New in this update: After a few additional months of testing, we found an additional budget cookware set to recommend from the DTC brand Goldilocks.

The best cookware set is a 7-piece cookware set

In the grand scheme of cookware sets, a 7-piece set is relatively small. But after much conversation and debate, we think it will cover all the most common cooking tasks. The specific pieces that make up a cookware set vary slightly from brand to brand—some include a steamer insert, while others have a second saucepan instead—but 7-piece cookware sets are generally consistent in what they offer. Most have a stockpot, a 2- to 3-quart saucepan, a medium- to large-size skillet (between 10″ and 12″ in diameter), and a sauté pan. The other three pieces are actually just the lids.

With these four tools, a home cook is able to accomplish a large swath of stovetop tasks in the kitchen: pan-frying, deep-frying, sautéing, boiling, braising, searing, stewing, saucing, melting, tempering, steaming, and the list goes on. As for specific cookware sets to buy, we picked out a few below. Two are top choices from our product tests and the third comes as a recommendation from deputy food editor Hana Asbrink.

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The best cookware set overall: All-Clad D3 or D5 7-Piece Cookware sets

All-Clad has long been an industry standard for professional restaurant kitchens in the United States. Their brand has a strong and well-regarded reputation that stands up to scrutiny, as we’ve found year after year in our product tests for the best stainless-steel skillets, saucepans, and stockpots. The D3 line is a tri-ply clad stainless steel that boasts excellent heat distribution across the cooking surface with no cold or hot spots. The D5 set is more expensive but adds two additional layers of cladding for improved heat retention. We recommend them both here. The pieces are sturdy and comfortable to handle, making them easy to maneuver across a cooktop. All-Clad cookware is expensive, but it is high-quality cookware that will last you a lifetime with good care, which is why we feel confident in recommending it to people.

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The best budget cookware set: Goldilocks Cookware Set

As far as affordable picks go, the Goldilocks cookware set impressed us quite a bit in recent tests, and we now consider it a favorite to recommend as a budget alternative. In terms of the shape and design of each piece, the cookware strongly resembles products made by All-Clad. Are the pans a little thinner and a little more volatile and scorchy in comparison to All-Clad? Sure, but for the price they’re about as good as you can get. The set comes with two different saucepans and doesn’t include its sauté pan—the budget pick in our product test. Unfortunate, but we still think it’s worth recommending this set due to the quality it offers, and if you really want the sauté pan, you should just add it to your cart when purchasing the set.

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Another good budget set: Ninja EverClad Commercial-Grade Cookware Set

Ninja is newer to making stainless-steel pans, but this set impressed our tester Allison Robicelli in a recent review of the best stainless-steel cookware test. We consider Ninja to be a quality budget choice compared to the higher-end options above. These pans definitely have some shortcomings; they don’t have quite the even heating of a pricier All-Clad set, and they are definitely on the heavier side. But at a fraction of the price, they are a good, affordable alternative. You also get glass lids rather than full stainless steel, which let you see the food more easily, but are more fragile. They are tempered glass, which means you can put them in the oven, but some people may choose not to.

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A favorite from our test kitchen editor: Fissler M5 Pro-Ply 5-Ply Cookware set

Deputy food editor Hana Asbrink has an affinity for German-made cookware brand Fissler, which has become more readily available in the US in recent years. The brand’s pans can go toe-to-toe with All-Clad in terms of quality, design, and reputation. Like All-Clad, these are multi-clad stainless-steel pans with an aluminum core (this particular set is 5-ply, which means it has two additional layers of metal on top of the three the All-Clad D3 has). They heat evenly and are lightweight and comfortable in the hand. Unlike All-Clad, Fissler cookware has a welded construction instead of riveted handles, which makes it easier to clean up. It’s also got cool to the touch handles and sealed edges. This is definitely a premium cookware set, but it’s one that will stick with you for life.

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The best cookware set for tiny a** kitchens: All-Clad 5-Piece Cookware Set

Living spaces are getting smaller, meaning that more people are using kitchenettes or similar reduced set-ups to prepare their meals at home. I’m talking efficiency apartment renters, van life people, tiny home dwellers, and steadfast minimalists. The question is then, what is the smallest arrangement of pans that allows for the greatest variety of meal preparations? Or in other words, what’s a set that takes up little space, but is versatile enough that you never feel like you’re missing a tool when cooking a typical meal?

Very few of us are afforded the luxury of a full arsenal of All-Clad pans when we move into our first apartment. As nice as it would be for your first set of cookware to be the only set of cookware you ever have to buy, it’s much more likely that the foundation of your first kitchen will be an eclectic medley of economical cookware.

Having tested pots and pans for years now, I must (somewhat reluctantly) admit that well-made, more-expensive cookware consistently performs better than budget counterparts. By “performs better,” I mean it distributes heat more evenly, is less likely to scorch food, and tends to be more comfortable to handle, both in balance and weight. (But you can read more about all that in our reviews here.)

But this doesn’t mean budget cookware is patently unusable. Cheaper pots and pans are often less forgiving of common mistakes. It’s easier to burn food if the heat’s too high, and they’re more prone to warping if you accidentally shock them with cold water—two things green cooks tend to do. However, this doesn’t make them useless. If anything, they might help you become a better cook as you learn through the process of trial and error…and I’m speaking from personal experience!

That said, some lines of budget cookware are certainly better than others. Taking price, performance, design, and overall quality into consideration, my go-to affordable recommendation is definitely Goldilocks. Here’s why.

What I like about Goldilocks Cookware

Goldilocks pots and pans consistently impressed us with their performance and design during testing. We were able to brown onions and crisp up chicken thighs with relative ease. They’re lightweight, making them easy to maneuver with one hand. The pans have spacious surface areas for better searing and browning, and the cooking surface isn’t particularly sticky either.

In general, the shape and design of the skillet and sauté pan are similar to the broad and shallow dimensions of All-Clad pans. Goldilocks strays more with the saucepans, opting for a more typical ratio between diameter and height (All-Clad saucepans are notably tall and more narrow), but it’s clear that the makers of these pans have thought these things through.

The pans are made with tri-ply construction: two layers of stainless steel surrounding an aluminum core. For a while, cladding was synonymous with high-end cookware (hence the name All-Clad) because this layered construction distributes heat more evenly across the pan. These days, cladding is standard on most decent stainless-steel cookware, but it’s still a reliable marker of quality.

Goldilocks sells two main cookware sets simply named The Cookware Set and The Cookware Set Plus. The basic set consists of two saucepans, a 10″ skillet, and a stockpot, and three lids, with the largest fitting both the skillet and the stockpot. The plus set includes an additional 12″ skillet. They also offer a couple of other pieces, like a 3.5-quart sauté pan and a 6-quart Dutch oven. For these cookware sets, the price-to-quality ratio is pretty fantastic, with the 7-piece set going for $235.

What I don’t like about Goldilocks

Praise aside, these pans do suffer from some shortcomings. They are a bit more volatile over the heat, prone to scorching and burning if you aren’t keeping an eye on your sautéed onions. (It should be noted that similarly priced pans we’ve tested were just as, if not more, prone to this as well.) Higher quality stainless steel cookware heats at a more consistent and even pace, allowing for gradual yet expedient warming that encourages browning rather than burning. So a more reactive pan requires more attention.

The metal finish on these pans isn’t quite as polished as more expensive cookware, with an ever-so-slight rough finish on the cooking surface. While this surface texture didn’t significantly impact the pan’s performance, it did make the pan more prone to discoloration with repeated use.

Bottom line: These pans are still great.

Despite a few criticisms, I think it’s important to note that these differences in quality are really only perceptible when comparing pans in a controlled side-by-side environment. Cookware is as capable as the hands that wield it, so if you have a basic understanding of how to cook, I am confident that these pans will serve you well. Who knows, you might end up holding onto these for years and years to come.

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