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If you are considering for have decided to go on the GAPS Intro Diet, there is one big question you will eventually face: What are the essential GAPS kitchen tools?

GAPS Intro is a huge undertaking, and the idea of having to invest money and time into books, high quality foods, and new kitchen gadgets can be overwhelming. Below I list which kitchen tools I have found to be the absolute essentials for the GAPS diet, as well as why I find them necessary, so you can make your own decisions about what your family needs. If you want more, go for it! You can purchase these items from Amazon, kitchen stores, or even thrift shops. Borrow if you need to! (that’s where our knife, blender, and stick blender came from) The majority of our kitchen supplies is second hand. $6 tea kettle? $8 slow cooker? They may not be top-of-the-line, but they do the job and help us stick to our budget.

Essential GAPS Kitchen Tools

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Books, resources, and food sources for completing GAPS Intro – Being comfortable with the information and your food choices will help you feel confident in the kitchen

Food processor – Batch chop and shred vegetables for soups and fermenting, make nut flours and butters from scratch, and more. My food processor is my baby, and one of the only new items in our kitchen.

Large Stainless Steel Stock Pot (or two) – You will be making lots of stocks and broths. Make sure you always have something to cook large batches in

Smaller Glass or Stainless Steel Pans – For heating up individual servings of soups and boiling eggs

Cast Iron Skillet – For making ghee, pancakes, scrambled eggs, and pan-fried meats. Cast iron is the only type of frying pan we use. All our pans come from flea markets and garage sales – my father-in-law is a stickler for cast iron quality and always get the highest quality for very low prices this way.

Slow Cooker – Make bone broth when you are farther in your healing, render lard and tallow, make soups and stews while running errands, and more.

Good Knife – You will be doing a lot of vegetable chopping. Make it easier on yourself with a high quality nice.

Vegetable Peeler – For peeling non-organic fruits and vegetables, as well as making vegetable “fettuccine”

Blender and/or Stick Blender – Create soup purees, make juice without a juicer, and blend up less palatable foods (for me, this is chicken skins and organs). I link to the Vitamix because I’m lusting after it. Any blender will do the job for the more basic functions.

Dehydrator – Make crispy nuts and homemade, healthy snacks. The Excalibur can even be used to make yogurt. While many of the tasks of a dehydrator can be done in an oven, I find that putting in the money for a cheap dehydrator was 100% worth it to have the optimal temperature and so that I didn’t have to constantly watch what I was dehydrating.

Mesh Strainer – For straining broth, ghee, etc.

Measuring cups and spoons – This is self explanatory

Lots of bowls and spoons – You’re eating soup 3 times a day or more; it’s amazing how many bowls and spoons you go through

Thermoses – Keep soups and broths warm while on the road, use them to make yogurt. I use a large one for soup purees, yogurt, and tea/broth, and a small one for meals.

Compost bucket – Don’t waste your food scraps – turn them into soil! Whether you use a pile in the backyard, or a more sophisticated system, this is a must have for me. We use the Bokashi system I linked to because it can be used indoors and you can compost meat/bones in it (no throwing out chicken carcasses!)

Lots of glass storage (mason jars (both pint and quart sized), storage containers, etc.) – Glass is ideal to prevent chemicals leeching into your food. The more storage containers you have, the more you can batch cook. Look for freezer safe jars.

Water filter – Remove harmful chemicals, like chlorine and fluoride, from your water. Look into doing this for both drinking and bathing water.

Non-Toxic Personal Care and Cleaning Products – Decide what you will be using to eliminate the toxic load of your products. Either purchase these or make them up ahead of time.

Optional GAPS Kitchen Tools

These are tools that I sometimes wish I had to make life a little easier, but I do not own because they are not necessary.

Juicer – Making juice is much easier with an actual juicer

Yogurt Maker – There are many frugal ways to make yogurt, but using a designed yogurt maker may be preferable for some

Garlic Press – We just use a knife, but a garlic press is much faster and prevents you from biting into a chunk of garlic (if you’re not into that)

Spiralizer – For “noodle” soup

Fermentation Caps – After a massive fermentation failure, I broke down and bought these. Instead of getting a whole jar, I got 6 caps that turn any mason jar into a fermentation jar. I fermented things for quite some time without these, but now that I am relying on my ferments for my probiotic intake, I like the extra security.

What essential GAPS kitchen tools would you add?

Shared on Wildcrafting Wednesday.

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