A Good Soup Ladle Is Worth Its Weight in Gold (or at Least Stainless Steel)
When I graduated from high school, I got a plastic set of cooking utensils that all locked into each other for easy storage. I used this Big Love of spoons and spatulas for almost a decade, and they got burnt, melted, and stained along the way. The first real casualty was the soup ladle, which was used for turmeric chicken noodle soup and never recovered. What was once a lovely(ish) shade of mint green plastic became...yellowish? Light orange? It's a hard color to describe. Since it also kinda melted, I decided to say goodbye to my college utensils once and for all and went on a hunt for new ones.
But I didn't get a new ladle right away; it was low on my list. I had my silicone spatulas to stir and flip food, tongs, and a wooden spoon, so it just wasn't a priority. Then I made lemony chicken and rice soup and realized there was no way to get soup from my Dutch oven to a bowl without spilling it all over the place. I realized how much I took my ladle for granted, a tool that could easily pour stock into quarts for freezing, portion soup into meal prep containers, and generally keep a kind-of-klutzy person like me from splashing hot liquid everywhere. In a panic, I used the largest serving spoon I had to carefully get soup into the bowl, and then immediately ordered a stainless steel ladle on Amazon. ($7.70—what a steal!)
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Look: If you make soup, chili, stew, or anything even remotely broth-y, it's time to buy a damn ladle already. A sturdy, no-nonsense stainless steel one that isn't going to warp and melt and get stained and permanently smell like the first thing you used it for. It will help keep your life spill-proof—my favorite microwavable soup containers also do that—and will actually hang onto the side of the pot so you don't have to get your counters all dirty or have it fall into the pot by accident. The one you want is all metal, which means it will get hot if you leave it in the pot (careful!), but it won't melt or stain like my old plastic ladle (R.I.P.).
Soup is just the beginning, though. It also is great for saucing Italian food like spaghetti and meatballs, layers of lasagna, or simple homemade pizza. You could use it to serve a giant punch bowl of rosé aperol spritzes. If you made a big vat of queso (normal weekend activity), you could keep most of it warm on the stove and ladle some into a serving bowl. If your boat sprung a leak, you could probably use a ladle to get water out and maybe even plug the hole. Travel with your ladle—you never know when you're going to need it.
