Kitchen Essentials - Practical cooking tips to help you make easy budget recipes

Kitchen Essential 1: Pots and Pans

Investing in a few quality pots and pans is definitely money well spent. If you're just about to get married then put some on your wedding list!

You can buy cheap aluminium ones but they will dent and wear out quite quickly, so I would advise you to avoid them. High grade stainless steel ones with a heavy copper base are probably the best pans you can buy and could last you a lifetime. On the downside they can be a pain to clean and they are quite heavy. Cast iron pans are also top end but they weigh a lot and cost a fortune.

My kitchen essentials tip is to use the Teflon coated (i.e. non-stick) pans which are fairly light, easy to clean and don't cost the earth. As long as you only use wood or plastic utensils and do not heat an empty pan for a long time then they should last you for at least 10 years. I like glass lids so you can see what's going on inside without lifting it.

Another practical cooking tip is to only buy the pans you actually need. It may be tempting to go for a large set of  five saucepans which nest nicely inside each other, but you're likely to only use a couple of the larger ones so the rest will just take up valuable space.

Below is a list of the essential pot's and pan's you will need for all of my easy budget recipes:

• Large frying pan
• Large saucepan with lid
• Medium saucepan with lid
• Large ‘pot' style pan with lid
• Wok style pan for stir fries

Kitchen Essential 2: Electrical Items

There are lots of fun and seemingly useful electrical kitchen gadgets on the market, but I think there's just three items which really count as essential:

• Hand whisk - A hand whisk will cost you £5 - £10 from a supermarket, catalogue shop or department store.
• Food processor - There are many food processors on the market but I think mine is the best! It cost £40 about 7 years ago, has survived all sorts of recipes and baby purees and the best part of all is that all the various attachments come off and go in the dishwasher. Brilliant!
• Microwave – They're not just for heating up ready meals, they are a really useful piece of equipment! You can reheat food, steam vegetables and make jacket potatoes in no time, so lets use them for good!

Kitchen Essential 3: Knives

Knives are another thing to splurge on! Decent knives are expensive but worth every penny. Stainless steel or carbon knives are the best and all the good ones will come with a lifetime guarantee. Remember it's important to keep them sharp! Accidents happen when the blades are blunt! Quality is definitely more important than quantity, below is a list of my kitchen essentials:

• Paring knife
• Large chef's knife
• Large serrated / bread knife
• Good pair of kitchen scissors

Kitchen Essential 4: Essential Utensils

You can get most of these cheaply at places like Ikea, supermarkets or even pound shops and unlike knives, these kitchen essentials don't necessarily need to cost a lot of money. It's simply knowing which 'apparatus' are essential. This will ensure you not only prevent wasting money but will also prevent you from running out space trying to store items which are quite literally, a waste of space!

• Mixing bowls
• Large roasting dish
• Couple of non-stick baking sheets
• Large square / rectangular lasagne dish
• Casserole dish
• 2 x Chopping boards (one for meat only)
• Colander (for draining pasta etc)
• Small Sieve (for washing rice etc)
• Rubber spatula (for stirring and scraping bowls
• Garlic crusher
• Potato masher
• Wooden spoons
• Vegetable peeler
• Whisk
• Plastic or rubber tongs (to turn frying food)
• Ladle
• Rolling pin
• Cheese grater
• Fish slice
• Slotted Spoon
• Measuring jug
• Tin opener
• Tupperware for food storage 

We all have to eat three times a day, so it's well worth investing in your basic kitchen essentials which will help you to cook a variety of meals easily. A bad workman always blames his/her tools - don't give yourself that excuse!