You should get a utensil rest for cooking.
Whether you need one for eating is debatable, since in almost all cases you already have a perfectly good one, sometimes called a "plate" or "bowl". But when you're cooking, constantly tasting things and moving around any number of semi-dirty dishes, it's harder to keep track of a clean utensil and there's nowhere to put it. The counter is easy, but who knows what's been splattered on it while you've been cooking. If you have one utensil rest, you know your tasting utensil must be on it and won't end up accidentally going through five spoons or mixing it up with something that touched raw meat.
Get one of the little curved rectangles originally meant for chopsticks. They fit just about anywhere, and are easily cleaned. The tiny shallow bowl style is acceptable, but they have a bigger footprint and are slightly more work to clean. Better if you want to catch drips, but I'm going to wipe down the counter anyway so all I care about is the utensil staying raised up.
I don't recommend the chunky rests with a short slotted wall meant for large cooking utensils. Cooking utensils are large and sturdy enough to rest on the handle of the pot or a spare bowl, and they're touching all the raw food already anyway. Save the counter space.
Besides, do you really want to wipe down those slots? I'd rather keep rinsing off the utensils instead.
- Rew
Nightly Notes
I have an unreasonable affinity for small useful objects. You can get gorgeous ceramic utensil rests for basically nothing in a lovely range of easily cleanable glazes.
They make me happy, and I know they will stop making me happy if I accumulate more than I can actually use. So I abstain.
- Rew