Here's What You Need If You're Going To Cook

Here's one for the cooks among you: the 50 greatest kitchen inventions from The Daily Meal.

When you look at the bottom half of the list (the pull tab at 50, paper towels at 48, egg carton at 37, the blender at 44, the microwave at 34, recipes at 27, refrigerator at 25), you see there's some serious stuff near the top.

The top four are salt, fire, knife and spoon. I think my dad, who cooked for a living, would have taken that knife and put it on top and I tend to agree, though I know some mighty fine cooks (mostly women) who have a lot of trouble with knives (keeping them sharp, using the right one, putting them in drawers, washing them with the forks, etc.). When men cook well, you get an indication of what's coming when they pick up a Sabatier eight-inch chef's knife (pictured; ain't it purty?) and slice a cucumber. Tap, tap, tap.

Go to the list and take a look. Fun stuff, like picking the best all-time shortstops.