Toasters and Toaster Ovens
Bread, bagels, and beyond
For toast fans, pop-up toasters are the greatest thing since sliced bread. Today’s models accommodate thicker bread slices and bagels, too.
If you want a more versatile appliance, you might be interested in a toaster oven. It can’t toast bread as quickly or sometimes as evenly as a pop-up toaster, but it can broil a filet of fish, bake a few cookies, cook a small casserole, or heat up a small pizza.
Top Tips
- Know what you need. If you only want to toast bread, a pop-up toaster is your most effective and energy-efficient option. If you want to be able to bake, broil, or warm up small meals in addition to toasting bread, a toaster oven is a more energy-efficient alternative to a full-size oven. Microwave ovens cook faster and so use even less energy than toaster ovens, but they don’t toast, bake or broil.
- Fan the fire. Toaster ovens with convection fans often cost more, but they cook faster and more evenly.
- Watch your watts. Higher wattage appliances use more energy, but usually can toast more bread or cook more food. Typical toasters are 800 to 1,400 watts, while typical toaster ovens range from about 1,200 to 1,700 watts.
Other Considerations
Fifteen dollars will get you a basic pop-up toaster that works fine. Or you can spend a few dollars more for a toaster oven. For toaster ovens with more style, color choices, settings, and convection fans, costs range from $60 to $150 (or more for the fanciest toaster ovens).
Benefits…
…to the Earth
In general, toasters use a little less energy than toaster ovens, and toaster ovens use about half as much energy as a full-size electric oven. (A microwave conserves even more, though. It uses about two-thirds less energy than a conventional electric oven.) A convection fan can reduce the energy use of a toaster oven by cooking the food 20% to 30% faster.
Common Mistakes
Having too many choices. Few people need a pop-up toaster, a toaster oven, a conventional oven, and a microwave. Too many appliances will clutter your shelves and boost your consumption of natural resources. Figure out which ones you really need and just buy those.
Getting Started
If you want to calculate how much a toaster or toaster oven would cost you to operate each year, use this formula:
Multiply the appliance’s wattage times the number of hours used per day times the number of days used per year. Divide the product by 1,000 to get the number of kilowatt-hours used annually. Then multiple the number of kilowatt-hours by your electricity rate in $/kilowatt-hour (typically around $0.12 per kWh).
For example, using a 1,000-watt toaster for 10 minutes a day would cost about $7 per year in electricity if your electricity rate were 12 cents per kWh.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:06 am
Okay, so an ELECTRIC toaster oven is better than an ELECTRIC oven.
So, do they make GAS toaster ovens?
If not, how about including a comparison of the efficiency of ELECTRIC toaster ovens to GAS ovens?
If you are questioning efficiency in the first place, why presume everyone has an ELECTRIC oven?
(Yeah, I realize rates for either vary considerably, so lira/kroner/dollar comparisons might be too open…)
October 26th, 2009 at 12:58 am
Small gas toaster ovens would be brilliant for those with summer cabins. They would be more energy efficient than electricity for the rest of us.However, to design one to meet safety requirements would be extremely difficult. Electricity is actually far safer to design with because it’s very easy to turn on and off.
With gas, you need to design for the following:
1. Insure there is adequate fresh air inflow to support complete combustion, otherwise there is a carbon monoxide hazard.
2. A gas flow cutoff device is required to stop flow during flameouts.
3. A reliable igniter system, so that you can relight the flame as needed. It cant
be on all the time. And if you wanted to throttle the flame, you’d need a very sophisticated and reliable flow controller. For ignition, you need electricity. At the minimum battery type power to drive an electrostatic generator to make a spark. Even then, spark ignition is not entirely trustworthy. In modern gas ovens, an electric glowbar is used to fire the flame. You could use a pilot light, but that is wasteful of resources, more reliable than spark, but not reliable as glowbar.
December 21st, 2009 at 5:19 am
Electric toaster oven beats gas oven, from a cost perspective.
It costs approximately 1/4 as much to operate for the same amount of time at the same temperature as a regular gas oven.
February 3rd, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Since my toaster oven broke, I am deciding which to get now: a toaster or a toaster oven.
Our needs are:
• We need to use a toaster 2 times a day (toasting in a toaster is twice as quick than in a toaster oven)
• We sometimes need a toaster oven for reheating, frozen quickies, or melting cheese. (About once or twice a week)
Should I get a toaster, and use the oven 4-8 times a month for the other times
or get a toaster oven to do it all, and not have to use the oven at all?
April 27th, 2010 at 8:16 pm
I think you did an excellent job of giving information and lots of details for people considering a toaster oven purchase.
July 15th, 2010 at 12:58 pm
I was re-reading your blog (and again kudos for your research), and I wondered if people are using the formula to assess operating costs. Do they find it pretty accurate? Are today’s appliances even better yet at energy conservation so that affects the results of the formula? (Not sure when it was written and there isalways new & better coming out)
Shop at http://www.toasterandconvectionovens.com
November 6th, 2010 at 1:10 pm
Toaster ovens are a great invention! I don’t think I could live without mine; I use it so often that I probably use it more than my regular oven!
http://www.toasterovenreview.org
December 4th, 2010 at 2:30 pm
Gas ovens use about .112 therms of gas for an hour of cooking at 350 degrees. To compare this with kilowatt hours convert both to British thermal units (calculators available on the web). At first when I did this using a toaster oven came out as much more energy efficient than a gas oven for baking and broiling small amounts of food; but, then I remembered that because of energy lost during transmission the power plant must generate 3 kilowatt hours of energy for every one kilowatt hour of energy I use in my home. This is not true with gas because energy is generated and consumer right in the home. So I multiplied the number of kilowatt hours a toaster oven uses by three. Then it became more energy efficient to use a toaster for toasting but my gas oven for broiling and baking.
December 6th, 2010 at 12:53 pm
I have had no luck finding a toaster that allows one to choose to use one bay or both – it drives me crazy to watch the empty bay glowing red uselessly when I want only one slice – anyone know of an intelligent toaster?
February 25th, 2011 at 10:46 pm
Nice tips. They’ll come in handy.
http://frigidairemicrowaveparts.com/
April 6th, 2011 at 7:42 am
I love a toaster oven, but they seem so inefficient with the heat going outside of them so much. Can’t one be designed so that the heat stays in the heating chamber where the food you want to heat is? It seems that would reduce the energy cost a lot and allow the toaster oven to go on the same cupboard shelf as the microwave oven.
April 25th, 2012 at 11:49 pm
Most toasters will give you a note as to which slot to use for a single slice. This is to say that it is a smart toaster!
May 7th, 2012 at 2:42 pm
[...] you about $18 dollars per year in electricity costs. Although a toaster oven does only use about half the energy of a conventional oven, it is still not as efficient as microwave, which uses about one third of [...]