The Well-Appointed Desk

With it being graduation season, Father’s Day and kids heading off to college and their first apartments, I thought it might be fun to well-appoint the kitchen this week. I’ve included my absolute go-to cookbook, The Better Homes & Gardens New Cookbook. Even if you’re an experienced cook, this is a great reference for those staple recipes or the young cook or baker in your life. From exactly how long to cook vegetables to standard recipes for gravy, soups, and salad dressings, this book has all the basics without having to scroll endlessly through the internet. I told my pals I was including it and they all admitted to having it and dog-earing certain recipes. “Did you know it has how to carve a turkey in it?” a certain regular contributor to this very blog sagely told me yesterday. I’m putting an Inkaren Memo Clip on THAT page.

The Lamy Logo Multicolor Ballpoint pen take standard D1 refills like its more expensive cousin, the 2000 multipen, but for a fraction of the cost. It’s also stainless steel which means its kitchen-friendly material. In the kitchen, a good ballpoint or gel pen to annotate recipe cards is essential. I also strongly recommend having a pencil, a mechanical pencil or multi-function pen/pencil makes it easy to have a sharp point handy at all times. The Zebra Sharbo-X is a great candidate here in that it is customizable with three components and features a metal body. I always keep my Sharbo filled with a mechanical pencil, a gel pen and a needlepoint ballpoint for writing on waxy paper surfaces like magazines and filling out forms. Zebra refills are top notch and will accept standard D1 in a pinch.

If you want to keep a fountain pen in the kitchen, I’d recommend a Pilot Vanishing Point or a Decimo. This is a place where you will most likely be writing notes, recipes, grocery lists and other short items rather than longer writing. Not having to cap and uncap it would speed up use and the extra fine nibs of the Pilot line would be beneficial on the somewhat lesser quality papers you could find yourself writing upon.

The classic Rifle Paper recipe box is the perfect size to fill your family’s favorite recipes, new and old. Exacompta Index Cards which are very fountain pen-friendly will fit perfectly into the recipe box and is a great option to continue to add recipes to the box or you can purchase additional recipe cards from Rifle.

Finally, don’t stop with just that one dishtowel from Easy, Tiger. I pretty own all of them now. Really. I’m not just saying that because I want them to like me. But they do work in my same zip code.

• Zebra Sharbo X LT3 Multi Pen Body Component in Silver $32.50 (via JetPens)
• EDK Pen, starting at $60 (via Karas Pen Co.)
• Inkaren Memo Clips Box of 30 $5.50 (via Fresh Stock Japan)
• L’Artisan Pastellier Callifolio Bleu Equinoxe 5 Fountain Pen Ink (40 ml Bottle) $12 (via JetPens)
• Better Homes & Gardens New Cookbook, 16th Edition $20.07 Hardcover, Ringbound (via Amazon)
• Polka Dot Recipe Box & Card Set (include 12 letterpress printed dividers and 24 spoon recipe cards) $34 (via Rifle Paper Co.)
• Boys to the Yard Dishtowel $15 (via Easy Tiger)
• Triangle Colored Pencil Set $14.95 (via Sapori)
• Latte Bowls (set of four) in Tourmaline $24 (via Anthropologie)
• Newgate Wall Clock – Brixton $108 Special Price (via West Elm)
• Lamy Logo Multicolor Ballpoint Pen $32 (via Pen Chalet)
• Pilot Vanishing Point Decimo Fountain Pen in Burgundy, Fine Nib $140 (via Anderson Pens)
• Four-Colour Ballpoint Pen by Hightide £11.50 (via The Stationer)
• Wooden Utensils Fork Spoon Knife (Set of 20) $3.50 per set (via CuteTape)
• Exacompta Record Index Cards in Graph (4″ x 6″) 100 Cards, $14.95 per pack (via JetPens)

Thanks to my sponsors for providing some of the images I use for Fashionable Friday. Please consider making your next purchase from one of the shops that support this blog and let them know you heard about them here. Thanks for your support and for supporting the shops that help keep it running.

There’s some discount codes to be used this week so don’t forget to check some of those out… The Stationer is having a sale right now and Pen Chalet has an extra coupon code that expires today in the header bar… look up!