There’s nothing more satisfying than that first time you fire up the grill each year. In prelude to the Memorial Day ritual most of us restock our grill gadget arsenal with mostly unnecessary but highly pleasurable new toys. The SteakChamp might not actually fall into that category because of it’s incredibly functional tech. A simple set of colored LED’s flash green for rare, yellow for medium and red for well to indicate that illusive inner doneness. No, it does not talk to your phone but part of the grill experience is hanging out and tending to it. We’ve field tested this one and the thermometer is dead on. As soon as we get a flashing green we know we have a perfectly done medium rare cut. Now you just have to convince your butcher to cut you that 3 inch porterhouse.
More Gear Stuff
PancakeBot
You needed this yesterday morning. Maybe the most complicated breakfast gadget ever, the PancakeBot is a robot mashed up with an electric griddle holding a squeeze bottle of batter controlled by your computer. I’ll give you a Monday morning minute to let that seep in. Miguel Valenzuela, who’s Norwegian (go figure), dreamt of a “Pancake Machine” and with the curiosity of his daughter and eventual help from StoreBound it’s now his reality and our breakfast bounty. Getting started is easier than you might think with downloadable designs that range from Snoop Dogg to the Poo Emoji to Jesus. All seemingly appropriate for a Sunday morning.
Bruvelo Coffee Maker
12 years ago I bought a Vietnamese pour over on the streets of Saigon for 12 cents. Since then a lot has changed in the quality and consumption of coffee in our over caffeinated, craft-focused country. Dustin Sell has spent years perfecting the perfect coffee maker in order to preserve that quality and enhance the consumption experience. He’s so dedicated that he scrapped his first crowdfunding effort because it just wasn’t “right”. Now he’s back with a perfected version that makes the perfect cup of coffee and looks great on your counter top while it pours it’s deep, rich, sweet, bitter, chocolatey, earthy, mellow, nutty, spicy, sweet, bright, sharp, magic.
ColdSnap invents the Keurig of Ice Cream
It’s been a long week of zoom calls, home school disasters and Amazon delivery thefts. You go to reach for the corkscrew only to remember it’s still Dry January. A quick rummage through the panty is a reminder you finished the gummy bears and the Chips Ahoy went stale. A freezer burned teaspoon of Chunky Monkey sits lonely at the bottom of a dilapidated pint container. Worthless. For a second you think you remember how to make a cake. Then you also remember the time and effort even the quickest of Betty Crocker box mix entails. Enter the Keurig of ice cream to literally and figuratively cool your frantic, throttled up jets. Coldsnap is a countertop soft serve machine that takes meer minutes to produce a sweet, fresh, creamy antidote to your week of woes. Debuted at CES just weeks ago, the dessert gods have delivered everything but a link to purchase. Seems like it’s still in production. Coldsnap peeps made this cute little video to build the anticipation further. They say it should be shipping soon. Until then you’re stuck with Cookie Puss for a few more months.
You Better Have Tacos Doormat
So you’re hungry and want tacos for dinner, huh? In the great, ancient tradition of hungry-people-eating-food-they-want-to-eat-in-order-to-become-less-hungry, you’ve got a few go-to options: go out, order in, or even cook to get what you so desire. The only problem? Those options require effort. Be honest with yourself: do you really feel like putting in that kind of work? Especially when eating tacos is supposed to be one of the most effortless culinary experiences of all time. But what’s a hungry taco lover to do? What about ‘no pain, no gain,’ you wonder? The answer is in this revolutionary, (practically) effortless alternative to your average, everyday taco-procurement strategies. We’re talking about the “You Better Have Tacos” doormat, and we urge you to lay that bad boy outside your door and wait for the cha-ching, cha-ching — I mean crinkle, crinkle — of an endless supply our fave member of the no-utensil food group, brought to you by your friends, neighbors, and anyone else who should pass through your threshold. It’s so simple, you may weep. So convenient, you may never leave your place again. So foolproof…well we think that it maybe, probably, most likely will work. But if for whatever reason it doesn’t, well then at at least you’ve got a good place to wipe off your shoes — you know, in case you gotta go out for tacos in the rain.