Americas Test Kitchen

!±8± Americas Test Kitchen

I had never seen Americas Test Kitchen before. The first time I saw it, I was really impressed. It struck me kind of like the Consumer Reports of food.

America's Test Kitchen is currently in its seventh season and is reportedly the most-watched cooking show on public television with over 2.9 million viewers. Just outside Boston, the show is produced at the test kitchen of Cook's Illustrated magazine. Each episode features recipes that purportedly work every time. The host and the test cooks test equipment, solve typical cooking problems, and taste supermarket ingredients.

In a recent test on Basmati rice, they ranked a rice grown in the Himalayas as the top rated rice. A show n favorite citrus dessert recipes pitted baking non-stick sprays against regular non-stick sprays - no contest, the baking sprays fared better. The two that got me, though, were the table-top grill reviews and the knives reviews. After reviewing several, they came up with the following recommendations:

GRILLS

They highly recommended the KRUPS Universal Grill and Panini Maker (FDE312) and recommended, you guessed it, the GEORGE FOREMAN Family Size Grill (GR26).

I ended up buying the Krups. However, I'm very impressed with what I've researched about the newest Foreman grills. I have a model picked out for my next purchase (George Foreman GRP90WGR Next Grilleration Removable-Plate Grill with 5 Plates). The knock on Foreman grills in the past was that they were difficult to clean. Their latest models have removable, dishwasher safe plates that users seem to really appreciate. I also bought a grill for individual meals to make in my microwave, which saves a ton of time and does a great job - the Microgrill. It's great for those quick meals when you're only cooking for yourself - a fast lunch, for example.

KNIVES:

Cutco knives are great knives with a lifetime warranty but some might find them out of their price range. The Test Kitchens recommendation is the Victorinox Fibrox chef's knife. They also recommend Wüsthof Gourmet Cook's Knives. The Victorinox was touted for its more reasonable price, given the high quality of the knife.

The show specifically recommended the following knives:

Highly Recommended: Forschner Victorinox Fibrox Chef's Knife

Recommended: Wüsthof Gourmet Cook's Knife

I hope you enjoyed these reviews. I'm hooked on this show!