Home and Kitchen Reviews

After getting rid of a disastrous Bundt Pan which came as a gift, I went with what America's Test Kitchen suggested - The NordicWare Platinum Series Cast Aluminium 12-cup Bundt Pan. I couldn't believe what I saw, it was as if a professional chef made the cake!! Perfectly even browning, beautiful well-defined shape - just perfect!

I am now adding one more to my wish list, and I am going to stick with the Test Kitchen's advice.

This Bundt Pan is great. The Cakes come out cooked evenly, moist, and removes easily from the pan. Made 3 cakes using this pan & everyone loves them! This bundt pan is going to be used alot more!!! I love it!!

TOOOO much fun! Tip: you don't have to flour on top of spray.

1. So big it's almost frightening - like a small washing machine.

2. You need a degree from MIT to get this thing out of the box and assemble it.

3. Won't fit in kitchen cabinet under counter.

4. Disposal of rancid oil a big problem. Too big and awkward to siphon off into other container.

5. Not want to store used oil in stainless steel thing, but have no other choice. Too much oil, too big.

6. Like commercial units, built to last, but I'm not running a short order joint. My old appliances eventually get tossed out on front lawn.

7. The printed instructions got lost after Game 5 of Cleveland/Washington NBA playoffs.

8. Temperature sensor with connecting tubes is way too easily damaged.

9. At $60.00 retail, an instructional VHS tape or dvd featuring Rachel Ray, Emeril LaGasse, or even Norman Chad would have been nice...

10. Will cook lots of food all at once. Not good for small batches - The thing just uses too much oil.

This deep fryer does a good job frying food. There is plenty of room in the basket and it is relatively easy to clean. This would be a great deep fryer if the controls were not so annoying and complicated. You can't just 'set it and forget it', you have to follow a sequence of steps just to get the fryer to the desired temperature. Then you have to select a time period for the frying or the fryer will cut off. I find it all very annoying and unnecessary. All of that aside, the fryer does a good job and is probably the best buy available for the quality of fried foods.

This is replacing a flash-fryer bought from a 'famous Chef's' line on HSN. I should have known better than to buy a fryer from a chef noted for his yuppie pizzas. It lasted one year and died.

This one comes back to heat faster and isn't quite as large. That is a huge plus on my countertop. It fried better and is every bit as attractive.

The issues people had mentioned were non-issues for me. Inserting it the first time was a learning experience but believe me it is better/safer than my old models drop it in any old way. Temps are close enough for anything. Just because it is digital doesn't mean you need that kind of accuracy. What is important is that it come back to temp when you drop a cold product into the oil. This does that well.

The french fries it produced came out faster/better than the one mentioned above. Happy the old one died--other than it cost almost twice what this one did.

And, the info says 2-year warrantee which is an extra over the posted info

Wedding? Graduation? Housewarming? You cannot go wrong with the Pyrex starter kit as a present.

We have one and we use EVERY SINGLE one of the items daily. The custard cups are good for prep, for baking custard (imagine) and for eating ice cream in reasonable quantities (small serving looks bigger in small bowl...works for us.)

The glass bowls are great for mixing and even as a salad bowl.

The casserole is great for baking tuna noodle glop or for baking meatballs--it has a cover.

The measuring cup does double duty as a small pitcher.

Really, if you are not shopping off the register, this is a wonderful choice. And if you are setting up house yourself, this is a great way to start off. Recommended for nearly every kitchen.

I highly recommend this set. I love the mixing bowls and the 4 smaller bowls I have used for dips for parties, it's a perfect size! I only use Pyrex measuring cups, so this one is perfect. I also love the pie pan and the covers that come with the set. It really is a nice addition to any kitchen!

I don't know how we ever survived in the kitchen without this handy set. We have used every item multiple times--even the parts we never thought we'd use! The price is terrific, too, for a gift for newlyweds or recent grads just leaving home. They'll appreciate it for certain.

I originally bought this strainer to make baby food for my son, but I use it all the time for things that are smaller and don't necessitate a large colander. It is very sturdy and fits across one side of my double sink, leaving my hands free. It cleans in the dishwasher. Good product at a reasonable price.

Over the years, I've come to expect good things from OXO and they didn't let me down with this item. I enjoy using this when I don't quite need a colander but need something larger than a typical strainer. This is made with quality, durable material that will last.

the decanter works well with the bunn coffee maker and is included in the price, when you buy the bunn nhb professional coffee maker.

This model is an improvement over the older pot shape. It is easier to clean and use. I wish it was available in local stores. I had to order it online which means extra for shipping.

received just what I had ordered in an amazingly quick amount of time!

Look. I suck at using a normal iron. But, after reading some reviews decided to try a press out to decrease my dependence on Dry Cleaners.

The results are pretty good. As I have gotten better using it the results have gotten better. Plus, there are some fabrics and materials that iron much easier than others. I just did a couple of long-sleeve dress shirts and the results were good. Not perfect, but good.

As others have said, I wish it were bigger and wish the top plate opened higher and with the back hinge was farther back to give me more room to work with. But, once you understand the right method of doing it the back hinge isn't really a big deal. More height clearance would be nice, though.

It won't be too long before it pays for itself. And, now I have no excuses when it comes to wearing clothes that are wrinkled! Plus, I'm pressing my golf shirts which typically didn't look that good after being washed, but were too expensive to get dry cleaned...

I also just ironed an undershirt just for fun. Now THAT was an easy shirt to iron. :)

all the reviews i read were spot on.......

i golf a lot and as such my wardrobe contains a lot of polo golf shirts which my cleaners charge me $3.50/shirt to launder and iron. i was averaging 4-5 shirts per week which meant about $15/wk,$60/month, or $720/yr. on my polo shirts alone.

with this machine, i can do 5 or 6 polos in 15 minutes.

once the press heats up, you pull the handle down to make a press and on the cotton setting it takes about 10 seconds to make a press(a bell goes off when its time, so you wont forget). on my polos i need to do 6 presses. 3 for the body, 1 for the collar, and 1 for each sleeve. so each shirt requires 60 seconds of "pressing time" and i need 1-2 minutes to load the shirt and smooth the fabric on the ironing surface.

it does a great job and i'm very satisfied with the machine.
i've also pressed slacks, and it does a great job with them as well.

i have not tried pressing a man's business shirt...however, my cleaner charges me a $1.25 per shirt and for me that is well worth it to have them do it.

overall, i'm satisfied with the product. i'll echo the words of wisdom from the other reviews.......

1) watch the top plate !! it gets hott(with 2 Ts) and the press doesn't open wide enough. so your fingers and knuckles are very much "at risk" - just be careful !

2) the 22x9 ironing surface still seems small to me, but i guess without buying a "commercial" grade press the 22x9 size seems standard. would be nice if it were bigger, but it is what it is.

I'm a man and as such my domestic skills are minimal.....this machine makes me look like a pro !

We had a press made by Singer that finally gave up the ghost after more than 10 years. After a several days of ironing clothes with mixed results & a lot of frustration, we researched presses on Amazon based on customer reviews. We decided on this press and have not been disappointed. The press is ready to use as soon as it's out of the box. Operation is simple & all but self-explanatory, and it heats up VERY quickly. It is a little smaller than our previous press, but not so small as to be a drawback. Clothes are ready in no time compared to ironing. The press comes with a water spray-bottle if you prefer not to use the steam feature. Definitely worth the money spent!

Classic nicely designed easy-enough to clean up and as other reviewers say - wow - grind away and watch the by-products emerge out of door number 2! Some exceptions to the "so easy" stamp of approval were harder or stringier fleshed items like tart granny smiths (even when precooked somewhat as directed) and fresh pineapple which turned my arms into Popeye's for a night. Ditto for thicker skinned fruits like my own backyard plums - the flavor is in those skins so grind/regrind/regrind it was.

In fact, I generally reprocessed the pulp etc at least twice in most cases since it was often quite juicy and tasty after the first pass. The table grip/interface could be better and as with any canning project it's still a horrible messy sticky potentially-stain-causing event. Don't let the pretty machine fool you...there are new little leaks and drips with each new fruit you use - no matter what you try.

So this would be a 4 star item if I had never tried the "upgrade" - and I use the term quite loosely -- to the "motorizer." First of all, this is a pasta machine motor attachment that also works (supposedly) on the strainer/grinder. The one I purchased online at another site even came in a pasta machine designed box etc, despite the non-pasta-usage-plan. There was a little withered looking photocopy of some instructions that help you make this pasta attachment into a power-grinder-upgrade.

And honestly it's always an odd thing to add a small power motor to some manual tool like this so I can't fault Villaware on the relative non-ease and design-oddity that emerges while adding the scaffolding and the pasta motor and tightening it all with the tiniest allen wrench ever (also came with that instruction sheet)...BUT despite all the efforts, it never worked right. Seems that the specifications for the grinder motor are a millimeter off from the pasta machine version or something, because the "male" and "female" were never gonna have a real partnership. The grinder motor only pushes the manual shaft in too far, instead of slipping into place like the manual handle does so effectively. And this is the short version -- I mean who would think that a big snafu like this would result in anything but telling retailers about the issue so they would not sell these to folks like you and me! When I told my nice retailer about the motor issue, the manager thanked ME for the information since they had never been informed by the manufacturer.

Back to the Candid-Camera episode where a guy tries to make the motor driver fit correctly inside the grinder shaft with juice and pulp everywhere. Hello Lucy and Ethel at the chocolate factory. That was me. So, yes, it's true that it's not male nature to conclude that a) nothing I can fix and/or it's nothing I did wrong!

After finally asking for directions from Villaware directly (again, several calls to reach the right person when she was in and available), I succeeded in having only one brief chat, at the end of which she acknowledged that "Houston, We Have a Problem" -- but only after checking that I had not done any of the typical 2-3 motor installation mistakes that preceed the motor even being switched on! The Italian manufacturer changed something apparently. And though I called back as requested 2 or so weeks later when a solution was supposed to be ready, I never heard from them again about this failure. Bad news badly handled from start to finish.

I wanted a flexible manual/power option for my fruit grinder but learned that it was not to be. I have returned both grinder and motor and am using two electric-only and two manual-only fruit processing appliances happily instead. So very long story short - great potential, but no delivery. And the assorted strainer versions for thicker or thinner etc purees seem to be no longer produced since I never found a new or used set anywhere online.

This item arrived from Amazon without the critical gasket needed to help prevent leaks. Something that I did not realize when I purchased it on 7-22-04. No opportunity to use it last year as all my tomatoes were too juicy to make sauce. It took some doing, but I have finally ran down the company who is now supplying these gaskets and other replacement parts for the Villaware Strainer. http://www.kasbahouse.com/ Suggest caution in ordering additional screens to make positive the screens are made for this particular strainer and not for the VillaWare Victorio. Not certain but there may well be intentional obfuscation from sellers of the screens.

This food strainer is not the fastest in the world, even with the optional motor...but it is well built and will last for years. It is hard to beat the price and the wonderful job this machine does. Consider you can put raw tomatoes in and it spits out the skins and seeds...how much is that worth to you? $40 is a cheap price to pay for this item and you will be happy with the results...just realize operating it by manually cranking it is not easy, it is work. If you want something easy, go to the store and buy your tomato or apple sauce. If you want the satisfaction and quality of homemade, use this strainer.

This skillet has worked great, but it has 2 drawbacks: 1) it's HEAVY and 2) it creates a lot of smoke.

I don't know how much it weighs exaclty, but it is heavy enough that cleaning is difficult (especially since most authorities reccomend cleaning the skillet while it's still hot).

It also creates a lot of smoke. I set off the smoke detector everytime I use this thing even when I have all the windows and doors open to ventilate the apartment (I have no exhaust on top of my range). I'm not sure if this is because of the way I seasoned the pan and it's the oil burning off, or if it's a characteristic of iron in general.

Otherwise it has worked very well. I've mainly cooked steaks with it and they've all come out excellent.

At some point in the post WWII American consumerist age, we decided to replace all the good stuff that worked with newly invented junk that did not work in the name of progress. Think of margerine instead of butter..for some reason we took natural butter off of our tables and replaced it with artery clogging scientfically invented margerine. Americans such as my grandparents ate butter every day of their lives and lived into their 90's.

This is exactly the type of thing with happened with cookware in the US. We had a perfectly good product (cast iron) which has superior heat retention and distribution and we replaced it with the miracle of science..TEFLON!! Teflon was a newer better way to cook except that we eventually found out it might be killing us. Besides, were you ever able to make a meal properly with those junky teflon pans?? They always over heated and burned or were not hot enough and cooked your food irregularly. I could never get these cheapo teflon pans to cook a simple blueberry pancake all the way through without burning the pancake.

Being in my thirties and never having had any cooking lessons, I stumbled upon cast iron one day and like the other reviewers here, I can't believe that Americans ever decided to use a different (new and better!) product. The original is still the best!! Buy this cast iron product and amaze yourself at how much more efficiently it cooks and tastier the food is. The heat retention of these pans literally amazes me. You can take the pan cold, wash it with hot water and then dry it..at this point you can feel the warmth from the hot water that was retained in the iron..amazing.

If you have a Wal Mart near you you should first check there for the pans. They have the three different frying pans pre seasoned for cheap and no shipping cost!

Lodge rocks!

One of the most important things to consider when buying anything cast iron is its weight, and therefore, balance. Never use your wrist alone to pick up a heavy skillet, use part of your arm as well. Because for its inherent weight, it is very important for cast iron cookware to be properly balanced. You should be able to put part of the skillets handle just past your wrist so that your arm is providing partial support. The pan should feel balanced this way.

Another thing about cast iron is its non-stick abilities. Once a pan is properly seasoned, and kept rust free, it will work better than a teflon coated pan. Why? Because, the butter or oil that you put into the pan distributes evenly, and doesn't form a puddle like it does with traditional non-stick cookware.

How to clean it? Personally, I don't feel a pan isn't clean without using soap. So, I use a vegetable brush to get rid of any hard stuff, then wash it out with dishsoap and rinse thorougly. Then I put it on the stove, heat it until it is dry, and rub a little oil on it.

Yes, there are health benefits to using cast iron. Some of the cast iron gets into your food, which you eat and absorb. Wouldn't you rather eat iron than teflon? I would.