16 Dec Easier Jar Opening

A couple years ago, I broke my right wrist.  Yeah, I’m right handed.  And while the bone has healed, I lost a lot of grip strength.  And I’m not too good with my left hand, either.

Silly as it sounds, one of my biggest problems is been opening jars.  Then I grabbed my Gecko Grip — and it has been so incredibly useful that I just have to write about it again (you can read my first article here, it’s mostly about using them as a nonslip pad and trivet).

Reader and cruiser-in-waiting Julie Lambert invented these while in culinary school.  They were originally designed to go under the ends of a cutting board to make it non-slip, and that’s one good use for them on a boat.  But they’re also great as a trivet (100% silicone, heat resistant to 500° F.) — in particular putting one under each end of large pans so they don’t tip as you serve from them.

And, as I mentioned before, they are great as jar grips.  They work way better than a damp towel or my old standby, my round silicone trivet.  (I do sometimes have to run the lid under hot water as well.)  I just leave one on the counter all the time so it’s easy to grab.  The funny thing is that I’ve noticed Dave using it as well . . . and one day I had to scrub oil off it from where he’d used it to get a better grip on an oil filter (it’s non-porous so it’s easy to wash pretty much anything off).

For those who have a set of Gecko Grips, I just wanted to remind you how well they work for gripping jars — the more purposes something has, the better, right?  And for those who don’t have a set, I really recommend them!

• Buy Gecko Grips on Amazon

P.S. Dave has found them useful as a pseudo strap wrench, too!