Salt and pepper go together like… salt and pepper.  (They don’t go together like things, things go together like them!)  We all have salt and pepper in our house, and most of us use them for more than just killing slugs.  But due to their grainy nature, you can’t just keep them in a bowl or throw a pile in your fridge – you need a specially designed salt and/or pepper carrier known to top-level chefs as a “shaker.”

But if you’re using those standard glass 24-hour-diner-in-Jersey shakers, you need to stop!  Have some self-respect, and get a shaker that makes you happy!  Sure, no one needs fancy salt and pepper shakers, you can still get by without them… but you don’t need salt and pepper on your eggs, either, yet something so small can just make the experience more enjoyable.  Isn’t it time you Spice Up Your Salt and Pepper Shakers?

Marvel Superheroes Salt and Pepper Shakers

Earth’s mightiest heroes join together once again, this time to fight a foe worthy of their strength – bland, tasteless food!  (This has Dr. Doom written all over it…)  These hand-crafted and hand-drawn figures of the Marvel Superheroes Salt and Pepper Shakers bring the fight to your dinner table, with Spider-Man and Thor as one unit and Hulk and the Cap as the other!  Excelsium chloride!

Buy the Marvel Superheroes Salt and Pepper Shakers Here

Fred and Friends Salt and Magic

You know how magic wands work: you say an incantation, sacrifice your soul to Satan (if applicable), and then a magic powder falls out of your wand!  That much is just basic, elementary school science – what they never get into is what the powder is.  What if you needed a spell to make your food better?  Then the “magic powder” is no more than common salt!  In which case, the Fred and Friends Salt and Magic are perfectly appropriate.

Check Amazon for the Fred and Friends Salt and Magic Here

Saruman and Gandalf

What better way to symbolize the contrast of salt and pepper than with the eternal battle of good versus evil!  Light versus… gray?  Is that right?  The Saruman and Gandalf shakers are pretty epic.  Dandruff won’t be the only flakes falling from these old men’s heads. You can find more designs featured here.

Check Amazon for the Saruman and Gandalf Here

King and Queen Salt and Pepper Mills

We had to do a double-take to make sure these were actually themed salt and pepper shakers instead of just normal ones.  The King and Queen Salt and Pepper Mills are pretty similar to regular mills, but true chess fans will recognize the difference right away.

Buy the King and Queen Salt and Pepper Mills Here

Superman Vs. Lex Luthor  Set

Man, Superman sure was pissed when Luthor used salt to melt all the ice around his Fortress of Solitude!  With the Superman Vs. Lex Luthor Set, you can reenact that classic battle with Luthor’s salt spraying suit and Superman’s pepper-ray vision (one of his lesser known powers).

Buy the Superman Vs. Lex Luthor  Set Here

Saltepper

They’re both granutaled spices intended to improve the quality of your food – can’t they just get along?  The Saltepper rethinks the separate shakers formula and brings them together as one, where they belong.  Maybe now they can put aside their differences and face the real threat:  oregano.

Buy the Saltepper Here

Creepy Doll Head Shakers

How thoughtless of us – we’re sitting here presenting shakers for normal – perhaps a little nerdy – people, but we forget all about the psychotic killers out there!  What, you assume Kevin Spacey’s character in Seven ate his French fries as-is?  No, he had his own shakers to reflect his personality, like these Creepy Doll Head Shakers.  Mm-mm, we’re getting hungry just looking at them!

Buy the Creepy Doll Head Shakers Here

Spice Up Your Life with These Fantastic Salt and Pepper Shakers

Shopping for a KitchenAid Mixer this year? We’ve looked through all the Black Friday ads and broken down where you can get the cheapest KitchenAid Mixer in the 4.5 quart size, the 5 quart size and the 6 quart size during Black Friday sales.

Best Deal on the 4.5-quart KitchenAid Mixer: $199.99 + $60 Gift Card

You can already find this mixer on sale for $199.99 at sites like Amazon and Macy’s (Regular MSRP: $259.99), but the real bargain will be on Black Friday at Kohl’s when you can earn an additional $60 to spend at Kohl’s with this purchase.

If you are looking for an even smaller model, be on the lookout for the 3.5-quart model around the $150 price point. We recently had a deal that brought it down to $147. However, the 4.5-quart will have better capacity for baking projects, especially during holiday cooking. It offers a 275-watt motor and 10-speed settings.

• Kohl’s: 4.5-quart KitchenAid Mixer (2 colors)

Best Deal on the 5-quart KitchenAid Mixer: $229.99

If you are looking for the best overall discount, performance and size, this is probably the sweet spot. The $499.99 5-quart Professional KitchenAid Mixer (KV25G0X model) offers a 450-watt motor, 10 speeds (direct drive transmission), and all-steel gears (ideal for longevity). It’s the fixed-head design (bowl-lift).

You will be able to find this mixer for $229.99 at Best Buy and Target during Black Friday, but Target may have the edge since it’s offering an additional color option (ice blue). The 5-qt capacity is ideal for larger baking projects and the increased size helps when using attachments like the pasta maker.

• Target: 5-quart KitchenAid Mixer (4 colors)
• Best Buy: 5-quart KitchenAid Mixer (3 colors)

Best Deal on the 6-quart KitchenAid Mixer: $249.99

You won’t find the 6-quart model advertised in the Black Friday ads, but we have seen this deal pop up in October and November. Both Amazon and Costco have been pushing the price of the 6-qt model down to the $250-range, specifically due to a manufacturer discount through 11/24/19. The price will likely stay the same on Black Friday.

What you are really purchasing here is a massive mixing capacity (13 dozen cookie yield) along with one of the strongest motors in a consumer-grade KitchenAid Mixer, 575 watts. It comes with the spiral dough hook, flat beater, and stainless steel wire whip. Be aware that this model is the fixed head design (bowl-lift), not tilt-head.

• Amazon: 6-quart KitchenAid Mixer (3 colors)
• Costco: 6-quart KitchenAid Mixer (1 color)

Here’s the cheapest KitchenAid Mixer on Black Friday 2019

The New Year is a new opportunity to trick yourself into thinking you’ll form new habits in the kitchen. You won’t (statistically, you just won’t). BUT. You will buy yourself some fun new kitchen gadgets that will take your meals from everyday to upgrade.

Kitchen gadgets can take over your meal prep space fast and not in a good way. So while there are a plethora of doohickies that claim to save time, cut calories, and trim costs, these five suggestions really do!

KitchenAid 5-Speed Hand Blender

When you’re in a pinch, blend! This immersion blender from KitchenAid (obviously) makes your kitchen a verifiable meal factory. Need a smoothie? Blend it. Need a quick soup? Puree it. Need a salad dressing? Whisk it. With a name like KitchenAid, would you really expect anything else?

Check Prices on Amazon

Hamilton Beach Breakfast Sandwich Maker

You know you want one. Is it a unitasker? That’s pretty obvious. But it’s also a life saver. No body wants their drive-thru sammies to come with the guilt of a million unknown calories. With this counter-top gadget, you know exactly what’s in your morning meal and can customize it to taste!

Check Prices on Target

Easy Lunch Boxes

When you are short on time but big on eating, pack it in with these Easy Lunch Boxes. These keep sliced produce, pre-made sandwiches, and cooked pasta fresh for days, meaning you can meal prep once and eat twice…without double the work.

B. Smith Wood Lazy Susan

Treat your kitchen to a little summin’ summin’ sweet this year. This loopy little gadget will keep your meal time spinnin’ right ’round until you land on what you need. Great for table-top organization or spice-jar rotation.

Kilner Butter Churner

Been watching enough Great British Bake Off to know the difference between butter and butttterrrr. Kilner knows the difference. Get the good milk from the local farm and whip it into a creamy frenzy in ten minutes flat. Paul Hollywood would be so proud.

Check Kilner for Prices

5 Kitchen Gadgets that will Upgrade your Meals this Year

Developed by former NASA engineer Mark Rober, the Heat Map Microwave is a new twist on a kitchen appliance that’s gone relatively unchanged for the last twenty years.

Utilizing an infrared camera built into the top of the microwave’s cook chamber, a LCD screen mounted on the front of the microwave displays the temperature of the food cooking inside the appliance.

Viewed in real-time on the LCD or within a smartphone application, the person cooking food within the microwave can see when their food is completely cooked. This can be particularly helpful if you are constantly burning food in a high wattage microwave or under-cooking in a low wattage microwave.

Interestingly, you can increase cooking time with the smartphone application, an ideal feature for anyone in a busy household. The microwave can also be programmed to stop cooking when a specific heat threshold is met, something of a fail-safe feature. Finally, the LCD screen can be used for browsing the Web to watch cooking videos on YouTube or read recipes.

Rober isn’t pursuing a crowd-funded Kickstarter or Indiegogo campaign at this time. Instead, he has investors ready to start manufacturing his prototype, assuming there’s enough interest in the product. You can add your signature to the digital petition here. As of today, approximately 35,000 people have signed. No pricing data or availability is known at this time.

Shut Up and Take My Money: Heat Map Microwave