Buying Guide for Cooking Tongs
A tong is a tool used to grasp and lift objects instead of directly holding them with your hands. Various types of tongs can be used for different purposes. Tongs with long arms that end in small flat circular ends and pivot at a point close to the handle in order to handle delicate objects. Kitchen utensils such as tongs for grilling, tongs for serving salad, and tongs for serving spaghetti are of the same type.
Food can be moved and rotated with delicate precision, or a full serving can be retrieved in one go. Utility Tongs are probably the most widely used and versatile type of tong, suitable for flipping or turning foods while cooking, removing cooked food from boiling water, and handling hot items from an oven or grill. Tongs with a scalloped tip for better grip are usually made of metal, stainless steel, or plastic. You can check out Amazon for some of the exclusive selections of cooking tongs available at great prices.
Benefits of Cooking Tongs
Easy to Lift
Dimsums, sushi, and noodles are best served with tongs to make it easier to lift them from the serving tray and place them on your plate. Foods with a slippery consistency are hard to pick up with a fork, spoon, or even your hands due to the tight grip of the tongs.
Convenient Flipping
Using tongs makes flipping and upending noodles easier when you boil them or cook them with other ingredients. The tongs can also be used to take out dim sums from the steamer or to turn and cook pasta and meat. You can also use tongs to remove foods like potatoes from boiling water.
Helps in Tossing Salad
Salad is all about mixing together the ingredients and spices in a bowl. The process of making salad is fairly straightforward, but you can make it easier by tossing the salad with other foods to mix it thoroughly.
Hold Hot Pots
You don't have heat-resistant handles on all your pots and pans. While stirring or lifting the pot from the stove, you should not use a kitchen cloth. To do the job easily, use two pairs of tongs with strong grips as two handles.
Factors to Consider Before Buying Cooking Tongs
Material
In the bean and spaghetti-strand tests, stainless steel cooking tongs performed better than silicone-coated models, but less so when pulling up clumps of pasta. Tong heads with silicone coatings are grippy, but also bulky, making them less suitable for detailed work.
Locking Mechanism
Tongs typically have three locking mechanisms: a pull-tab lock at the fulcrum, an inner ring sliding up and down the arms, and a locking mechanism controlled by dark sorcery based on whether or not the head is facing up or down. Choose cooking tongs as per your preference.
Size
Varying in general sizes that range from 6 to 20 inches in length, cooking tongs are available for numerous types of food preparation activities. Smaller-sized cooking tongs often referred to as "serving Tongs," are used for handling small ingredients during the preparation of foods or during the serving while the bigger ones are used for holding utensils. For regular use, it is advisable to go with 12" cooking tong.
Heat Resistant
Look for heat-resistant cooking tongs. The pincers should be scalloped and not too jagged. Get ones that have silicone or nylon pincers—with a high enough heat resistance, you can use these on pretty much anything, whether that's for scraping and deglazing a pan or turning over sauteeing sausages.
Conclusion
Cooking can be easier and safer when you have a good set of tongs. They can be used to grab hot noodles out of a pot of boiling water, turn food in a hot pan, snare the lid off a hot pot, or serve food. Sometimes it is tempting to reach directly into a hot pot or a pan of cooking food if you cook a lot.
A good pair of kitchen tongs are an essential tool. Use them frequently, and they'll spare you many kitchen accidents. To know your buying choices, head over to our featured section. We review and recommend leading products based on design, performance, and ease of use.