If you love bread, a well-toasted bread slice topped with your favourite spread can be the perfect way to start your day on a good note. You can also make your toasts healthier by stuffing a healthy filling of vegetables, boiled egg or cooked & seasoned meat of your choice, between two toasted bread slices. Further, choose a healthy bread variety like multigrain, whole wheat or brown bread. With a bread toaster at home, you can quickly make toasts as per your preference. This kitchen appliance is easy to use even for novices. If you don’t have one yet, it’s time to buy one. Here’s a smart shopping guide with tips to find the best pop-up toaster.
Different Heating Modes
Most of the advanced toasters available today come with different browning modes. Such an option helps you get the desired colour and crunchiness of toasts. Some people like mildly toasted bread, while others prefer deep dark toasts. Depending on individual preferences, you can set the heating mode accordingly and get the perfect toasts. So, while shopping, choose a bread toaster with various heating modes.
Size of the Toaster
Answering the below three questions can help you decide the right size of the toaster:
- How much countertop space do you have available for this appliance? – Pop-up toasters are generally compact and occupy very little space. But still, it’s always better to take this into account for any appliance that you buy. If your countertop is too small to accommodate it, you can consider buying a toaster that you can store in a kitchen cabinet.
- How many bread slices would you want to toast at a time? – Usually, you will find bread toasters that can toast two or four bread slices at a time. A toaster that is capable of toasting two slices at one is often sufficient because this helps in serving hot toasts as and when done.
- How big do you want the slots to be? – If you want to toast larger slices of bread, then find a pop–up toaster that has wide slots.
Read more: Advantages Of Having a Food Chopper in Your Kitchen
Useful Functions
During shopping, look for a bread toaster that can add more convenience to your busy mornings. Here are some of the functions that you need to check for:
- Defrost: Thawing frozen bread is not an easy task if your toaster doesn’t have a ‘Defrost’ feature. With a single touch, you can complete this task.
- Reheat: If you regularly have leftover toasts, ‘Reheat’ is a great feature that can help you. You can reheat cold toasts without changing their taste or colour and relish them just the way you would enjoy fresh toasts.
- Stop: This is yet another convenient feature. You can stop toasting at any time with a single press of the ‘Stop’ function. The appliance will eject the toasts and turn it off automatically.
Removable Crumb Tray
Cleaning a pop-up toaster becomes a hassle if the appliance lacks a detachable tray. Find a toaster with a tray that you can remove to discard the bread crumbs. This way, you don’t have to leave the crumbs right there to decay.
Easy to Clean, Use and Store
The toaster that you choose to buy should be easy to clean. While a removable crumb tray helps you clean the bread crumbs, it should be easy to clean the exterior body of the appliance with a wipe or two. Further, the appliance should have simple one-touch controls that make it easy for novices to use and it should be compact enough to be tucked away in any small space that is available.
Now that you have access to a simple shopping guide, start your research and buy home the best stylish pop-up toaster to make the perfect toasts.
