Modern kitchen gadgets and appliances have changed cooking beyond all recognition. With new technologies, changing habits and evolving food trends, these gizmos turned once-inconceivable cooking processes into everyday conveniences. So we've zipped down memory lane to bring you the kitchen tools that have defined cooking through the ages, counting down to our favourite.
Click or scroll through our gallery to uncover the truth behind the best kitchen gadgets – counting down to the greatest of all.
Spiralisers became all the rage in the early 2010s as health-conscious cooks ditched pasta in favour of courgetti noodles and vegetable ribbons. For many, this gadget is now gathering dust in the back of cupboards, but there’s still a large online community of food bloggers dedicated to creating spiralised recipes.
Few kitchen gadgets scream '1970s' more than the fondue set. Though fondue has been eaten for centuries, the concept took off in the United States after Konrad Egli brought it to his New York City restaurant in the 1950s. There's no word on who first started making and selling domestic fondue sets, but its popularity peaked through the 1970s. Fondue parties were commonplace, and fondue sets with a communal hot pot and long forks shot off the shelves.
In the early 1990s, an appetite for barista-quality home brews was growing and one man took it upon himself to make it possible. John Sylvan, co-founder of Keurig, introduced the first K-Cup coffee pods and brewing systems in the 1990s, and American coffee lovers haven't looked back since. Across the pond, the popularity of Nespresso coffee capsule machines, patented in the 1970s but not released until the 1990s, was burgeoning too.
People love waffles. Need proof? Cornelius Swarthout patented the stove-top waffle iron in 1869, and General Electric put out the first electric waffle iron as early as 1911. So kitchens everywhere have been perfecting the humble for well over 150 years, and it shows no sign of slowing down anytime soon. Technology has improved since 1911, and waffle iron designs are better than ever, but the waffle doesn't ever need to change.
https://blog.library.si.edu/blog/2010/08/24/waffle-iron-patented/
Sometimes referred to as boil-in-the-bag, the sous vide (pronounced sue-veed) cooks vacuum-sealed bags of food in temperature-controlled water. A gentle and precise way of enhancing flavours and ensuring tender meat, the method has been used by high-end restaurant chefs since 1974. But domestic sous vide appliances only became available in 2009. Credit for popularising the method is generally given to famed chef Thomas Keller, whose 2008 book, Under Pressure: Cooking Sous Vide, showed 2000s cooks the ropes.
https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/features/story-home-sous-vide-machine
The need for speed and ease continued through the 1960s, much to the benefit of the Teasmade. This automatic tea-making machine – which included a settable clock for hot beverages on demand – was patented in the 1930s but became a cult product in the 1960s and into the 1970s. It was made by Goblin, but other companies jumped on the bandwagon too.
https://www.teasmade.uk/1934-w-h-b-thotnton-prototype-3/
Touted as a super-speedy and super-healthy way of preparing food, pressure cookers work by sealing in heat and cooking ingredients using the resulting steam. People have been cooking this way for centuries, but the modern pressure cooker was first brought to market for domestic use in 1910 in Colorado. Their popularity burgeoned through the 1960s when second-wave feminism had taken hold and women were spending increasingly less time in the kitchen.
https://archive.org/details/popularsciencemo92newyuoft/page/68/mode/2up
Brits and Americans in the 1980s were becoming increasingly health conscious and limp lettuce simply would not do. Credit for the invention of the salad spinner is typically given to French inventors Jean Mantelet and Gilberte Fouineteau, who pioneered versions of the device in the 1970s. By the 1980s, the salad spinner was a countertop staple.
Stephen J. Poplawski is widely credited with inventing the world’s first electric blender, used for mixing malt drinks and milkshakes in soda fountains across America, in the 1920s. But it wasn’t until the stylish Waring Blendor (note the trademarked spelling) and Vitamix's The Blender hit the market in 1937 that it became a true kitchen essential. Unsurprisingly, smoothies started to become a thing right afterwards.
https://web.archive.org/web/20110414114516/http://www.vitamix.com/household/infocenter/history.asp
https://www.trademarkia.com/blendor-71606582
From heavyweight superstar to grill master, George Foreman launched his Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine in the mid-1990s. The countertop grill was sleek and easy to use, and the promise of ousted fat tapped into the psyche of the health-conscious 1990s cook. Foreman's slogan – "It's so good I put my name on it" – became as famous as the cult product itself.
It’s hard to imagine life without Tupperware now. These handy and ubiquitous storage tubs fit neatly in fridges and cupboards like Tetris blocks and have an endless amount of uses. Invented in 1946, they were a sleek solution for leftovers and packed lunches, and a godsend for working women still trying to uphold household duties. There still are Tupperware parties (such as the one pictured here), where hosts sell the products to their friends and family.
The SodaStream – the carbonating machine that makes plain old water into a fizzy drink – was invented in 1903 but didn't come to home kitchens until 1955. It was such a hit that in the 1980s, according to The Guardian, 40% of Brits owned a SodaStream. "Get busy with the fizzy" was the catchy line that rang out from TV ads throughout the decade.
After World War I, kitchens changed in America, Britain and beyond. With more women filling the workforce than ever before, the need for nifty, time-saving cooking devices was paramount. Enter the automatic toaster. The first automatic pop-up toaster that could brown bread on both sides at once was patented in 1921 and, in 1926, it was on shelves under the name ‘Toastmaster’.
Refrigeration paved the way for all sorts of kitchen innovations, but one of the unsung heroes of the home is the humble ice machine. After all, what would our cosy drinks be without an ice cube or two tinkling around in them? Jurgen Hans invented the first machine to produce edible ice in 1929, and he founded a company to sell them in 1932. Cheers!
https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780199311132.001.0001/acref-9780199311132-e-956
The can opener was first patented in 1858, but it took more than 60 years for the device to reach its peak design. One rotating wheel was added to the standard can opener in the 1870s, but it wasn't until 1920 that Charles Arthur Bunker patented a design that featured two wheels. Subsequent can openers followed the same basic blueprint ever since – and made our lives a lot easier in the process.
https://www.backthenhistory.com/articles/the-history-of-can-openers
Mixing dough and batter by hand can be arm-aching work and – for those who could afford it – the KitchenAid, an automatic stand mixer, meant waving goodbye to this toilsome task. The first KitchenAids came out in 1914, but they were big machines designed for industry. (The US Army was the first major fan.) A smaller, home version was invented in 1919, but the company introduced its game-changing 'model G' mixer in 1927. This was a lighter, more compact version of its predecessor, and it sold like hotcakes.
Who invented the deep-fat fryer and when did they do it? That's surprisingly hard to answer. Stanley J Budlane and Dusek Robert filed a patent for an 'electric deep fat fryer' in 1949, so that seems like the obvious. Until, that is, you discover previous patents for a 'deep fat cooker' in 1931 and an 'electric deep grease fryer and the like' in 1936. Not to mention the fact that humans have been deep frying food for literally thousands of years! But it is safe to say that the deep-fat fryer was a kitchen staple in the 1950s and 1960s.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3764363/The-great-deep-fat-frying-furore-Mary-Berry-thinks-stinking-outrage-Gregg-Wallace-insists-culinary-heritage-on.html
https://patents.google.com/patent/US2593392A/en?q=(A47J37%2f1209)&sort=old&page=1
https://patents.google.com/patent/US1925265A/en?q=(A47J37%2f1209)&sort=old
https://patents.google.com/patent/US2128738A/en?q=(A47J37%2f1209)&sort=old
The busy 1950s housewife didn't have time to wait around watching pots boil – and so Russell Hobbs came to the rescue. Though electric kettles had existed since the late 19th century, the brand introduced a model that would switch itself off when done (like modern-day kettles do) in 1955. The progressive appliance was marketed as "the kettle that watches itself" and was promised to be super safe and efficient.
The Crock-Pot didn't enter the market until 1971, but the concept of the slow cooker was in place 30 years earlier. Irving Naxon secured the patent for the device in 1940 and started selling it in the 1950s. But it was only after he sold his business to Rival Manufacturing that the newly christened Crock-Pot took off. The popularity of the handy slow cooker soared and sales rose to $93 million in 1975.
The steamer is a cooking technique that's been employed for thousands of years, but the advent of electricity brought the electric steamer into modern kitchens in the 1950s. But it truly came into its own when it sated Britain and America's appetite for uber-healthy meals in the 2000s. Anybody who was anybody was waxing lyrical about the benefits of steaming rather than boiling veg: steaming is thought to retain more nutrients than other methods of cooking. The gadget remains popular today.
The AGA was an iconic contraption born in the 1920s – and it aimed to make cooking less fiddly, fussy and time-guzzling. Swedish physicist Dr Gustaf Dalén invented the AGA after losing his sight in an accident. Spending more time at home, he realised that his wife was fatigued and frazzled from using her unwieldy cooker. His solution was the AGA, a cast-iron oven that stayed hot continuously. It was a quick hit, arriving in Britain and beyond in the late 1920s and rising in popularity throughout the following decades.
Juice cleanses have been a thing for, unbelievably, nearly 100 years. The first home juicer arrived in the 1930s, thanks to raw food enthusiast Dr. Norman Walker. The first masticating juicer arrived in the 1950s, and the twin-gear juicer revolutionised the scene again in the 1990s. The NutriBullet is the frontrunner these days, and it first hit shelves in 2003.
https://www.thembsgroup.co.uk/internal/the-nutribullet-generation-in-conversation-with-colin-sapire/
https://www.dummies.com/article/home-auto-hobbies/food-drink/juicing-smoothies/a-brief-history-of-juicing-142786/
The non-stick pan was the invention of French engineer Marc Grégoire, although his wife Colette gave him the idea. She challenged him to create a non-stick pan using the Teflon polymer she'd seen him use to coat his beloved fishing gear. He concurred and succeeded, creating the Tefal brand in 1956. Other brands followed suit and soon non-stick pans became a household mainstay.
Panasonic (then Matsushita Electric) invented the very first domestic bread maker in 1986 in Japan. You simply poured the dough mixture into the device and, hey presto, the comforting smell of freshly baked bread filled your kitchen in no time. The appliance's popularity skyrocketed in the 1990s and it's estimated that 25 million Americans owned a bread machine in this decade.
This multi-tasking domestic gadget was invented in 1961 by Pierre Verdun and Robert Comte. The ‘Robot Coupe’ food processor was sold in 1963 to commercial kitchens, but the real revolution came in 1971. That's when the pair invented the Magimix, a compact food processor ideal for home use. For the first time, arduous and time-consuming tasks such as chopping, grating and slicing could all be done by one compact machine – and fast. Home cooks have never looked back.
https://www.magimix.co.uk/content/8-about-us
Oh, the humble potato peeler. Imagine how much longer your roast potatoes would take without this simple bit of kitchen kit. The painstaking task of peeling potatoes was made a lot easier with the invention of the French Econome peeler – with a split blade – in the 1920s by Victor Pouzet. But the Zena Rex speed peeler (pictured centre) came around in 1947 and took things up a level. Still on the market today, it was dreamt up by Alfred Neweczerzal and is an iconic Swiss design.
https://www.cooksinfo.com/econome-peelers
Convection ovens have been around since the 1940s, but the Philips Air Fryer took the world by storm when it launched in 2010. Using just one teaspoon of oil, the device circulates super-hot air around food to give it a crispy texture similar to deep frying. The device received lots of praise at the prestigious 2010 IFA consumer electronics show – and it really took off in the 2020s.
The invention of the deep freezer is very closely related to the invention of the refrigerator. But while the fridge was perfect for keeping food cool, the deep freezer took domestic food preservation to new heights. When the first domestic deep freezers went on the market in 1955, it was the first home cooks could freeze their own fresh food. Before this, only food bought frozen could be stored in a freezer.
https://web.archive.org/web/20230116095022/https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1990-02-25-9001170072-story.html
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the electric stove was born around the same time as the electric oven. William Hadaway received the first patent for an electric stove in 1896, with his invention eventually coming to replace coal or wood-fired stoves. The electric stove naturally didn't become a common part of kitchens until the 1930s and 1940s when electricity found its way to more and more homes.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/almanac-the-first-electric-stove/
Faster and more economical, the electric oven was a kitchen game changer. Incredibly, it was invented in the 1890s, with most giving credit to Thomas Ahearn. However, it wasn’t until the 1930s that electric ovens became more commonplace in British and American kitchens. In Britain in particular, the birth of a National Grid in the 1920s meant that more households were connected to power than ever before.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/cooking-through-the-ages-a-timeline-of-oven-inventions-380050/
The history of the dishwasher is longer than you might think. The first successful dishwasher was invented in the 1890s by an affluent American woman named Josephine Cochran, who wasn't satisfied with the care her servants took with her expensive china. Electricity changed everything, of course, and German heavyweight Miele led the way with a domestic dishwasher in 1929. The post-war boom saw to it that – by the 1950s – dishwashers were increasingly commonplace in kitchens across the world.
Many of us can barely get out of bed without a cup of coffee, and we have Mr. Coffee to thank for making it so easy to enjoy that much-needed first cup of joe. Before Mr. Coffee was unveiled to the world in 1971, people at home had to make do with percolators and coffee filters. But after Vincent Marotta Sr. and his business partner, Samuel Glazer, engaged engineers to create a drip brewer for the home kitchen, everybody had access to good coffee at the touch of a button. Home brewing has never been the same since.
https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/08/mr-coffee-inventor-dies-vincent-marotta-sr-co-created-drip-coffeemaker-that-revolutionized-home-brewing.html
A post-World War II technology boom transformed kitchens at a more rapid pace than ever before. The first home refrigerator was introduced in the 1910s, but it was the preserve of the very wealthiest in society. In the following decades, companies such as Whirlpool pioneered more efficient, economical designs, leading to 45% of Americans owning a refrigerator in the 1940s. They were mostly boxy and compact with little freezer compartments built in – so not a lot has changed!
The mother of all time-saving devices, the microwave was actually invented by chance. Percy Spencer, an engineer who worked with magnetrons, was conducting a test in the 1940s when he realised that radiation had caused the chocolate bar in his pocket to melt. He soon set to work on an early version of the modern microwave and they were in commercial kitchens by the end of the decade. It wasn't until the 1960s that microwaves were built to sit neatly on domestic kitchen countertops but, after this, the rest was history.
Now discover the retro ingredients we wish would make a comeback
Last updated by Luke Paton.