Minions! Teens who have good concentration skills and are looking forward to a reward make the best minions, IMHO, but young adults who want to learn what you're doing can be good too. Middle aged men (not our cooking bros, but the ones who don't generally know anything about a kitchen other than "beer here") aren't nearly as good workers, but if they're bored, and you can entertain them with obscure anecdotes while you work, are generally pretty biddable and make decent spare hands. Just don't let one of them stir!!

ETA: Such minions can be cultivated amongst your acquaintance. :) When my own minions aren't available, I import. :)

There is a tool that stirs pots. There are different versions. Some hang from the rim. Some rotate in the middle. The best reviewed one I've seen, ”walks” around the pot and scrapes the bottom, while stirring higher up. None of themreplace a strong arm, but one could be a help to allow you a quick run to the bathroom.

Dince the pandemic, I've often been short of minions. I break big jobs down into bits of prep that can be done ahead and stored. I don't know if that’s feasible for canning because of the volume. You might be able to break it down into batches just big enough to fill out one round of processing. For lasagna, however, the meat can be cooked ahead, and the vegetables sautéd, and the sauce made on separate days. Perhaps not ideal, but it works.

I'm sure you know all the processing tools. The apple peeler/corer/slicer, cherry stoner, etc. I don't have the former. it works best with uniformly stmmetrical apples and takes a lot of flesh with the skin. OTOH, I recently picked up a little plastic corer/slicer (not peeler), which works great for a few apples. I haven't used it for pie, but it would work fine. So would a crank spirazer if it had the ribbon blade. Because one is holding the apple—and there's no peeler—it's easier to adjust for wonkiness. Super large apples might have cores too big to work, though. My cherry stoner works really well, but after half a pie”s eofth, my hands start to hurt. I'd think it would be impossible for jam quantity of cherries, and only called for if one were making whole cherry preserve. In other words, some times processing tools work, but often a paring knife works better. :)

My vote is still minions...

Pllog may have missed a key point. No minions or various even half knife skill adults here. Or there. Solo households do not have that...ever. (maybe once a year at a holiday)...neices and nephews we have spent time teaching---but not at all available daily.

Clean, prep, piggy-back, mise en place----meditation helps 😂

I've been a singleton all week and probably next week. We are up at 3.30am. Dh is getting home at 9pm. A big switch from pre-C-19. ---I was the long hour worker in the past.

A struggle at times. I'm coming to the end of harvest processing. (i hope). I don't 'can' but still lots of prep. I'm semi-dry oven roasting. Then flat pack freezing. Three trays twice a week. That is my emotional limit. Run the smoker Sundays. Peppers, tomatillos, done. Any extras i'll just freeze whole fresh.

Figured out over the years what we want, use, and look for all winter. Freeze cherry toms whole and berries. Juicing all pears and apples. Only ran the dehydrator twice this year. It is huge with ten big trays but plenty for our needs running once for hot/mild peppers and a run of toms for flake and powder.

(freezer clean-out during early lock-down i found so much crap from experiments 2017-18 like pear/apple butters, food saver bags of dehydrated fruits we just don't care for.)

Goes with your other post about waste---simplified our oils and vinegars to basics---avocado, olive, evoo, toasted sesame in the fridge, AC vinegar, unsweetened rice wine, one fancy Banyuls.

I use avocado oil for all my condiments like chili oil, chili crisp, mustards, etc. Neutral high heat friendly.

Look on free-cycle for a small freezer. I have a freebie industrial i only use in the fall harvest months. Killer for a few months through the holidays when i get overwhelmed with harvest. Unplugged most of the year.

Thursdays---sometimes painful...i take all off my main prep counter and clean. Empty compost, etc. 20 minutes i often kick and complain...run the dishwasher sometimes twice. Ready for the weekend and harvest prep.

Last friday night i prepped for a Saturday BBQ. Weather permiting...weather gorgeous i went into a hour of focused multi-tasking having a clean kitchen prep area---BBQ canceled due to a teen feeling ill friday afternoon. (all vacinated). 4 salads, ---slaws, potato salad, quick pickles.

Made for a nice non-cooking weekend having so many salads prepped. Made easy by a clean prep area and time for some more roasting of toms and harvest juicing of fruits.

If i don't freeze whole in a pinch, i roast a few trays to concetrate the toms when overwhelmed.

Stuff them in quart zip-locks. Flat-pack freezer dealio. Smash 10-15 pounds of ripe toms in a couple gallon freezer zip-locks. Process later when you have time.

I never peel apples when making sauce. I only use organic apples. Sometimes I leave the peels in the sauce, other times I use a food mill to sieve them out. I only eat cherries fresh, but when my grandson was little, I bought a cherry pitter like this - it's easier on the hands/fingers:

I don't do any canning except for jams/jellies. I freeze berries in the summer and make it when the weather cools. I remove the seeds to make seedless jam and find if I process the berries one day, then clean up and get things back in order, then make the jam in the next day or two, it is easier for me than doing a marathon in the kitchen.

My point was really to have a bit of a laugh and bump up the thread, really, but I do import minions when I need to. One can court minions. It may not be your style, or they may not fit with your covid-19 plan, but they're very useful. She said bumping up the thread yet again...

Agmss- Off topic but I’ve been meaning to reach out to you ”by thread” for a while as you don’t have PM enabled.

Have you ever done knife handles? I’ve got some Wusthof knives in various states of melting, breaking, or falling apart. I was given some homemade knives a while back, no idea what they’re supposed to be used for but they look nice, and they got me thinking someone might be able to do something with my Wusthofs.

I’ll say up front that I expect fixing them would cost more than they’re worth to me, even if custom handles would make them special. But if you’re interesred in the work let me know!

Soooo my sister and I have a running joke about minions... When we are outside endless sanding - we ahout at passing cars ’wanna sand?’. Alas we are the minions.

I have access to the occasional niece minion. More likely to help with technology or frog identification than chopping vegetables or sanding. She did spend an entire day this summer investigating why pineapple interferes with gelatin. Then there are some step/great nephews and niece - inclined to be helpful in the way that 5-9 year olds are. ie fun but more work. The great is very gallant though - trying to take my hand as I scrabbled down to see his and his dads crawdad situation.

The great niece is 6 months - not chopping anything yet.

I think a first frost is coming in the next week. Yesterday I made tomato chutney. I have a pile of cukes, zucchini and apples to deal with - but the harvest is slowing down.

And just because she is soooo cute.

Great-niece trying her first plum.

Cute. Future minions.

My knife handles started cracking 5-6 yrs ago. We are more than capable of replacing them but just no time. Surprised a simple replacement kit is not an option. I remember looking at one time. A good link, HERE

Ours are 30+ yrs old. We might get to it someday. Instead we added a few new ones and hand wash all wooden kitchen tools.

I don’t think I have the artistic talent. I can’t explain what happened to the chef’s knife. Handle just warped out over time then broke. The others were left on burners or something. Doesn’t bother me to use any of them but I don’t like the crevices on things that are used with raw food.

I meant a 'kit' with the two cast resin halves including the rivets that just needs a little 'lady' hammer to tap into place and secure. Though might need a dremmel or wire wheel to clean up any old apoxy. Another flaw in DYI is if any open gaps exist, food and bacteria could get in.

The link is just showing the work involved for a wood replacement. I could easily cast the two halves if i had the clean blanks but prefer wood.

I have some old carbon from yard sales and my grandmothers. Some Japanese. More knives than necessay but i do reach for different ones for different needs.

”Lady” hammer brought such a smile. My father gave me a ”hammer” when I was in college. It was probably a freebie. All metal, shiny, with an integrated claw head and perforated rubberized grip. So unbalanced it didn't even know the word ”balance”. Perfect for picture hooks and similar you-could-use-a-shoe kinds of household hammering. Useless for driving nails. No tears if lost. I still have it. After we moved here, so many years later, he was over helping me with something, swore genteelly at my hammer, and went to get his own hammer...which he then tried to give me. His favorite hammer. Like I even had the strength and skill to drive nails, even if I had some reason to (and they do go in if you rap them five times with a bad hammer). I wouldn't accept it. I had no need for a good hammer. It's not that there was ever any doubt of it, but what better testament to true and abiding love is there than a man who tries to give his adult daughter his favorite hammer?