If you subscribe to The Veggie, you probably already know a little bit about its author. “I want our readers to think of me as a friend who is going through some similar things in their life,” Tanya Sichynsky, the editor behind the weekly New York Times Cooking newsletter, explained as she answered my questions from her Brooklyn apartment kitchen. “I try to share, within reason, and relate it as much as possible to what I am cooking, what I wish I was cooking, what I’m planning to cook.”The Veggie curates New York Times Cooking’s vegetarian (and vegan-friendly) recipes around relatable questions like: What should you do with that coconut milk that’s been languishing in the pantry? What about all of those cans of chickpeas you’ve collected without realizing it (Tanya has coined this “chickpea anxiety”). How do you make dinner without sabotaging your newly cleaned kitchen (and tanking your mood in the process)? What even is salad?For many, cooking with plants can seem daunting and prep-heavy. “I can be a pretty lazy cook,” Tanya admitted. “Like so many readers, I’m looking for a lot of shortcuts. So it’s really like, how few things can I break out to make this thing come together as quickly as possible?”Indeed, the right setup can alleviate some of the pain points of cooking, so you can spend more time enjoying the process (and the results). Here are the tricks and indispensable kitchen tools that allow Tanya to stress less while cooking with veggies at home.