Tools editor
Rosa Whittaker
Rosa Whittaker has been writing about kitchen tools for two decades. She owns three knives.
Beats
Published in Open Burner
Tools
The Mortar and Pestle That Earns Its Shelf Space
Rosa Whittaker resisted buying one for eight years. Then she did, and she uses it five nights a week.
Preserving
Smoked Trout on the Back Porch
Rosa Whittaker cures and cold-smokes four small rainbow trout each spring on a homemade rig assembled from a cardboard box and a soldering iron.
Weeknight
Five-Ingredient Yogurt-Marinated Chicken for a Wednesday Grill
Rosa Whittaker walks through the yogurt-marinated chicken thighs she has been cooking on her small Toronto balcony since the first warm week of May — yogurt, garlic, lemon, salt, and time.
Drinks
The Second Coffee: A Pour-Over Routine for the 10:30 Cup
Rosa Whittaker has a morning drip and an 10:30 pour-over. The two cups do different work, and after six years she has stopped pretending one is better than the other.
Drinks
The Kettle That Worked: Eight Years with a Cheap Electric
Rosa Whittaker has been writing about kitchen tools for twenty years. The kettle in her own apartment is a $32 electric she bought at a Canadian Tire in 2018, and she has no intention of replacing it.
Slow Cooking
A Pot of Cassoulet Over Three Days
Rosa Whittaker started a cassoulet on a Thursday evening in late April and finished it on Saturday night. The pot, an old French cazuela her aunt brought back from Toulouse in 1979, did most of the work.
Preserving
The Sauerkraut Crock on the Windowsill
Rosa Whittaker fills a five-litre stoneware crock in her Toronto kitchen every October, and the cabbage carries her through the dark months.
Weeknight
Sheet-Pan Chicken Thighs and Whatever Is Left in the Crisper
Rosa Whittaker makes a case for the sheet-pan dinner as a small act of pantry inventory — six bone-in thighs, a hot oven, and the vegetables you bought on Saturday and forgot.
Pantry
The Salt Question, Settled
Rosa Whittaker spent six months cooking with seven salts in her Toronto kitchen and emerged with a position she is willing to defend.
Tools
The Only Knife You Actually Need
Rosa Whittaker owns three knives. She used to own twenty-two. The eighteen she gave away are not missed.
Bread & Baking
Quick Yeast Rolls for a Friday Dinner
Rosa Whittaker bakes a batch of yeast rolls on Fridays when her sister and her sister's partner come to dinner. Ninety minutes start to finish, including the rise.
Kitchen Notes
Cooking for One, Without Theatre
A reporter's notebook from six months of weeknight dinners alone in a Toronto apartment, where the goal is not self-care but simply dinner.
Tools
Cast Iron Skillet Care, With Apologies
Rosa Whittaker has scrubbed her 1962 Griswold with soap for two decades. The pan is fine. The internet is not.