Slot toaster vs toaster oven?

I have one, albeit it a stainless steel one.

I completely disagree. Our Breville Smart Oven does a fabulous job with toasting bread, bagels, English muffins. In addition to being able to handle broiling, pizza, cookies, etc. without having to heat up the big wall ovens.

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Not heating up the house is a huge sell point for me.

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And you can dry fruit in them too!

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Just made my wife her tator tot hotdish in one. If you get a big one, it replaces the full-size oven for a lot of things. That’s my love note to my toaster oven.

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B-I-N-G-O. On the money.

We love our Breville but toast at mid-doneness is 4 minutes plus and I find that it takes what seems like a long time to heat up on bake, roast to around 375°, or on air fry. Even with those reservations it’s a ‘can’t live without’ item.

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Do those settings require a preheat? I can’t seem to predict that. I guess I could read the manual. I avoid using it for awhile because I dreaded having to clean it by hand. Now I’ve thrown caution to the wind!

When I set it to bake, roast, or air fry it takes quite a while to get up to temp, so…… yes.

My Hamilton Beach gets there quickly. About 5 minutes. Surprising the Breville takes a while.

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Same with my InstantPot Omni. I think it’s 4:25 for a single slice of toast, but I put it in and then putter about making an egg, slicing an avocado, etc, so it’s not like I’m standing there waiting for it to finish. For bake and air fry, it beeps when it’s at temp, and it never takes more than a couple of minutes…certainly nowhere as long as the big oven.

I have had both, and, no question, the slot toaster just does toast better. But, if you want to toast something different, like a croissant, toaster oven.

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it doesn’t take that long in my mind.

Yeah, I am often multi-tasking in the kitchen, even when making toast so it never feels long. I am rarely just staring at the oven waiting for it to finish.

If I want toast, I will slide the bread/bagel in and set – make coffee, unload the dried and clean dishes, get the butter and jam or other toppings ready, get a plate, etc. Most of this easily takes up the time when the food is ready to be plated, buttered/jammed and ready for eating.

A slot toaster will get more browning quicker for sure since the heating elements are super close to the food, but I never cared for darker toast. I like my breads and bagels just toasted with a light golden color.

@shrinkrap - I’ve never tried drying fruit, but the nice thing with the Breville is that you can set the oven quite low. I’ve tried drying mushrooms in it before - worked fine, even if I didn’t love the mushrooms afterwards :stuck_out_tongue:. I think the lowest temperature setting on the device is about 125 or 150F, which is super low compared to the typical countertop oven. I use this oven regularly to do duck confit or reverse sears (when I’m too lazy to break out the sous vide) and need temps in the low to mid 200s.

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If they’re dried, pulverize those mushrooms and use the powder. Magic powder.

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