Black & Decker TRO480BS Toaster Oven
This is a toaster oven you can get from Black and Decker - you can see it in the box below.
Here's a picture of it out of the box, with materials. As you can see, it comes with a little pan, a shelf, and a manual:
Here it is with the door closed:
You can see the interior below. It's (roughly) six inches high and eleven inches wide.
Here is the three-dial system that operates it. You have to set a temperature, then pick what you want it to do, then a timer for it on bottom.
Toast Test:
This was a big, big failure. Here was my first effort - I figured I'd try the little circle you can see above (it's between the dark toast picture and the light toast picture, so I was figuring I'd get medium toast).
Here it is pre-toasting - normal white bread:
Here's what came out - a nuclear holocaust of toast. This thing was nearly totally black - good thing I didn't try whatever the dark toast is supposed to be like.
I decided to try a light toasting - maybe I could stomach that. It's really hard to do, though - surprisingly, it was extremely difficult to get the dial to actually go there. It was sort of trial and error (and I get the feeling that your toasting would be the same).
Here it is mid-process:
Here's the result. Edible, but I ordered the lightest toasting possible, and I got what I'd consider pretty heavily toasted - it's even black on one side.
The verdict - don't get this thing if you ever want to eat toast.
Cookie Test:
Here's my effort at a chocolate chip cookie. I set it to 350 degrees, bake, for 15 minutes per the instructions on the cookie dough.
Here it is in process:
Here it is completed:
It tasted good - cooked a little bit more than I would have liked, but I'm not a very good cook. I think this works fine as a smaller, substitute oven.
Disadvantages:
One thing I didn't like about this was the short cord. It only goes about a foot and a half - if you have a long countertop, you might want more than that.
Another thing that was annoying to me was that you have to use all three dials to get anything to work. When I was fiddling around with it, it actually took me three tries to successfully make my first piece of toast - I thought the bottom dial (Timer/Toast) would be enough, but you actually have to set the Temperature to Toast, and the Function to Toast, and then tell it to Toast with the bottom dial. I thought it was overkill.
I also found the dials a little hard to use - they "jump" to the next slot so you can't just turn it slightly to the right. This is a big problem, especially because the "medium" toast option is actually "nuke it to an inedible crisp." I have to jump to medium, and then try to edge it back to something normal through trial and error.
Summary:
It's $27. You get what you pay for - an extremely basic toaster oven that is functional, but hard to use except by trial and error. If you're a college student, or a homeless guy, go for it. But for most adults, it's going to be worth spending a little more money to get something with some more options.
This is basically just a mini oven, and it's no more precise than a full size one. You're not adding anything to your kitchen by getting this. Now you just have two ovens, and one is a little smaller. The whole point of a toaster oven is to get something that can be more precise for when you want to make smaller portions, or is easier to use if you're cooking for one, and buying this defeats that point. You can buy it online here.
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