Finding Great Uses for Your Kettles and Stockpots

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Versatile kettles and stockpots are essential kitchen gear. They can handle everything from boiling bagels, to making soups, to braising short ribs. They’re available in a range of sizes to meet your needs as well as your budget. With the right kitchen equipment on hand, like stockpots and kettles, the possibilities are endless. Let’s explore some of those possibilities.

Using Your Stockpot

  1. Bagels need a quick dip (30 to 60 seconds per side) in boiling, seasoned water to develop their signature flavor and texture. A stockpot works perfectly for this purpose. It’s easy to dip, flip, and remove batches of boiled bagels quickly, so they maintain that perfect texture.
  2. Reducing sauces to rich perfection is almost effortless in a stockpot. Large quantities of liquid can be slowly reduced in volume as excess water simmers away, leaving behind the concentrated flavors of an exceptional sauce. 
  3. A stockpot of boiling water is handy for cooking spaghetti or other pasta à la minute.
  4. Stockpots are also fantastic for creating rich, gelatinous broths. Kettles work for this purpose, as well. Having a selection of both stockpots and kettles on hand allows you to choose the perfect one based on the quantity of broth you’ll be making.

Cooking In A Kettle

  1. Thinner soups do fine in a stockpot, but thicker soups, stews, and chili are better off in a kettle. There’s virtually no chance of these thicker products burning in the more controlled environment of the kettle. They’ll simmer to perfection with no worry about acrid burned bits ruining the entire batch. A kettle with a built-in stirrer will even save you labor costs since you’ll no longer need someone to stir the contents manually. 
  2. Speaking of burning… You’ll never have to worry about burned rice again when you cook it in a kettle! That’s because a kettle basically functions as a double boiler. Since the rice isn’t cooking over direct heat, it doesn’t have a chance to burn.
  3. A kettle will cook large batches of pasta to perfection. We have kettle sizes to accommodate even the busiest Italian kitchen’s pasta needs, too.
  4. Vegetables cook quickly and evenly in a kettle. No more soggy asparagus, limp green beans, or sodden corn on the cob! The fact that the heating surfaces extend at least part-way up the sides of the kettle ensures quick, even cooking of these tender items.
  5. Meats braise beautifully in a kettle. Steam-heated kettles efficiently braise even the toughest cuts of meat. Those meltingly tender and delicious short ribs will be ready to serve in approximately one-third of the time they would take in a stockpot. They’ll need much less tending along the way, too. 
  6. Desserts are another dish that often fares well in the controlled environment of a steam kettle. The gentle, encompassing heat produces divine results with minimum supervision!

Thinking Outside the Kitchen…

  1. Okay, we’ll grant that this one isn’t exactly in the realm of kitchen tasks. But did you know that stockpots and kettles also work great for dyeing fabric? That’s right! The Arena Stage in Washington DC uses the one they bought from us to dye their theater costumes the exact color they need. A stockpot is handy for trims and other small pieces while a large kettle can handle even heavy period outfits.

Now, that’s what we call getting creative with these versatile kitchen essentials!

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