Toaster Saga

I'm not sure anyone can build a toaster any more. I had a two slot cheap Wal-Mart toaster which actually did a good job, but I have a large family and we decided to save a little time in our busy morning and invest, yes, invest in a four slot toaster.

First we bought a Sears brand toaster which didn't work at all. We took it back for a replacement and the second toaster popped up as soon as we lowered the bread...so...no toast.....we took the second toaster back and decided to put another &20.00 into a toaster and bought the Cuisinart four slot toaster. It has a sleek look to it and each pair of slots had its own set of controls. Since the slots were wider than our previous toaster we looked forward to toasting English Muffins and bagels......

However, there is a malfunction in this toaster and one side of the bread toasts darker than the other side....in all four slots.....if I use the control on either side either I get burnt toast on one side and warm bread on the other.

This toaster comes with a dial that provides 6 different settings, but we have never set one above 2 because the toast burns and if we set the dial lower, then we have warm bread. My opinion is that the toaster is malfunctioning in the bagel mode. Bagels turn out pretty well. But what I really wanted was a toaster first, bagel warmer second.

There is warning in the instructions not to use pastry with fillings. So basically, this machine is mostly a malfunctioning toaster and a fairly good bagel warmer.

The cleaning tray is nice because it makes cleaning so much easier. The slots are wide and since I use Leander frozen Bagels I have never had a problem with them sticking.

The cabinet is as sleek as a 4 slot toaster could look because it is a large toaster and it takes up a lot of space. However, I expected it to.

Aside from the temp. settings, there are four separate other settings for reheat, defrost, Bagel, and cancel.

I like everything about this toaster except the fact I can't get a decent piece of toast out of it.

I didn't return it because I just got tired of returning toasters. We live a couple of hours from the nearest mall and it just wasn't worth the third trip.

More than likely, I'll buy 2 two slot toasters and set them side by side. It shouldn't cost me more than $20.00 which is $40.00 less than the Cuisinart 4 slot toaster. I'll keep the four slot for bagels and keep it under the cabinet since we don't make bagels as often as we toast bread. I wish the toaster worked because we toast slices of french bread and the width of the slices vary which the extra wide feature really would have helped. In a regular 2 slice toaster I have had to dig the captured piece of toast from the clutches of the much too narrow rack and even though I unplug the toaster, it still seems unsafe!

If I discover a four slot toaster which actually works, I'll write a review and let you know.