Detoxing and real food have helped me to recover my health. So, I am very choosy about what kind of kitchen products I buy. I want them to be non toxic, highly functional, and of great quality. I want to have a kitchen that helps me to be vibrantly healthy! I have done a lot of research over the years on the best items for a real food cook.

Most of these are inexpensive, but they are very high quality. These items would make excellent gifts for real food cooks, or for anyone trying to stock their kitchen with high quality non toxic kitchen ware. (You could always lead others to this page if they want ideas of what to buy you. ;))

Top Picks for Cooks

1. Good Quality Knives

Every real food kitchen needs a good knife. And if you are doing the Paleo diet or other healing diets you really need a good knife. Having the right knife will save you loads of time. I have a Victorinox Chef’s Knife, and a J.A. HENCKELS INTERNATIONAL Paring Knife in my kitchen. Those are two of the best sized knives to have. I picked these because they are great knives that are reasonably priced. Other knives of similar quality are much more expensive!

2. Peeler

Another item that is a must have for cooks is a good peeler. Again, having a good peeler will save you a lot of time. I have 3 peelers in my kitchen, but my OXO Good Grips Swivel Peeler works the best!

3. Pyrex Containers

Plastic containers can leach chemicals into your food! I have slowly changed over my food containers to glass containers. I love the pyrex containers. These are awesome for storing your food in and reheating your leftovers. Your food will taste better reheated in the oven or toaster oven and you can avoid the health hazards of the microwave. I have these:

And these:

and these:

I really do love them as you can tell.

4. Toaster Oven

Another must have item in a real food kitchen is a toaster oven. I have this one and we use it constantly. We reheat our leftovers in it and they taste a whole lot better than microwaved food!

5. Stainless Steel Pan

Here is one item that I don’t have yet-an All Clad stainless steel pan. I am still using my old stainless steel pans, but the company that made my pans went out of business. So, I would like to have this pan when mine wear out. This is the least expensive frying pan I have found that doesn’t have toxic metal problems. And, since I believe heavy metals played a part in my illness, I am careful about my cookware.

6. Real Food Cookbooks

Real Food Cookbooks are so wonderful for learning new recipes and techniques! I highly recommend Katie Kimball’s cookbooks. Katie is a very good teacher. Her style is very down to earth, and I love her kid friendly American type recipes. She takes recognizable food like granola bars and makes them “real food style” with many of Weston A Price’s nutritional principles integrated.

(Weston Price was the dentist who traveled the world studying nutrition. He found that nutrition was tied to everything including immunity to diseases and cavities. He had success in reversing cavities by using food.)

I own many of Katie’s cookbooks, but I will try to pick out my favorite two. I really love Better Than a Box. It is more than a cookbook-it is like getting a real food ecourse in a book! What is really awesome about this book is that it teaches how to take any recipe that you like and turn it into a real food recipe!

I often prefer ebooks to print books. It is easier to search for what you are looking for and they often have links to ingredients and other interesting things. And, if I want to google something while I am cooking, then I already have my computer available.

If you would like to give the ebook as a gift, you could download it to a flashdrive, and wrap the flashdrive. Here is a printable tag that you could wrap with the flashdrive. (Of course please delete your own copy-ebooks are meant to be bought 1 for each person. Of course you can always buy 2 copies.)

Click here to download and print the tag.

If you would prefer a print book, Better Than a Box is available here.

Katie has also written a book on kid friendly snacks called Healthy Snacks to Go. It is full of recipes for healthy snack bars, muffins, crackers and other portable food. I have made her Grain Free Coconut Muffins quite a few times without changing the recipe-that means they were really good and I couldn’t think of a way to improve it health wise!

Katie has real food snacks down to a science. These are nourishing, yummy and kids like them-which is no small feat! Katie also lists the allergy information so she has you covered if you need grain free, gluten free, dairy free etc.

If you would like to give the ebook as a gift, you could download it to a flashdrive, and wrap the flashdrive. Here is a tag that you can print if you would like to wrap it with the flashdrive.