How To Protect Your Hands from Holiday Cooking Scars

When you’re prepping for a family feast or holiday bake sale, it’s easy to get caught up in what you’re doing and absentmindedly injure yourself. Being prepared with a few essential tools can help keep your hands safe this season, even when you’re rushing. Here are a few popular cooking methods often used this season and some tools that can keep your hands protected.

Baking

Baking is extremely popular during the holidays! Whether you’re baking cookies for Santa or preparing a cake for the family, you’re likely going to get your hands covered in flour this season. Here are a few tools you can use to keep your hands safe while baking:

  • Oven Mitts – This tool comes in all shapes and sizes, and can even be categorized by cooking method, like grilling or baking. Grab a pair that will cover your hands completely, but aren’t too big to avoid them slipping around as you’re trying to grab things. Also, make sure they’re heat resistant or flame retardant.
  • A Food Mixer or Processor – Save your hands the trouble of mixing batter and kneading dough by investing in a machine that will do the hard work for you! That way, you can decorate to your fullest potential.

Roasting

With this season’s delicious selection, you’re bound to be heating up that oven and roasting up some delicious veggies! Not to mention your holiday protein that will be basted and roasted to perfection. While you’re balancing and basting, consider the following tools to keep your hands unscorched:

  • A Sturdy Roasting Pan – During the holidays it’s always tempting to swap out your metal roasting pan for a disposable aluminum one. After all, it’s one less dish to wash! But aluminum pans are flimsy and unreliable. Spare your hands the scorching, sloshing juice by using your regular roasting pan. Use regular aluminum foil to line the pan and avoid a deep clean that way.
  • A Pot Holder Cover – If you’re planning on using your cast iron skillet for roasting this season, make sure you have a holder to slip onto the handle when you’re ready to pull it out. A cast iron gets extremely hot and takes a long time to cool down. A handle cover will save your hand from a nasty burn this season.

Frying

Frying isn’t typically an everyday cooking method if for no other reason than the difficulty and mess. However, a crispy treat is sure to delight your holiday guests! If you’re planning on frying anything this holiday season, please do so with extreme caution and make sure you have all of the necessary protective gear. Here are just a few tools to consider to protect your hands:

  • A Deep and Heavy Pot – When frying, you have to have a lot of oil and enough space for your food to move around in the oil. Using a deeper pot can help control some of that hot splatter from burning your skin. A heavy pot will make sure that, even when you’re pulling things out of the oil, your large pot of extremely hot oil will stay in place.
  • Gloves – A pair of durable kitchen gloves will keep your hands protected from the splatter often associated with frying. You could use your oven mitts, but it will probably limit your mobility. Gloves will keep your hands protected and still allow you to hold and grasp your other tools.
  • A Frying Basket – A frying basket is the easiest way to get food in and out of hot oil. They come in all shapes and sizes and are relatively inexpensive to purchase. It’s likely you can find one to fit a pot you already have! If you don’t want to invest in a frying basket, opt for a pair of long tongs to keep your hands as far away from the bubbling oil as possible.

We hope these tools will help keep your hands safe this season! If you do happen to get injured, you can always call the Hand Surgery Specialists of Texas for help. Happy Holidays!

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