The Egg & Muffin Toaster
From Back to BasicsMy baby sister got me a great Christmas gift this year. An Egg & Muffin toaster!
I've been a big egg-a-muffin fan ever since McDonald's began offering them years ago (BTW Heaven used to call them egg-a-muffins when she was little). I still use the name. Although I'm not what you'd call a "morning" person, I typically take advantage of any rare morning opportunity I can for an egg-a-muffin.
Once I saw my first Egg & Muffin Toaster commercial, I've been considering buying one. That said however, I've always been a bit skeptical. After all, it's rare to find a device that really works as well as advertised. Right? Is it really as *easy* as they make it look on TV? Until now, my skepticism outweighed my impulsiveness.
Then came Christmas.
I got the toaster when the family exchanged gifts on Christmas Eve at my mom's house. I'd actually been looking at one just a few nights earlier when I was in BestBuy. I was looking forward to trying it out.
I won't go into the details of why it actually took three days for me to try it for the first time. Instead, I'll just document the event.
Thursday morning, I headed down to the kitchen for my new adventure...
Surprisingly enough, I began by unpacking the toaster. And I gotta admit, I was pleasantly surprised at how simple it was mechanically. Not a lot of parts, and just a few simple controls. I spent a minute or two perusing the manual and examining the parts and their names. By then, I was ready to go.
I then got out the necessary ingredients. I started my pulling out some frozen sausage patties and put them into the microwave to defrost for a few minutes. I decided I'd use 2 patties since they were slightly thin, and not a large in diameter as my english muffins.
The Egg & Muffin Toaster, and the ingrediants
I figured by the time they were done, I'd be almost ready to go.
Step 1: in process...
Next I put water in the heating tray. The marking on the provided measuring cup were a bit hard to read, but not a big deal. I then covered the heating tray with the steamer tray.
Step 2: done.
Egg preparation caused a little hesitation however. I realized I didn't have the recommended non-stick cooking spray. Oh well. I guess I'd just have to make due with a manually applied butter coating for the poaching tray. No biggie.
Step 3: done.
Not being a cooking aficionado (like everyone else in the family), I had been wondering how easy it'd be to crack an egg into such a small and shallow egg tray. But, as it turns out, it wasn't difficult at all. Then I just went ahead and broke the yolk and spread it out a bit. I then set the egg-filler poaching try in it's spot on the steamer tray
Step 4: done.
The egg preparation and setup to cook
The next task was the simplest: split an english muffin and load it in the toaster.
Step 5: done.
At this point, I was ready to load the sausage onto its heating tray and load it into position above the egg. I was just 2 min 30 sec into defrosting the sausage patties, but I popped 'em out to check and they were already defrosted enough. So I loaded them onto the warming tray, and put it in place above the poaching tray. At that point I went ahead and put on the clear lid as well.
Step 1: done.
Step 6: done.
Egg & Muffin Toaster
with all ingrediants loaded
All the was left was to set the controls. I Set the toaster control to about the 3/4 setting (I like my muffins on the dark side), and pushed the egg&toast button.
Step 7: done.
At this point it seemed like I was good to go. Being the overly cautious type that I am, I quickly walked through the process again mentally. Following the necessary confirmations, all systems were 'go'.
I pushed down the toaster lever and my Egg & Muffin toaster lit up.
Speaking officially: Just over 3.5 minutes after getting out the ingredients, we were under way.
The clear lid began showing condensed moisture inside almost right away. It continued to steadily accumulate during the cooking process.
Condensed Steam during cooking
I wasn't sure how long it would take, so I migrated to the living room to find something to watch once I sat down to eat. After a bit of channel surfing, I heard the toaster pop up.
Step 8: done.
I went back to the kitchen and took the nicely toasted muffin halves out and put them on my paper plate. I then took off the lid, and lifted out the warming tray holding my 2 warm and juicy sausage patties. I set it on the counter.
I then took out the poaching tray and was pleasantly surprised to find not just a perfectly form poached egg, but also a few drippings from the sausage patties that had been just above the egg. Nice bonus!
The egg came out easily, and I placed it on the muffin. I then picked up the sausage patties and put them in place on top of the egg. Things were coming together quite nicely.
Lastly, I unwrapped a fresh slice of cheese and placed it on top of the sausage. I then finished it off by topping it with the other half of the muffin.
The egg with sausage drippings, and a
partially assembled egg-a-muffin
Egg-a-muffin Assembly complete.
Step 9: done.
I did a surprisingly quick cleanup before filling the requisite glass of milk, and stepping back to the living room to see if it tasted as good as it looked.
It did.
The final product
The best part is that now I get Egg-a-muffins exactly the way I want them. Highly toasted, extra sausage and melted cheese. No more egg-a-muffins that have been sitting under a heat lamp for an indefinite period of time. No more soggy muffins. No more poorly assembled sandwiches. And best of all, no more rushing to get your egg-a-muffin before 10:30am.
Actually, that's the best part. Egg-a-muffins are now on the menu for any meal of the day!
Now really, how great is that!?
Since I made my first sandwich, I've done several more. I'm experimenting with alternate breads amd meats; And I expect to also try alternates cheeses, and lots of other combinations as well. This will be fun.
The Egg & Muffin Toaster from Back to Basics. Easy to use. Easy to clean. And it does what it's supposed to do really well.
I love my egg-a-muffin machine!
Thanks Bud.