New Toy

[liralen]

I'm going to San Jose for a week for work, starting on Saturday, and after a month on road there was something in my head that WANTED something to make boiling water with while traveling. Something more practical than my little coil that I can pop into a non-plastic mug of water that takes 15 minutes on a good day to boil water, and something smaller than my Russell-Hobbs electric kettle. I thought about buying a small electric kettle; but stumbled across the Sunbeam Hot Shot.

It's pretty cool. It does one thing and it does it really, really well. It's just a little too short for *everything* I want it to do, i.e. to put boiling water directly into a French Press or into my IngenuiTEA pot, but it can fill my Chatsford teapots and it makes tea that's too hot for me to drink! Yay!

Jet loved getting it to work, too, and had a blast working the buttons and playing with steaming hot water without the possibility of getting scalded. That's nice.

It's great for putting in a mugful of water and getting exactly that out, so I can just fill my tea mug with exactly what it will hold. Better yet, I can measure the mugful of water into the boiler and have it go into my Chatsford teapot for the brew, and the results fit into the mug exactly. Not something I could do by eyeballing my pour from the teapot. It always hits my old goal of only boiling as much freshly pulled water as I needed. Fun.

Comments

[erikred.livejournal.com]

Dim sum in Oakland Chinatown.

I ain't saying, I'm just saying.

[liralen.livejournal.com]

*grin*

[jilara.livejournal.com]

According to Alton Brown, you can also use such devices to cook a single hard-boiled egg. Just in case you ever want to.

[liralen.livejournal.com]

ooooo! I would never have thought! Probably put it in with the water, bring it to a boil and let it sit for 20 minutes? Wow....

[jilara.livejournal.com]

And speaking of San Jose, any chance you might be convinced to stop by the Starport Wednesday gathering? I know it's been...hmm...let's just say over 10 years...

[liralen.livejournal.com]

Sadly, most of my weekday nights are already spoken for, and my present job is such that I'm often burnt out on people when it's done. For a M-B introvert I get pretty much talked to to the max with my job as "person to talk to" and extra social stuff just makes me surly in ways that aren't good for anyone.

still, it's a great thought, and I appreciate that I'm still welcome! :-)

[foomf.livejournal.com]

Some people (british mostly) swear by the idea that you must pre-hot the teapot or you will end up with inferior brewing because the pot will absorb some of the heat, so the tea actually brews at a lower temperature.

Have you found this to be an issue when brewing personal-sized amounts of tea?

[liralen.livejournal.com]

Yes.

:-)

It takes off approximately 10 degrees if you start with a cold mug or pot, which is great for darjeelings and oolongs, and I actually add some cold water for greens to get them down to about the 170 degree range.

If I'm brewing black tea do boil a smaller amount to warm the mug and since it only takes 2 minutes to boil a full cup and it takes about that time to warm it up, it works out nicely.

[liralen.livejournal.com]

Heck, even the 10 degrees of temperature I lose to altitude makes a real difference in the flavor of the tea. Whenever I go to sea level I try my best to get real, boiling water on my tea, which is why I bought this thing in the first place. I'll be at sea level for the week. Woot.