We're testing a batch of professed kitchen miracles and innovations that promise to make our cooking chores faster and easier.
Will they really?
Armed with a healthy dose of skepticism, Beacon Journal home writer Mary Beth Breckenridge, consumer affairs writer Betty Lin-Fisher and I got down to business to find out.
Here's what we have to report:
GT Xpress 101
If Billy Mays is the king of the infomercial, then pitchwoman Cathy Mitchell has to be the queen.
What is it about her that makes you want to buy everything she's selling? Her grandmotherly manner? That voice? Or the fact that she looks like she's really enjoying all of those pocket meals she produces on her GT Xpress 101?
This compact electric "meal, snack and dessert maker" has two wells for preparing everything from omelets to salmon to individual cakes. Like a panini maker, it cooks from the top and bottom.
We approached this $29.99 cooker with varying attitudes. Betty was completely enamored with it and was convinced she would like it. I was a total skeptic, and Mary Beth had not even heard of it.
Perhaps the biggest surprise of our testing was that this cooker works well, and we all loved it. Shocked was probably the better reaction when we removed two stuffed chicken breasts from the cooker's wells, sliced into them and found them to be perfectly cooked. (Yes, we tested with a meat thermometer, and they were over 165 degrees.)
The chicken, which was stuffed with ham and cheese, was moist on the inside and nicely browned on the outside. It performed equally well on minute steak roll-ups and when baking angel food cake with strawberries.
A word of caution: We mistakenly baked a batch of cakes without first spraying the machine with non-stick spray and had a real mess on our hands. So always make sure you are armed with a can of spray before using the machine, despite its non-stick surface.
We all liked the fact that the machine had permanent cord storage on its underside. It's compact — about the size of a waffle iron — and could easily store in a drawer or standing up in the corner of a cupboard. Mary Beth liked the fact that it would use much less energy than the oven.
There were a few drawbacks. The specially designed spatula that comes with the GT Xpress is rather flimsy, and we wondered how well it would hold up over time.
I had problems with the recipes that came with it. Most don't even call for a simple sprinkle of salt and pepper, and many call for the use of high-fat or high-sodium ingredients like stuffing mix or canned soup. However, if you are willing to improvise from the book, it wouldn't be hard to make healthy meals in the GT Xpress. We also had concerns about how well the non-stick coating on the machine would hold up. But after several weeks of making breakfast and snacks for Betty's children, the Xpress is going strong with no problems to date. You can't make dinner for four with this cooker, but it would be good for singles, seniors, and even busy families who juggle different meal schedules.
Verdicts: Betty: Snap it up. Lisa: Snap it up. Mary Beth: Snap it up.
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Titan Peeler
The advertising for this peeler claims it is "the world's best." Those are big words to live up to.
At $14.99 for a two-pack, the price wasn't out of line. But after trying it on a variety of vegetables, none of us felt overly excited about it.
As a peeler, it works well. But it's a peeler like any other. We didn't find anything special about it, and it worked as well as the peelers we all had at home.
One of the peelers has a special blade for making julienne strips of vegetables and it worked well also, after a few attempts at learning how to use it. "It's gadget-y, but it doesn't seem worth learning how to use it," was Betty's reaction. Mary Beth and I just didn't think it was all that special.
While Betty liked its ability to julienne, she questioned how often she would ever need the function. "I just don't julienne all that often. I don't think I've ever julienned in my life," she said. Bottom line, if you need a peeler, this one works well, but it's nothing extraordinary.
Verdicts: Betty: It depends. Lisa: It depends. Mary Beth: It depends.
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Beater Blade
The Beater Blade isn't an infomercial special, but rather one of a few new products that are out for use on traditional stand mixers. We were sent one as a sample, so we didn't have to pay to test it out. It sells for $24.95 at major retailers or on the Internet.
The concept behind the Beater Blade is that it eliminates the need to constantly scrape the sides of the bowl when mixing, combining the features of a mixing blade and a spatula into one attachment. It is available in a variety of styles to fit most stand mixers in either the tilt-head or bowl-lift styles.
We all agreed that this blade works, continuously scraping the sides of the bowl and eliminating the need to constantly stop the mixer and scrape down the sides. Where we disagreed was on its usefulness.
As someone who uses my mixer a lot, I found it convenient and appreciated not having to turn the mixer off and on.
Betty questioned whether there is a real need for it. "I guess I don't understand what the big deal was," she said. Mary Beth didn't think the price was worth it, because she doesn't view scraping the bowl as that big of a task. "To me, that's not a time-saver," she said.
Verdicts: Betty: It depends. Lisa: Snap it up. Mary Beth: It depends.
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One Touch Cordless Knife
We had high-hopes for this One-Touch product, because we liked the brand's can opener and jar opener in past reviews. This cordless knife, however, fell short of our expectations.
Our problems began when loading in the six AA batteries needed to operate the knife. We were unable to get the battery cover to close tightly. It's possible we had a defective model, but we ended up taping the knife handle with duct tape to keep the batteries from popping out before we were able to test it.
Once we got the knife working, we tested it on a variety of items, and it cut OK. I felt that it lacked the power of my electric knife, and the blades are considerably shorter, so I wondered how well it would slice a large ham or turkey. Betty questioned whether you would ever need the power of an electric knife where you won't have access to electricity. And Mary Beth didn't like the fact that it used so many batteries.
At $14.99, plus the cost of six batteries, we think your $20 is better spent on a real electric knife, even if you have to spend closer to $30 or $35. Over time, you'll make up the savings in the cost of replacing batteries.
Verdicts: Betty: Skip it. Lisa: Skip it. Mary Beth: Skip it.
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Miracle Blades III
"The last set of knives you will ever need," is the claim of this knife set.
For $19.99, the 11 Piece Perfection Series contained 10 knives — a paring knife, two long serrated knives, four steak knives, a fillet knife with a flexible blade, a "Rock 'n' Chop" (similar to a traditional chef's knife) and a "Chop 'n' Scoop" knife with a wide blade for lifting items like chopped vegetables. There is also a pair of kitchen shears, which product information on the Internet claimed would even cut through a can.
The blades were sharp — as all new knives typically are — and performed well.
They weren't perfect. Despite our best efforts, none of us was able to cut through a can with the shears, and the Chop 'n' Scoop seems rather flimsy.
We don't think this is the last knife set you will ever need. These blades can hardly compete with professional-quality knives. They don't have a full tang; their stainless steel blades are fused into their plastic handles. But as inexpensive knife sets go, they aren't bad. These knives average just $1.82 per blade. That's cheap even for cheap knives. So if they only last a year or two, you are still likely to get your money's worth of performance out of them.
If you don't cook much and aren't concerned about owning chef's-quality knives, I say go ahead. But if you are looking for lasting quality, I doubt you will find it in this box.
Betty agreed that buying them or not depends on what you are looking for in a knife set. Mary Beth, who admittedly doesn't cook a lot, said the knives would be fine for her purposes and felt that for the price, they were a bargain.
Verdicts: Betty: It depends. Lisa: It depends. Mary Beth: Snap it up.
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(c) 2009, Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio).
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