You may have seen Toastabags as one of the businesses pitched to Dragons Den UK back in 2008. After watching the episode, I was impressed and intrigued by the product so I decided to add one onto my next Tesco online delivery for a pair of these for a mere £1.69.
The Toastabag is a bag made of a heat resistant material that covers your sandwich so that the whole thing can be heated in your toaster. Covering the sandwich in a bag allow it to be placed in the toaster without everything falling out. The Toastabag makes the process of making a toastie much cleaner and easier than using the oven. And at £1.69 for two of these bags, it is also a lot cheaper and more space efficient than a toastie machine or a panini press. However, the proof is in the pudding. Are Toastabags any good at toasting sandwiches? The results are in after the cut.
Slightly hilarious JML advertising.
I love how the sandwich is moving so fast.
Here's the back.
2 Toastabags. Not bad value for £1.69!
Cheese BLT.
Sandwich fits the bag with a little bit of maneuvering.
The medium sliced bread sandwich fits tightly into a standard size toaster.
The bag itself gets f*cking hot so I used a chopstick to fish it out.
Slightly burnt on the top and no melted cheese! :(
Thoughts
The Toastabag definitely has a slight learning curve. If you are looking for that melted cheese kind of sandwich, you may end up toasting the thing so long that you accidentally burn the outside a little bit. However on subsequent attempts, I used a technique where I first microwaved the sandwich for 10 seconds to give the cheese a head start to melt, and then proceeded to toast the sandwich using the Toastabag. The resulting toastie is perfect. I thoroughly recommend using the Toastabag as it is a great cheap alternative to dedicated appliances that need counter top space and cleaning. It is also probably the fastest way to make a toastie compared to say, using an oven, which requires preheating and additional cleaning.
Perfect!
The bag itself is reusable and it simple to clean. It's possible to wipe and rinse using a little washing liquid and a sponge. The packaging states that the bags are good for 50 reuses. After the first few uses the bag has started to look a little rough around the edges but still perfectly usable.
I've also read a number of reports about alternative uses for this product, including things like danishes, croissants, fish fingers, etc. If anyone has tried these please leave a comment, as I'd love to hear about it!
