Snagged a nice toaster oven today

[human]

So I ran out this afternoon to get the oil changed in my car and on the way home, I decided to drop in on a nearby Goodwill store. I ended up walking out with a nice Black & Decker Continuous Clean Toast-R-Oven/Broiler for $4.00. I've never seen one exactly like this. The plastics on the outside, along with the metal framing the glass door on the front, are all chocolate brown and the top has a woodgrain finish. I have never seen one with the woodgrain top and the color combination would have looked somewhat outdated even when it was new. Woodgrain was big on kitchen appliances in the '70s but I'm thinking it was somewhat passé by the time Black & Decker took over GE's housewares division, including the Toast-R-Oven line, in 1984.

Other than a few crumbs in the bottom, it doesn't look like it's seen much use at all. The only problem with this toaster is it doesn't have the right tray. Someone had stuck a tray from an early '70s vintage GE Deluxe Toast-R-Oven in it, but that tray is good inch and a half too narrow, front to back. There was another Black & Decker Toast-R-Oven nearby, which had the right size tray but lacked the broiler insert since it was just a basic Toast-R-Oven model. Nonetheless, I swapped the trays so I would at least have one the right dimensions, even if it isn't the type that came with it. That's probably how the original tray got gone. I guess I'll keep looking until I find one with the broiler pan for a cheap price, then buy it and donate it back without the pan. That shouldn't be too difficult, considering how plentiful those toaster ovens are on thrift store shelves.

 

[suckolux]

Back in the early 80s I had one of those, baked a lot better than one would think

 

[human]

I've had one before

Yes, they do work well. It was a pretty successful model, first introduced by GE in the mid '70s and still being made by Black & Decker today. I've just never seen one with woodgrain like that before. I had a white one a few years ago but it quit and I replaced it with an early '70s GE Deluxe Toast-R-Oven that I'd paid about $2 for at a thrift store about five years ago. It's smaller but I like the way the door pops open when your toast is done. It worked great until a few months ago and then the thermostat went kind of wonky. One day it would barely warm the bread, then the next it would incinerate it on the same setting. I haven't put this one through its paces yet. I guess it'll start with a bagel in the morning and maybe some slice-n-bake cookies tomorrow night. If it can handle those two tasks successfully, I will have gotten a good one.

There's no rhyme or reason to the pricing of these things at thrift stores. The one I snitched the tray from was priced at $6, was a lesser model and wasn't in anywhere near as nice condition as this one that was priced at $4. But it was white, so maybe they thought it looked more contemporary. But when you're buying a used appliance, condition trumps color every time. Besides, the brown one works better with my countertops.

 

[nycwriter]

Grandma had one of these ...

... back in the '80s and '90s and into the '00s.

Baked and toasted like a little dream.

Being an elderly widow, she liked not having to fire up her big oven just to cook a couple of frozen fish sticks.

And having the presence of mind of realizing that something was going on with her head (she was suffering from dementia), she preferred a little electric oven turning itself off with a little timer and a bell, over turning on that big gas oven.

 

[human]

Standard equipment in my kitchen...

I agree for many small baking jobs, it's a nice alternative to a full size oven. Living alone, I usually find it's faster, easier, and probably more energy efficient than the big oven.

I've always had a GE or Black & Decker Toast-R-Oven in my kitchen and even before I had my own kitchen. My parents gave me their early '70s vintage Deluxe Toast-R-Oven to use in my freshman dorm room when I went off to college. I think I used it for the next 10 or 12 years before I got a brand new one that my ex-wife ultimately ended up with. The last few I've owned have come from thrift stores for between $2 and $5.

The one I just got seems to work quite well. I've heated a couple of things in it using the oven function and the thermostat appears to run slightly cool but at least it's consistent. I have yet to toast anything in it but I have no reason to think it won't work fine in that mode. My only complaint about it is it lacks the linkage between the door and the rack that pulls the rack forward when you open the door. I don't know why Black & Decker did away with that feature. It couldn't have added more than a few pennies to the production cost.

Although it has a smaller capacity--barely big enough for two slices of bread--I actually prefer the design of the older Deluxe Toast-R-Oven, which automatically pops the door open and extends the wire rack forward at the end of the toasting cycle. I've been using one of these the past three or four years. The link below takes you to a video that shows how the older model worked.

http://https//www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EqMx8crd3I

 

[human]

Well, I toasted a bagel in it for lunch and it came out perfectly browned. So given that it's perfectly functioning, in excellent condition, and an unusual but pleasing color scheme, I say this thing's a keeper.

I had one last surprise when I peeled off the orange price stickers from the top. I found it had been marked down from $6 to $4. If the date codes on the price stickers are correct, it came into the store in mid-February and was marked down in mid-May. That being the case, it was probably just about due for another markdown when I bought it. But the fact that I don't remember seeing it on the shelf before--and it's something I would have noticed--makes me question the date code.

 

[human]

Just found a broiler pan on eBay

I just grabbed a replacement broiler pan for my toaster oven on eBay for $7. It's ridiculous that I paid more for it than I did for the appliance itself. But as a bonus, it includes a toaster oven size AirBake cookie sheet. I had no idea there were so many third party accessories for toaster ovens. There are all manner of muffin pans, cake/casserole pans pizza pans, etc. by brands like Nordic Ware and Pampered Chef in diminutive sizes to fit inside them.

 

[jmurray01]

We have a small Cookworks "mini-oven" which is fantastic - although it is worthless in terms of collecting as it is fairly new (about 5 years old) and a budget brand from Argos, but still a great machine nonetheless.


 


Here is a picture of the same model we have.