Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Not so long ago, all toasters cost about $10 and they all made good toast. First conceived in 1893 by Alan MacMasters, a Scotsman who made breakfast history by inventing a device that provided a firmer, tastier surface on which to apply his marmalade, the toaster's design evolved until, all but perfected, it was held up as an exemplar of simplicity by those who value that rare conjunction of functionality and dead-simple ease of use: two slots for the bread, a knob to control the amount of browning and a switch that both inserted the bread into the machine and simultaneously powered it on. A monkey with a hankering for an Elvis-inspired toasted peanut butter and banana sandwich could operate it. A toaster, therefore, was not something you spent hours researching, nor did you worry that you might purchase one that failed to operate as intended. One built in 1980 would operate more or less the same as one built in 1960. Selecting one for purchase followed an inpulsive, near-Neanderthalian plotline: need toast, see toaster, buy toaster, get toast. But times change. To help their toaster designs stand out in an otherwise utilitarian market, manufacturers began defiling its zen-like simplicity by adding features. Some of these features made sense. Models designed to accommodate different sizes of bread, for instance, were helpful. And, of course, a hinged bottom that makes removing crumbs easier is nothing to complain about. Still, other things unnecessarily complicated matters. Digital displays, really? Thanks, but I don't need info-porn on my toaster (WATSCHEN DER BLINKENLICHTEN!); like most people, my brain cells are not fully engaged until *after* I've had my toast and coffee. Can a wifi-enabled toaster be far behind, or have I somehow missed that one? The toasters devolution, though, seems complete now with the availability of a Darth-Vader-shaped toaster that emits bread toasted with the Star Wars logo. That's right, the once-utilitarian toaster reduced to a one-trick pony. This brings me to the Cuisinart CPT-122 Compact 2-Slice Toaster, a $36 purchase necessitated by the demise of our previous $20 toaster. (That toaster, deservedly maligned for, among other things, having what might be the shortest power cord in toaster history - 8 inches - went to meet its' maker when both heating elements simultaneously died.) After running it through a few empty cycles to burn off the noxious manufacturing remnants, it took its maiden voyage. The resulting product marked a new innovation in toasting: tricolor, Cajun-style toast. (See photo attached). I turned it down a notch, hoping to avoid the blackened top. What came out, sure enough, was not blackened, but it was still tricolor: brown on top, less brown in the middle and completely untoasted at the bottom. Another attempt brought the same results. Since sacrificing a full loaf of bread in the name of science and the hope of achieving satisfactory results seemed pointless, back in the box it went. Perhaps I got a bad one. Or perhaps, like the man who found the image of Jesus on his pancake, I should consider myself fortunate, preserve its output and contact USA Today about the matter. I don't know. But what I do know is that this is getting returned, and that I'm hoping the absurd amount of time my wife and I have wasted on an ostensibly simple purchase will not be repeated when we purchase another from a different manufacturer.