Prep bowls

[Chris Hennes]

I use Pyrex (or Anchor Hocking) glass bowls (the 1 cup variety). You all must have harder floors than mine or something: I beat the heck out of mine and have never broken one yet.

[Special K]

Costco had sets of stainless steel mixing bowls that came with 3 small prep bowls.  I bought two sets and I use the prep bowls all the time for diced veg, minced garlic etc.

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The ones with the plastic lids? I love those! I use the middle mixing bowl to make the no-knead bread. I just mix everything together, slap on the lid, let it sit overnight, and then scrape it right into my pre-heated Romertopf. No muss, no fuss. But I digress . . .

Yes, the little bowls are nice for prep bowls, but their lids aren't air-tight enough to use them for any long-term storage, darn it.

I also have the little pinch bowls, which are great in a . . . pinch.

[moreace01]

I use these cute little melamine bowls from Crate and Barrel. I honestly don't know what their intended purpose is (dipping sauces? who knows), but they work great for prep. And when I run out or need larger bowls (onions), I move on to the cereal bowls.

[Qwerty]

I'm telling ya, free deli cups are the way to go. Just hit up all the grocery stores in your area and you'll be set in an hour.

[Dianabanana]

One thing I started using when I came to Japan is stainless steel trays (about an inch deep), with drop-in wire  trays. I use these extensively for lining up prepped vegetables, marinading or flouring meat, draining fried food or cooling boiled food...they stack flat, and being rectangular, they make it super-easy to keep items in rows, easy to pick up for the next step.

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Those look great. Plus, they are rectangular! I'm forever ranting about how much more I could fit in my refrigerator/cabinets if everything came in a rectangular container instead of round. Looking at all that wasted space between the round jars and bowls and pans just makes me want to cry!

[onehsancare]

I picked up the Mario Batali prep bowls on impulse at Christmas (I think--in any event, they were a "present" for Mr. Care!)

I love using them--someone wrote that they make him feel like a chef--but they have not held up well. The melamine is cracking on several of the rims, and the color has faded unevenly.

My go-to bowls are the pyrex custard cups.

[artisan02]

I use a set of glass bowls I got at Williams Sonoma.  When I bought mine, I got six in one size that holds about a cup.

glass prep bowls

Those are insanely great. 

These are the same ones I get at Dollar Tree for about 3/$1. As far as I can tell, they are exactly the same.

[birder53]

I picked up a set at a Le Creuset outlet several years ago. The bowls are stainless steel and hold about one cup. The weird thing is the plastic lids which do not completely cover the bowl. There are small openings along the bowl edge in two spots on each lid. This only becomes a problem if storing liquids for later use and forgetting to be very careful when taking the bowl out of the fridge. It happens.

[Jmahl]

We use "Pyro-O-Rey" custard cups that we picked up in Mexico. That is Mexico's version of Pyrex. You can pick them up in any Mexican supermarket or hardware store. We have had them forever. They seem indestructable. We also we use some little 2 0z. "Crestware" stainless steel containers made in India.

[C. sapidus]

For small prep (chopped garlic, chiles, etc.) I am breaking my way through Mrs. C’s swinging bachelorette collection of what would be tea saucers, except they lack the indentation for the teacup. Like many here, we use Pyrex custard cups or Corelware soup bowls for larger prep items. I also use a Corelware bowl for trimmings headed for the compost bin. Most of the Pyrex and Corelware has survived 20 years of abuse in the kitchen.

I can’t wait to break the last of the tea saucers so I can replace them with square stackable containers. Square for space efficiency, and stackable so that I can line up ingredients vertically rather than horizontally.

[Anna N]

. . .

I can’t wait to break the last of the tea saucers so I can replace them with square stackable containers. Square for space efficiency, and stackable so that I can line up ingredients vertically rather than horizontally.

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Those are the exact reasons I envy the containers in helenjp's post above! I just couldn't articulate the reasons as well as you did.

[Jamie Lee]

I use corningware custard cups, some cheapo asian rice bowls and these:

Bad pic, as usual. These are mis en place/amuse containers from our own Live It Up member. I use one (as can be seen) for kosher salt - always at the ready, right next to the stove.

J.

[Dianabanana]

One thing I started using when I came to Japan is stainless steel trays (about an inch deep), with drop-in wire  trays. I use these extensively for lining up prepped vegetables, marinading or flouring meat, draining fried food or cooling boiled food...they stack flat, and being rectangular, they make it super-easy to keep items in rows, easy to pick up for the next step.

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I just discovered a wide selection of these at Daiso! Shallow, deep, short, long, different kinds of drop-in trays, and of course all $1.50!

[alwang]

Amazon sells these Pyrex bowl sets, often for cheap, sometimes for extremely cheap:

http://www.amazon.com/Pyrex-14-Piece-Stora...97138459&sr=8-2

Right now, these are eligible for their Buy-4-Pay-For-3 promotion. They had a similar, even better deal earlier this year where I bought 8 sets. The price of each set worked out to around $7.

The bowls themselves are perfect; the lids are a little flimsy and tend to warp.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Prep bowls have been on my mind.  I seldom use large mixing bowls, except on the KitchenAid, but I never have enough small bowls on hand.  My favorite are a set of chartreuse pyrex from a garage sale in the 1970's.  Perhaps my finest culinary bargain ever (not counting possessions pulled from the dumpster).

 

Anyhow I just got a couple Vollrath small mixing bowls from JB Prince.*

https://www.jbprince.com/utensils/heavy-weight-mix-bowl-0.5-qt.asp

 

Normally I avoid Vollrath like the plague as they have no warrantee.  But what could go wrong with a stainless steel bowl, right?  I probably will order more.

 

 

*the real reason was to pad the JB Prince order for free shipping.

 

[PassionateAmateur]

About 12 years ago I scored about 15 small pyrex bowls that a neighbor in my apartment building had left in the communal "free to whoever wants it" zone - they hold maybe 1.5 cups, go in the microwave, stack...couldn't have been more perfect if I'd had them commissioned specially for me.  It's the little things, you know?

[paulraphael]

My smallest ones are a 0.3L stainless mixing bowls that came as part of a set. I use these constantly for little stuff, including whisking slurries and weighing out small quantities of dry ingredients.

 

Beyond that, it's all takeout containers and semi-disposable plastic containers from the supermarket, which do triple duty for prep, storage, and leftovers. I try to standardize on just a few sizes to keep from going crazy with organizing and finding lids. Right now the arsenal includes:

-1pt takeout containers
-1qt takeout containers (uses same lids as above)

-1 qt square ziploc containers

-2qt rectangular glad containers

 

The ziploc and glad containers last almost forever, except the lids sometimes tear. The takeout containers last almost forever too, which is a problem, because takeout delivery people are always bringing new ones. Both kinds can break when they're cold (I use the pint takeout containers for ice cream, and often crack them when trying to scoop before it's warmed up a bit). 

 

All this stuff is dishwashable. All but the stainless mixing bowls can go in the microwave. The plastic containers are all polypropylene, so there are no food safety concerns. But they'll all melt at moderately high temps (don't use for grease right out of frying pan, etc.).