Scouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.
I’m not the most organized cook in the world. Whenever I’m chopping up vegetables, I either leave them all haphazardly splayed all over my cutting board, dump them into a giant mixing bowl, or if I’m feeling especially good, I’ll use several of my soup bowls for some sort of deranged mise en place regime. I say deranged because since they are all the same size, one bowl will be overflowing with lettuce, while the other has about two pieces of ginger in it.
I decided to reach out to the founders of Omsom, a brand we’ve reviewed before and absolutely loved, for some help. Each pack comes with three packets of “starter” that combine hard-to-get ingredients in a way to bring great Asian flavors to your kitchen, easily. So for a tip on how to make weeknight dinners a little more enjoyable for me, the cook, I thought Kim Pham, one of the founders, would be the perfect person to ask.
ADVERTISEMENT
“An organized kitchen is a happy one!” she told me. She told me to ditch my deranged mise en place method and start taking it seriously. “This set is the perfect introduction to mise en place — stackable to save room in your pantry, but also enough sizes to be compatible for most meals,” she said.
The set has ten pieces. Each bowl is a different size, made of glass, and they all stack into one another. They are also pretty difficult to break (I tried).
“There is nothing quite as dreamy as a beautifully prepped mise en place when cooking dinner, especially after a long day of WFH. There's something just so comforting about breaking down each ingredient and storing them in their own perfectly-sized glass bowl.”
If you’re wondering if the glass material is important, Kim says it is. “I prefer glass over plastic because it's more sustainable and won't stain from ingredients like chili oil and turmeric. Plus, you can just chuck them in the dishwasher once you're done, making cleanup a total breeze.”
Kim also had one last tip for me, one I’ve been doing ever since she told me. “I also like to use one as a ‘trash bowl’ while I'm prepping, that way I don't have to keep running over to my trash can with scraps. Yes, this technically means more bowls to clean - but I like to think it's less ingredients you have to clean off the floor or counter from pushing things around a crowded cutting board.”
I got the set and have been using it ever since. Not only do I love Kim’s trash bowl idea—which I think is widely accredited to Rachael Ray—but it makes chopping, slicing, and dicing that much more enjoyable. I use them every night I cook, usually for something like onion, garlic, shallots, or even cilantro, but on nights when there are a lot of veggies, I break them all out. Instead of worrying about how I’m going to fit more and more onto my small cutting board, everything I chop has a place to go to (hence “mise en place”). Does it mean more dishes—yeah, a little bit—but because they are glass, they are easy to clean, can go into the dishwasher—and honestly, it’s worth it.
Don’t forget to check out our coupon site to find home deals, including Home Depot coupons, Ashley Furniture coupons, and Overstock coupons.
