The quest ...
for toast (86)
One of the first things we decided we needed upon reaching Portugal was a toaster oven. Our kitchen was equipped with the usual oven and microwave and it also had the Portuguese-standard but unfamiliar-to-us induction hob. (This last would take a while to master, but that’s off topic for today.) What it didn’t have was a quick and simple way to transform an ordinary slice of bread into a piece of crunchy, chewy goodness.
The toaster oven
In the US, our toaster oven filled multiple tasks. Some items don’t reheat well in a microwave. Like pizza. Pizza should be reheated in a toaster oven. As should anything you want crispy rather than soggy. Since we love pizza (and French fries), a toaster oven was the perfect solution. Since we were ignorant newbie Portuguese residents, a toaster oven was what we searched for last summer.
Scott found one on the Cash Converters website. Cash Converters is a secondhand shop that sells all manner of gently used items from electronics to housewares to musical instruments and more. They have several physical stores in Lisbon but back then our “reasonable walking radius” was considerably smaller, so website it was.
The thing about websites is you can’t always tell exactly what you’re getting. It’s likely that if we’d seen the toaster oven on a shelf in a store, we’d have realized just how gargantuan it was and kept on moving. Certainly, we wouldn’t have wanted to carry it home. But since the photo on the website was only, like, a couple centimeters wide and the item was being delivered to our door, these weren’t issues. Until they were.
We’ve already written about Scott’s experience returning that beast. It was probably our first real “this is what life without a car is like” moment.
After an intensive search, we ended up buying the smallest toaster oven we could find. It came from Worten, the Best Buy of Portugal. It still took up an inordinate amount of space on our kitchen counter but it was out of the way enough that we could at least make it work.
The problem was that it didn’t exactly make toast. Or at least, not in the way we expected. Our toaster oven was more of a dehydrator. It took an ordinary piece of bread and sucked the moisture out, transforming it into a desiccated network of bread crumbs that left almost as much on the plate at the end of the meal as made it into our stomachs. If you like swallowing sand, this was the toaster oven for you!
We also never reheated anything in it as our eating patterns have changed dramatically. In the US, we’d order a large pizza every couple/few weeks. That would keep the toaster oven busy at least four times each pizza. And we’d re-heat many doggie bags (Connecticut)/ to-go boxes (St. Louis)/ take-aways (Portugal) worth of French fries, fried chicken and catfish, and bbq we couldn’t finish at the restaurant. Here, we’re coming home with rice and sauce-based leftovers (Indian, Nepalese, Persian, Himalayan …) that re-heat better in a microwave.
So when it came time to move, there was no way we were bringing the toaster oven with us. We sold it on Facebook Marketplace a week before we changed apartments and marveled at the reclaimed counter space.
Important lesson learned
When doing the toaster oven post-mortem, we realized this was a perfect example of us trying to re-create our US lives here in Portugal. When we first landed, that was our focus: how can we get here what we had there? We’d used a toaster oven regularly for 25 years in the US1, so of course we’d need one in Portugal. While natural and understandable, this is based on a false premise.
Life in Portugal is different from life in the US. It has to be. The specifics of exactly how it will be different will probably vary for every person or family, but the fact that it will be different is universal. The challenge, then, is to live into life here for a while. Examine how things are different, and react to the reality rather than the expectation.
We can’t be the only ones who no longer need stuff they once found indispensable. Those of you who’ve moved from from one country to another, tell us your story: what did you bring with or obtain shortly after arrival that you no longer use and why?
Moving on
None of this, it should be noted, diminished our desire for actual toast. If anything, we missed good toast more than we thought we would. So we began a hunt for (yet) another toaster. This time, we decided to go with a traditional “stick a piece of bread in the slot, push the lever down, and wait for it to pop back up” model.
It needed to be white (matches our kitchen) and we wanted one that would accommodate a long slice of bread. It didn’t need to be fancy, it just needed to work. Tuns out, those are pretty darn expensive! Sixty euros for a machine that does one thing and takes up how much counter space?!
We were despairing of paying a reasonable price until Scott rounded a corner at our new Pingo Doce and spotted an end cap display with … a toaster! It was white, had one long slot, and was on sale for 25€. A couple of photos to Amy and in the shopping cart it went. It was very easy to carry home.
It also makes perfect toast. Which, it turns out, is made even more perfect with a combination of peanut butter and guacamole on top. Who knew?
That’s all for now.
Love from Lisbon,
Scott & Amy
Yes, you read that right. We had one toaster oven from when we married in 1997 until we moved in 2022. It was a perfect size, small and no nonsense. And it was sturdy. We think it first caught fire in the ‘00s. We got the fire out, did a high five, and then, for ha-ha’s, gave it a try. And it turned right back on! Once we cleaned the pizza gunk off the bottom, it was off to the races. By the time we moved, it was just one of those things that happened when relating your day as we sat in the garden as evening fell. “… oh and the toaster caught fire again.” “Did you clean it out?” “Sure. Was even able to salvage my lunch!” When we moved someone even paid us $10 for The Toaster That Would Not Die.
I really like your toaster oven adventures. Funnily, the first thing I bought for my Lisbon's home was...a toaster device! It is an aluminium pan with holes, a sort of a griddle, where I can put bread and the gas (I have gas at home) toasts. My secret love is though the old-style toaster (https://www.worten.pt/produtos/torradeira-classic-010-crussel-mrkean-5600928300258?gclid=CjwKCAjwxr2iBhBJEiwAdXECw3QQo5Z9RWVVSFjFFElJK_50hF5NRFzTz2RBpxktjgPh4rjQSGL8FRoCr1MQAvD_BwE) as it opens on the side. Meanwhile, I became addicted to the toasts (torradas) that are prepared at A Padaria Portuguesa, as I can choose whatever bread fancies me on that day and it can always be a new one. They have a very cheap option for breakfast that is my to-go pick-me-up: scrambled eggs with a velvety smooth avocado toast. Delicious. When I want a tosta, i demand thought to be done with Alentejo bread. The best one in my life was eaten in Mertola, at the small souvenir shop that doubles as café called Alem Cante. Merola is worth a trip just to buy some bread, it was awarded as the best in Portugal (frequently, at Taberna do Calhau they also have it for the service).
I am sad to leave my Sunbeam polished stainless steel toaster behind. It was a gift from my late mother. She gave it to me circa 1985. It still works very well. It is a bit magical in that the on/off mechanism activates when a slice of bread is placed on a cradle in the toaster. The cradle senses the bread, it slowly descends. The bread toasts to a lovely golden brown, then majestically rises to the top when done. In my mind I hear a herald of trumpets. But your words “[L]ive into life here for a while. Examine how things are different, and react to the reality rather than the expectation” will be taken to heart. And Worten has a lovely Philips toaster I must see.