Menu Enter a recipe name, ingredient, keyword...

Is this gadget everything that is WRONG with the food industry?

By,
Gourmandize

The Bacon Express boasts that it can cook up to 6 strips of regular or thick cut bacon in just minutes... But so can a frypan. 

A new product by Nostalgia Electrics has recently caught our eye: a sleek, chrome-covered device that displays perfectly crisp rashers of bacon draped over a steel grill.

We love all things kitchen and cooking, but upon closer inspection, the appliance is revealed to be no more useful than a standard frypan.

We generally love Nostalgia products: they are beautifully designed, fun and serve a purpose that, while niche, is specific enough to warrant a dedicated product. Some good examples of this include their chocolate fondue fountains, cotton candy makers and epic 3-in-1 breakfast station. But in this case, all the Bacon Express does is cook bacon.

The only so-called feature of this product that seems to provide any kind of advantage is this vertical design which allows excess grease to drain away. Fine, slightly healthier bacon here. But does that really merit the $40 price tag?

And one of the features is nothing short of a disadvantage: "some meat market or specialty-cut bacon may be too thick for this unit". You know what can cook thick bacon? A frypan! Or a grill!

Another stated advantage is that its design cooks the bacon on both sides, and therefore does not require flipping. Frankly, if flipping bacon rashers is too strenuous for you, setting up, using and cleaning this gadget will be beyond your abilities.

Cooking isn't difficult, but millions of dollars are made by companies that produce increasingly complicated and specific appliances like these, convincing us that we need their help to do things that we are perfectly capable of doing ourselves.

And while this gadget is far from the only guilty party, it is certainly part of the problem.

Well you know where we stand, but what do you think of this appliance? A useful time-saver or ridiculous money-spinner?

Comment on this article

8 Things You've DEFINITELY Done if You've Ever Procrastinated Anything 20 Tricks To Help You Break Up With Plastic