Four Curious Kitchen Gadgets Put to the Test: Sausage Tongs, a Portable Water Boiler, an Egg Separator Slide, and a Waffle Brick Maker

Introduction

Kitchen gadgets often promise to solve a problem you did not know you had. To find out which ones actually earn a drawer slot, we put four reader-suggested gadgets through hands-on testing: a pair of sausage turning tongs, a portable instant hot water dispenser, a sliding egg separator, and a waffle maker that produces building blocks. Each was tested the way a normal home cook would use it, with an eye on build quality, usefulness, and whether the price matches the promise.

Sausage Turning Tongs

These long-handled barbecue tongs replace flat gripping jaws with a pair of inward-facing serrated rollers. The idea is that you clamp lightly onto a sausage and roll it along its length, using gravity and the serrated surface to turn it evenly on the grill without piercing the skin. The extra-long handles are designed to keep your hands away from the heat.

In testing, the rolling action worked exactly as described for turning cylindrical sausages a few degrees at a time, and the serrated rollers gave reasonable grip on the skin. The catch is versatility: they are looser than a normal pair of tongs, they cannot really grip and lift other food, and anyone grilling more than just sausages will still need a regular set of tongs alongside them. If you only cook sausages on the grill, they do their one job well; for most households, a good versatile pair of tongs makes more sense. At around £8.99 they are fairly priced, but they are a specialist tool rather than an everyday upgrade.

ZoomLand Instant Hot Water Dispenser

The ZoomLand Instant Hot Water Dispenser is a compact, fold-flat unit that heats water on demand in seconds. You unfold it, connect a water bottle, select one of its preset temperatures, and hot water flows through a small dispensing flap into your cup. The pitch is simple: make your favourite hot drinks anywhere with a plug socket.

In practice, the heating itself is genuinely quick. Once flushed through, the dispenser produced steaming water almost instantly at the selected setting. The first run dispensed cold water until the system warmed up, which is worth knowing before your first cup. The bigger question is the use case: anywhere with a plug and running water usually has a kettle too. Where it does make sense is porridge, instant noodles, baby bottles, hotel rooms without reliable kettles, or travel situations where a flat-pack device that fits a laptop bag beats carrying a kettle. At £67.24 it costs more than a decent kettle, so it only adds up if the portability genuinely matters to you. It does what it claims, quickly and compactly; whether you need it depends entirely on your situation.

Egg Separator Slide

This is the most theatrical of the four: a plastic multi-lane slide that imitates factory-style food engineering. You crack eggs into the top container, they travel down three separate slides, and thin slits let the whites drop through while the yolks continue to the bottom into separate bowls. The maker claims quick and easy yolk-white separation with zero effort.

The first egg through came out as a clean yolk with no white at all, and after a few runs the results became even better, with a dozen eggs separated without a single broken yolk. It is also genuinely fun to watch, like a marble run for breakfast. The limitation is volume: for one or two eggs it is slower and creates more washing up than doing it by hand. It earns its place if you regularly separate a dozen or more eggs for custards, meringues, or large bakes, where it saves real time. For everyone else, it is a delightful novelty rather than a necessity, and at £39 the price reinforces that it is aimed at high-volume users.

Waffle Wow Building Block Maker

The Waffle Wow Building Block Maker is an electric waffle iron whose plates are moulded into building-block shapes, producing 14 brick-shaped waffles in minutes. The pitch is playful breakfasts: stack the blocks into waffle houses and cities, load them with yoghurt and fresh fruit, and make an otherwise ordinary breakfast engaging, especially for children.

In testing, the waffles cooked in roughly three to five minutes as instructed and the blocks did stack and fit together, which is the whole point. Two design compromises stood out. There is no built-in timer, so you have to watch the clock yourself. More importantly, there is no clamp, so the plates do not press evenly, leaving the waffles near the hinge nicely cooked while those at the front came out paler and slightly underdone. Filling each mould neatly also takes some practice; a piping bag helps. Loaded with fruit, yoghurt, and honey, the results were genuinely enjoyable, and for parents trying to make breakfast more playful, it has real appeal. Just note it was picked up at a sale price of £11 against a recommended retail price of $49, and that gap tells you something about demand. It is the only gadget tested that did not fully deliver on its core promise of an even cook.

Buying Advice

Across the four, a clear pattern emerges: the more specific the gadget, the narrower its audience. The sausage tongs and the egg separator both perform their single job well, but only make sense for niche users such as hot dog vendors or high-volume bakers. The ZoomLand dispenser is a well-made, genuinely fast piece of kit for travellers and specific situations, but most kitchens already own a kettle that does the same job for less money. The Waffle Wow is the weakest as a pure waffle maker due to the uneven cooking, yet the strongest as a fun family product. Before buying any single-purpose gadget, ask how often the specific task actually comes up in your kitchen.

Conclusion

Three of the four gadgets did exactly what they promised, and one fell short on even cooking. The egg separator was the most impressive performer within its niche, the ZoomLand dispenser the most technologically interesting but hardest to justify, the sausage tongs competent but redundant next to regular tongs, and the Waffle Wow charming for families despite its flaws. Match the tool to the task, not to the novelty, and you will not go far wrong.