The Most Underrated Kitchen Appliance I Own

I cannot wait to tell you guys what the most underrated kitchen appliance I own is.  Any guesses?  We use it every single day in our house….

Our toaster oven!

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This is the one we have! It’s super old, but it works like a charm, and it’s a kitchen appliance that won’t break the bank. We got ours for $50!

I was talking to a friend about how much I loved our toaster oven, and she giggled and admitted that she had never cooked anything in a toaster oven and definitely didn’t own one at her own house (insert shocked face here).  I could not imagine not having one!

In case you also don’t have a toaster oven and also have never really used one, we basically use it as an alternative to our oven; it’s like a quicker oven!

Here are just a few of the ways we use our toaster oven:

• I heat up our eggless waffles and you guys know how often we eat those in our house (right now I have a 3 year old who wakes up and requests the waffles).

• Warming up burritos is one my favorite ways to use the toaster oven- it gives them a nice crispy crunchy outside (I make these vegetarian black bean burritos)
• I don’t like microwave re-heated meat, so I ALWAYS use my toaster oven to warm up meat. We heat up chicken tenders (my recipe for un-fried cornflake chicken) or any other type of chicken.
• I make open-face sandwich, like these surf and turf melts, but I also love making a kid-friendly version which I just call cheese melts; simply a slice of cheese and a few slices of tomato.
• It’s great for toasting buns that are too big to go in a toaster.

• Sweet potato black bean burgers – for the kids, I just make small little bite-sized nuggets and they love them!
• Anytime I want something with a little crispy crust, we throw it in the toaster oven!  Like, my egg cups for example.  These are the best a little crispy.
• Nachos!  These are a fave in our house.

• Cookies are another favorite thing to make in the toaster oven.  These ones are super easy to just pop a few out of the freezer and bake them for a quick sweet treat.
• We re-heat our pizza.  Or even make these pizzas with the kids.

• Garlic bread is super simple – just smear a little butter on the bread, sprinkle with garlic salt and bake.  You can also use the toaster oven to reheat the garlic bread. Or, if you’re looking for a crazy good garlic bread – try this one!!
• Quesadillas are another delicious thing to quickly make for the kids in the toaster oven.

I could go on and on about toaster oven recipes since we use ours all the time!  I truly believe a toaster oven is the most underrated kitchen appliance I own. It’s great for anything that’s cooked, coming out of the freezer that needs to be warmed.

And with that, I will leave you with one final toaster oven tip – don’t forget to line the tray with foil.  It makes cleanup so much easier!

What do you like making in the toaster oven? Let me know in the comments below.