Why A Ruler Is An Essential Kitchen Tool, According To Eitan Bernath - Exclusive

The following is a public service announcement: TikTok star and "The Drew Barrymore Show" principal culinary contributor Eitan Bernath has a new cookbook. Before you get any funky ideas, rest assured that this is not your one-stop shop for social media culinary trends. It won't teach you to make a pancake on an upside-down pan, to blowtorch rice paper, or to deep fry a chicken. Think of "Eitan Eats the World" as an essential comfort food companion. Rifle through its pages for rainy-day inspiration and find peanut butter and jelly pancakes, Tex-Mex breakfast burritos, and an entire section dedicated to the humble "handheld." 

That's not to say Bernath's first cookbook is devoid of hacks. Those lie, for the most part, in the book's obligatory section for suggested kitchen utensils. For example, Bernath would love it if you stopped relegating the whisk to mixing nascent waffle batters. He suggests using it the next time you make guacamole (maybe even the "Sweet & Smokey Guac Burger" or "Guac, Salsa & Chips Bar" that Bernath thoughtfully includes in his book for avocado devotees). Once you've let the kitchen whisk fulfill its true purpose in life, Bernath also urges you to add a ruler to your utensil crock.

A ruler keeping company with your ladles, spatulas, and microplanes? Bear with Eitan Bernath, and he might just convert you. "In my kitchen, I have it right next to the stovetop ... where I usually do prep," he explained exclusively to Tasting Table.

There are a couple of good reasons it's there. The first? For chopping things. "Let's say you read a recipe and it says, 'Do a medium dice.' You're like, 'What does that mean?' You can Google it and see," Bernath extrapolated. "Then you can get your ruler and measure it out." You won't always need to measure medium dice sizes or Juliennes, of course — not even Bernath harbors that illusion. "You're not going to use it every time," he clarified. "I do not recommend [it] for every time you want to chop an onion."

When your ruler has graduated from that purpose, it's still not time to send it back to the study. "In baking, I think it's important. [If] you're making cinnamon buns ... you want to roll it out to about 12 inches by 24 inches, give or take a few inches. You have got to measure that," Bernath said. "If you don't, you're going to not have enough. They're going to be too wide, [or] they won't be long enough."

That's not the only treat a ruler can help you bake. "Maybe you're making some type of dessert that's on a cookie sheet that you need to space out perfectly so they don't rise and spread and mash into each other," Bernath suggested. "The beauty of having it is you never know when you're going to need it, but having it there [only] costs a few dollars. It's very small [and] easy to store. It's so valuable."

"Eitan Eats the World" is available now everywhere books are sold and on EitanEatsTheWorld.com. Keep up with Eitan's latest projects at EitanBernath.com.