macstack

I just got a new house (!) and I no longer have a living room adjacent to the kitchen, so I can't hear the stereo (at reasonable volumes) while I'm cooking. I was thinking about getting a Homepod mini to easily listen to music, podcasts, internet radio, etc. while cooking. Is that the best choice for my use case or are there better options I should look at?

I don't know, but if you can, listen to one before you buy it. Try a time when there isn't a lot of people in the store. I mean, it's a speaker, sound is the most important feature.

I replaced my kitchen radio with an Alexa years ago.
It works great and sounds really good for background music.

Congrats on the new house!

For the use case it's not a bad option. The sound is decent, you won't get stereo sound out of one unit but if you're just listening to it to while the time away as you're the kitchen it does the job. The price is kind of all over the place, you can get a new one at Costco for cheaper than most places as long as you don't mind that the color options are black or white. I've seen them at pawn shops for $40 even.