The 12 Best Cooking Hacks Of 2025 (So Far)

Every year brings a bumper crop of helpful new (or not-so-new) kitchen hacks, a subject of which we never grow tired. After all, even those who've been cooking for years can still learn a thing or two. Sure, not every hack will actually work — storing your bagels on a CD spindle, while it will certainly make for an interesting centerpiece, won't do a darn thing to prevent them from growing stale. Also, opening wine with a blowtorch is something you should only try if you're auditioning for a "Jackass" reboot. Needless to say, we won't be recommending anything ridiculous like that; only tried-and-true helpful hints that actually live up to the name.

Among the things we've learned in 2025 are how to make food more visually appealing and less messy. We've also found a few new ways to keep some foods fresher and how to prepare others with less hassle (or, in one case, "hassel"). There are even a couple of fun but functional celebrity tips. All in all, we've come up with a dozen of our favorite suggestions, although the year's not over yet. There will undoubtedly be still more to come in the weeks ahead, so be sure to stay tuned.

Hot dogs are a favorite summer cookout food, partly because they can be affordable enough to feed the whole neighborhood and also because eating them outdoors helps mitigate some of the mess. If you want to do a better job of containing the toppings, though, here's an easy tip: Apply the condiments inside the bun instead of on top of the hot dog. They can also go on the bottom of the bun underneath the meat, although, in this case, you might want to add a protective barrier such as a lettuce leaf, cheese slice, or piece of fried bologna.

Jamie Oliver is a trained chef who's been working in the culinary field since he was a kid, so you might expect that he'd be nitpicky enough to insist that his recipes be made only with super-specific ingredients. As it turns out, though, he's not above using the occasional shortcut, such as using spaghetti to make fake orzo. He does this by putting the pasta in a clean kitchen towel, then pulling it across the edge of a kitchen counter or table to break it into bits. The final product won't be perfectly even, but the flavor's the same since pasta is pasta.

Martina McBride may not be a food professional, but she's a talented home cook who's authored a few celebrity cookbooks. She also has a helpful hack that keeps cucumbers from growing mushy ahead of their time: wrapping them in paper towels before storing them in the fridge. The reason it works is that cucumbers tend to leak moisture, and when it gets on the surface, it can accelerate spoilage. The paper towel helps to soak up any liquid before it can do too much damage.

Most types of sauce require some type of fat, be it butter, oil, or pan drippings, but it can be tricky to get the balance just right. If your sauce errs on the side of greasiness, you can always refrigerate it until the fat solidifies, but this tip won't do much good if you plan to eat it right away. In this case, a ladle of ice will help you say goodbye to greasy sauces. Use a metal ladle (it conducts the cold better) and skim it over the surface. As you do, some of the fat will solidify and stick to the bottom.

If you've ever heard the saying "like a hot knife through butter," it's pretty obvious that this simile is based on fact. This same heated utensil, however, is not only good for butter, but will also help you slice certain types of dessert. If the dessert comes straight from the fridge or freezer, warm the knife under hot running water. Wipe it dry, then use it to cut the cold cake, pastry, or what have you before the heat dissipates or the dessert warms up.

Purpose-built cherry pitters have been around at least since the 19th century, but if your kitchen drawers are already crammed full of gadgets, you really don't need to go out and buy one. Instead, you can use something you probably got free with your last order of Chinese takeout: a chopstick. The way to pit cherries with a chopstick starts with stemming the cherry and seating it in the neck of a bottle, then poking the wide part of the stick down through the middle where the stem used to be. If you don't have a chopstick handy, a straw should also do the trick.

Pork roast makes a delicious and economical dinner option, especially if you live in pig country where it's often cheaper than chicken. Another thing it has in common with chicken, besides being budget-friendly, is its deliciously crispy skin. To maximize the crunch, though, it's worth taking an extra few minutes to score the skin before cooking, then pour boiling water over it. The boiling water helps to jump-start the fat rendering, and the more fat that cooks out, the crunchier the pork skin will be.

Cereal can be pretty pricey, especially the brand-name stuff, so if you get a good deal on a bulk buy, by all means, go for it. Should the cereal start to go stale before you finish it, you can revive the crunch by baking it in a 300-degree Fahrenheit oven for about five to ten minutes. Not only will the cereal be crisped up once again, but it will also taste slightly toasty, which in many cases is an improvement over the original flavor.

Banana bread is a super-easy way to use up your mushy bananas, but we'll admit it's not the most glamorous of desserts. While it may never rank up there with a towering croquembouche or multi-layered mille-feuilles, you can make the most of its simple, baked-good-next-door appearance by laying a strip of butter across the uncooked dough. Once the bread is baked, there'll be a photogenic split where the butter once lay. Not a banana fan? The butter trick works for other loaf cakes and quick breads, too.

There are a zillion and six hacks for tear-free onion slicing, but most of them are more hassle than they're worth. Onion goggles are uncomfortable and impede your vision, while slicing an onion under running water is easier said than done. One thing that does work, however, is to chill the onion in the refrigerator or freezer before cutting. About half an hour should be enough to dampen down the tear-producing compounds for long enough to allow you to slice without sobbing.

Hasselback potatoes look like they'd live up to their name in that they'd be quite a hassle to prepare, what with all those thin, evenly spaced cuts. You don't actually need top-level knife skills to achieve these cuts, however, as long as you have two chopsticks on hand. The chopsticks serve as a cutting guide as well as ensuring that you don't slice all the way through the potato.

A rice bowl can be an easy, lazy-day dinner if you've got cooked rice on hand. Heat it, throw it in a bowl, add leftovers, and done. Rice bowls can be transformed into company fare, however, if you take a little extra effort with presentation. One way to achieve an extra-stylish rice bowl is to mold the rice between two bowls, a medium and a small one. This will form an edible rice bowl that's literally made out of rice.