Although I’ve always done a lot of cooking, I’ve been doing more baking lately. Baking – pastries, tarts, and the like – always seemed a bit frivolous to me since it’s not really part of a nutritious “diet”. But I’ve come to discover that bringing the occasional tray of baked goods to work, meetings and other gatherings is a very economical way to make a lot of people happy.
I’ve gotten pretty good at making tarts and pies from scratch now. I don’t own a rolling pin or a pastry cutter though. When I cut in butter or shortening, I use a knife to cut up the fat into small chucks and then use two butter knives to cut it in manually. When I need a rolling pin, I run across the street to borrow it from my friend… in exchange for the occasional slice of pie or tart. Sometimes, I just use a glass or some other cylindrical item. But now that I’m baking more often, I’m trying to decide whether or not I need to upgrade my baking tools.
The options are to buy a pastry cutter, a rolling pin, or both. I imagine that each item would cost between $5 and $10, though I haven’t started seriously looking or investigating. I would probably use each once every 2 months or so. Worth it or not worth it?
