Great kitchen gear you've found in the trash

[Fat Guy]

This morning I was taking our son to school on the subway and look what we saw on the platform:

I was bummed that I couldn't take this thing, because I was going away not toward home, but it reminded me of various great kitchen things I've seen in the trash. Actually our best find ever was a living-dining-room piece, a chair we fondly call "the garbage chair," but there have also been cast-iron skillets, mugs and trays -- people seem to throw out a lot of trays.

Have you found any gems in the trash? Is this just an urban phenomenon?

[weinoo]

That's scary.

[mbhank]

60+ years ago, when I was a kid, people burned trash in incinerators, One day I went to the incinerator in our complex with some trash and I noticed a box there waiting to be thrown in the flames.

In it were ten small hard cover books titled, "The Worlds Great Orations" William Jennings Bryan

Editor=In-Chief, copyright 1906. I still have them.

[lancastermike]

I found a 16 inch round cast iron griddle that my old neighbors had out with their trash. Of course, it was seriously rusted. I had a friend take it to his machine shop where he used a grinder to get rid of the rust. I re-seasoned it and still have it today. It works great on the grill when I want to cook something that may fall through the grates. It is also very, very heavy.

I wonder who would leave a toaster at a subway stop? Perhaps in NYC this is a common practice.

Edited January 31, 2011 by lancastermike (log)

[Darienne]

If you count stuff found at our local transfer station, then we have found plenty. There's a large building at the transfer station in which you leave stuff you can't use and don't want, and pick up stuff you can use and do want. Like a free second-hand store.

The list would be quite long in 15 years of dumping off our garbage and stuff we don't want, and includes a working VitaMix 3600 complete with manual.

[Richard Kilgore]

I wonder who would leave a toaster at a subway stop? Perhaps in NYC this is a common practice.

Running late at breakfast time?

Many years ago we found amazing things on the streets of the Upper Eastside on "large item trash day" or whatever it was called. One time we came away with a six foot high, double beveled glass door heavy, fine wood book case. I guess that could qualify as a bookcase for cookbooks.

[Beebs]

I found a large Cuisineart pot with copper bottom in our garbage room at the time the handle from my old pot fell off. It had only been gently-used. It's my pasta-boiling, dumpling-cooking pot.

[vice]

If you count stuff found at our local transfer station, then we have found plenty. There's a large building at the transfer station in which you leave stuff you can't use and don't want, and pick up stuff you can use and do want. Like a free second-hand store.

A woman I used to work for got all of her silver flatware from the Nantucket landfill. I think they have a similar setup there.

[Anna N]

A barely ever used 6 litre Fagor pressure cooker. A LeCreuset gratin dish. A LeCreuset dutch oven. And those are just the things that come easily to mind. All left in the recycle room in the apartment building we lived in.

Edited to correct the size of the Fagor!

Edited January 31, 2011 by Anna N (log)

[lesliec]

For many years (30 at least), Il Casino was the Italian restaurant in Wellington for special occasions. A couple of years ago it closed for refurbishment (unfortunately it never reopened and the owner died shortly afterwards - different story). A large bin was placed outside for demolition rubble and other rubbish. My wife and I happened to be passing one night and noticed a couple of people pulling something from the bin. After they'd gone (well, you can't be seen to be doing something like this, can you?) we went and had a rummage of our own. I remember there was a pretty respectable-looking kitchen knife in there with a broken handle, which I didn't rescue, but we did score a large Lanson champagne bucket - a 3-4 bottle job - which, after a spot of panel-beating and painting, now graces the kitchen bench when several bottles of fizzy wine are required to be kept cool for serving. A nice memory of some good times at the restaurant.

[Peter the eater]

My knives and some other tools are kept on the wall stuck to magnetic strips. Below this set up I used to keep the paper and glass recycling bins, that is until I notice my fancy carving fork hadn't been seen for a few weeks. It must have fallen off the magnet into one of the bins. Hopefully somebody else is now using it.

[ScoopKW]

Found a TEC Patio 2 Infrared Grill by the side of the road when I lived in Key West.

Needed $50 worth of parts.

[Yajna Patni]

My toaster... a really nice dualit with three slots, one which has a cage thing to make grilled cheese.

Lots of other stuff, but that was my favorite.

[David A. Goldfarb]

That 24 x 25 x 1.5 inch side-grain maple cutting board that shows up in a lot of my photos here was being discarded by contractors renovating an apartment in a brownstone in Brooklyn where I used to live circa 1994, and a friend who was visiting noticed it leaning against the fence near the trash. I sanded it down and cleaned it up, and I've been using it ever since.

[runwestierun]

Bedbugs! Bedbugs!

[Lindsey]

2 Le Creuset saucepans and a professional roller iron all left in a layby on the banks of Loch Ness, obviously the Monster is not house proud!

[dcarch]

Styro foam boxes.

They come in different sizes and all have tight fitting covers.

They are wonderful for my homemade sous vide cookers.

If you have something cooking for 48 hours or longer. These boxes will save you huge energy costs.

dcarch