smoke flavoring.
• Wood smoke is used to add flavor to the food.

Cooking Equipment: Oven - Infrared or Reconstituting Ovens

• Infrared ovens use quartz tubes or plates to generate intense infrared heat.
• They're very quick at reheating frozen foods to serving temperature.
• Heat is controlled and consistent.

Cooking Equipment: Broiler

• Broilers (also called overhead broilers) work by applying heat from above.
• Food is placed on a grate beneath the heat source.

Cooking Equipment: Broiler - Heavy-Duty Broilers

• Heavy-duty broilers produce very high heat.
• Use a lot of energy.

Cooking Equipment: Broiler - Salamanders

• Salamanders are small broilers typically placed above a range.
• Primarily used for browning or glazing food items' tops.

Cooking Equipment: Grills

• Grills are much like broilers, with the addition of the heat source being positioned below the food-holding grid versus above.
• Differences are due to the heat source.

Cooking Equipment: Griddles

• Griddles consist of heated flat surfaces used for direct cooking.
• Griddles should be cleaned after each use to maintain peak efficiency.
• Condition them often to maintain a nonstick surface and prevent rusting.

Cooking Equipment: Rotisseries & Deep Fryers

• Rotisseries use electric or gas-powered heating elements to cook food by turning rotisseries.
• Standard deep fryers cook in hot fat via gas or electric.
• Automatic fryers remove fried food from hot fat automatically.
• Pressure fryers use covered fry kettles, cooking under pressure.

Cooking Equipment: Tilting Skillet

• Tilting skillets (sometimes called tilting braziers or tilting fry pans), are a versatile cooking tool used in various ways.
• These tools can function as griddles, fry pans, braziers, stew pots, stockpots, steamers, and bain-marie, or steam tables.

Cooking Equipment: Steam-Jacketed Kettles

• Steam-jacketed kettles heat quickly, with even and controllable heat.
• Tilt or trunnion kettles can be emptied by turning a wheel or pulling a lever.
• Non-tilt kettles drain through a spigot.

Cooking Equipment: Steam Cookers

• Steam cookers quickly cook vegetables and many other foods.
• Pressure steamers cook food under pressure.
• Pressureless/Convection steamers do not utilize pressure.

Processing Equipment: Food Cutter

• Food cutters (or rotation choppers, sometimes called buffalo choppers) serve general food chopping.
• A food grinder is for grinding meat and other moist foods.
• Slicers/Shredders use a hopper and lever for rotating disks or plates.
• Dicers use grid-type blades to precisely dice food.

Processing Equipment: Food Processor

• Professional food processors are larger than home models.
• They have heavy bases, cylindrical work bowls, and S-shaped blades.

Cooking Equipment: Mixer

• Bench models range from 5 to 20 quarts.
• Floor models can hold as much as 140 quarts.
• Mixers have varying bowl sizes enabled by adaptors.
• Most mixers have three operating speeds.

Processing Equipment: Blender

• Blenders mix, crush, or puree food into other substances.
• Stationary blenders have rotating blades at the bottom of a container, powered by an electric motor.
• Immersible blenders have a motor on top connected to a blade at the bottom by a shaft and are used with any container.

Measuring Tools

• Measuring cups are for dry ingredients (e.g. flour, sugar, fat).
• Measuring cups are often made of aluminum or stainless steel.
• Spoons come in varying sizes and shapes; used for smaller quantities of ingredients.
• Household scales weigh large quantities of ingredients up to 25 pounds.
• Measuring cups for liquids are heat-proof glass and often transparent.
• Portion scales weigh food from ounces to pounds.

Basic Kitchen Utensils

• Kitchen shears are used for cutting packages, tape, strings, removing labels, etc.
• Scoops or dippers measure serving sizes.
• Tongs are used to grab and transfer large food items.
• Soup ladles measure soup, gravy, desert sauces, and other liquids.
• Can openers are for opening cans, bottles, and cartons.
• Garlic presses crush garlic.
• Handy poultry and roasting tools make lifting hot roasted meats easier, like turkeys from roasters to platters without them falling apart.
• Flipppers are for filling jars.
• Grates are used for grating foods such as carrots, cabbage and cheese.
• Kitchen knives are used for various tasks, including peeling, dicing, slicing, chopping, etc.

Common Types of Kitchen Knives

• Chef's knives have a broad, curved blade that enables rocking for mincing.
• Santoku knives are the Japanese versions of chef's knives, specializing in slicing, dicing and mincing.
• Utility, or paring knives, have specialized use in slicing fruits and vegetables.
• Citrus knives are for cutting citrus fruits with serrated edges and forked ends.
• Bread knives have serrated edges to cut through tough crusts without flattening them.
• Carving knives are long, thin, narrow blades good for smooth cutting of meats.
• Cleavers are thick, heavy blades used to force-cut through meat and poultry bones, and crush garlic effectively.
• Boning knives are thin and slightly smaller than carving knives to allow precise bone removal from meat.