Toaster Oven for the Two of us?

[pmdeve]

Since it is now only my DH and myself, we were thinking of buying a convection/toaster oven. It seems to make sence to use the toaster oven intead of heating up the oven and using all of that electric. Does this make sense? Also, does anyone have a toaster oven now and what would you suggest. Getting read to retire and trying to save $ wherever we can.

 

[Mrs D]

Since it is now only my DH and myself, we were thinking of buying a convection/toaster oven. It seems to make sence to use the toaster oven intead of heating up the oven and using all of that electric. Does this make sense? Also, does anyone have a toaster oven now and what would you suggest. Getting read to retire and trying to save $ wherever we can.

We remodeled our kitchen 3 years ago and that prompted the purchase of a toaster over (never had one prior). I can't imagine life without it! Granted I make a lot of chicken nuggets, fish sticks and french toast stick of little ones.
It really is handy to not heat up the big oven if I'm just going to be making something that can fit into the toaster oven.

I have a Black & Decker that works well. My brother have an Oyster that is curved and can fit a frozen pizza. He said it does a decent job on the pizza.

 

[JaymeC]

I *love* *love* *love* our toaster oven. It's the first thing we purchased after we moved and were setting up kitchen again. Ours isn't large enough for a frozen pizza, so I can't attest to that, but I put pizza slices in it for reheating and love that aspect. Our toaster oven gets far more use than any other kitchen item we have, oven included, and that's with two kids LOL Like the other poster said, they're great for chicken nuggets and the like I also love them for reheating things I don't want to get mushy. Ours is a black and decker I believe, we've only had it a few months but no problems so far I forget which brand our last one was, but we got it off someone on freecycle who had had it a few years and it continued to work for us til we moved (and passed it on via freecycle)

 

[lucigo]

Living in Florida we hate the idea of heating up the kitchen so use our toaster oven for anything that will fit in it! When my DD21 moved into an apartment for college that was one of our first purchases for her. I think it will save you a lot of money on your electric bill, go for it!!

Try to find one at least big enough for a small pizza. Ours is a black and decker. It has a "toast" feature that my daughter's doesn't have and she has complained about trying to find just the right setting to make toast, so that might be a feature worth looking for.

 

[mrsklamc]

Love having a toaster oven!

Ours is an Oster; I like that it is large enough for a 9' round pan (the rack curves out especially to accomodate this) and that it has a 'window' in the top so we can see inside from the top as opposed to the front.

We had a knob that broke off less than a year after we bought it though, and I don't think it should have, no more than we used it. We use a screwdriver to adjust that knob now.

We got it at Target.

 

[thebigkahuna]

Love having a toaster oven!

Ours is an Oster; I like that it is large enough for a 9' round pan (the rack curves out especially to accomodate this) and that it has a 'window' in the top so we can see inside from the top as opposed to the front.

We had a knob that broke off less than a year after we bought it though, and I don't think it should have, no more than we used it. We use a screwdriver to adjust that knob now.

We got it at Target.

I would contact them! I've had Oster products, and you're right, that's too soon for it to break. oster
Maybe they can fix it or replace it!

And to answer the OP's question - I received a Euro-Pro toaster oven as a housewarming gift, and I LOVE IT!! (brand isn't the issue - i just love having a toaster oven!)

My place is small, so using the oven really heats up the whole place - and most of the time, it's wasteful to use the "big" oven.

I can't assist with brands, I just highly recommend a toaster oven!

 

[Earstou]

I wouldn't live without a toaster oven!!!
I love that it doesn't heat up the kitchen in the summertime and I also like the faster pre-heating time anytime.
I first bought one in college when we had a funky oven. All my roomates loved it (sometimes had to fight them to use it ). It lasted almost 25 years! I think it was a Black & Decker.
I replaced it with a Toastmaster (got a great price on a clearance model) that I've had for 8 years now.
I wish I had bought a larger one, so that I could bake or reheat larger items. So when my mom requested one for Christmas, I bought her a toaster/convection oven big enough for a pizza.

 

[Gina]

I can't imagine life without my toaster/convection oven!! It's just DS and I, and it's SO much more convenient/cooler/quicker to cook in my "baby" oven. I have an Oster that is curved in the back to hold a pizza better, and it has convection-bake/broil/toast/keep warm functions. I use each of them ALL the time. The keep-warm function is so much more useful than I thought it would be!

I so love that appliance. My regular oven was actually broken for a year & a half, and it was just never a priority to get fixed because I can do pretty much everything in the toaster oven. (Finally got the big oven fixed when I needed to do a bunch of holiday baking at once! )

 

[kaywoody]

I love my toaster oven too. We rarely use our big oven, I even searched high and low to find pans that fit perfectly! I have a big Pyrex dish large enough even to do a full-size meatloaf! I even have a pizza stone just the right size for the toaster oven. Can't imagine life without it!

 

[superme80]

Love my toaster oven!!! It is the Blacker Decker. We bought the pans for it. A muffin tin and a pizza pan came with it. Love it!!!!

 

[bettymae1121]

Ditto, love mine. It's one of the smaller ones but I can still do so much with it. I use it for anything that doesn't re-heat well in the microwave (which is a lot of stuff, really). I even broiled steaks on it the other night rather than bother with the oven broiler.

Oddly enough, the one thing they aren't all that good at is making toast. If you're a big toast fan, you'll still want a regular toaster.

 

[Marionnette]

Since it is now only my DH and myself, we were thinking of buying a convection/toaster oven. It seems to make sence to use the toaster oven intead of heating up the oven and using all of that electric. Does this make sense? Also, does anyone have a toaster oven now and what would you suggest. Getting read to retire and trying to save $ wherever we can.

We have this one. http://www.amazon.com/Hamilton-Beach-31989KO-Toaster-Broiler/dp/B000LVC1PA Works great for most things. I find that I do need to turn items that Im baking about three quarters of the way thru since the items in the back seem to brown more. I especially see this with pizzas. The kids like that they can heat up something quickly without having to turn on the big oven. And I like the digital temperature control b/c it allows me to set the temp in twenty five degree increments.

 

[Dodielynn]

We have an airbaker instead - love it!! Bakes it half the time of an oven and pizzas fit and it does make fries crispy too. I have teens and they and their friends use this all the time!

 

[Gina]

And I like the digital temperature control b/c it allows me to set the temp in twenty five degree increments.

That's an excellent point -- I would definitely get one with digital controls rather than manual dials. Then you can precisely set both cooking temperature and time.

 

[4HppyCamprs]

We just bought a toaster oven a couple months ago and it is wonderful!! We love it~! Wish we would have had one way way before now. It does not heat up the kitchen and because you do not have to wait for the oven to heat up food gets down quicker. It is so nice to have things crispy on the outside and yummy on the inside...DH even made pork chops in ours and they were delicious~!

 

[brergnat]

I completely depend on toaster ovens. I've gone through a LOT of them over the past ten years.

From my experience, the following brands will last 2 years MAX (with heavy use).

-Black and Decker
-Hamilton Beach
-Oster
-and, essentially any brand you will find at Wal Mart or Target

A year ago, I bought a Cuisinart Convection/Toaster oven at Costco. It was pricey, but the BEST toaster oven I've EVER had, hands down. It is all digital, easy to clean, and HUGE (I can bake a 12" pizza in it!).

It's this one:

http://www.bedbathandbeyond.com/product.asp?SKU=14784853

It was $89.99 at Costco. They still had it last week when I was there. The costco one has black sides and top, instead of stainless steel.

I use it every day, multiple times a day. I bake chicken, pork chops, and baked goods in there. I use it for frozen pizzas, frozen soups, etc. It's AMAZING. The broiler function works amazingly well. Broiling fish and chicken breasts is easy and fast.

I'd not waste money on the other brands. I assure, you, they will break very quickly and you'll be out the $$$ as they usually only carry a 1 yr warranty (the Cuisinart one has a 3 year).