They say the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. They say that a woman’s adoration for chocolate is beyond compare. There’s a definite link between food and love! So as breakfast is the most important meal of the day, what better food to perfect to encourage romance to blossom?

Here are five breakfast enhancing appliances worth getting out of bed for.

Coffee Maker

Start the day buzzing with a lovingly brewed cup of coffee. A coffee machine means you can enjoy quality as good as the local coffee shop from the comfort of your own home!

Top Tips for Delectable Coffee

• Grind your own beans. Beans ground in advance quickly lose flavour.
• Brew the coffee at 90°C rather than at boiling temperature. Boiling water scalds coffee beans.
• Keep your coffee machine limescale free by regularly descaling it.
• Different beans have different flavours. Arabica beans are generally considered to be high quality, but experiment and find a bean that suits your taste buds.
• If you’re heating milk to make a cappuccino or latte, don’t let it boil as that will ruin the taste.

Electric Whisk

How do you like your eggs in the morning? If you’re partial to scrambled you’ll need a decent whisk and a hand blender with a whisk attachment is ideal for helping you to get the consistency just right.

Top tips for Scrumptious Scrambled Eggs

• Whisk well before adding the eggs to the pan.
• Cook the eggs with melted butter rather than margarine for a nice rich flavour.
• Don’t overcook the eggs! When they’re nearly done take them off the heat and keep stirring as they will finish cooking from the heat of the pan.
• Add cream or milk to taste. Different people prefer their eggs with different amounts of liquid or none at all!
• Don’t forget to season well.

Bread Maker

Warm, freshly baked bread will fill your home with delicious aromas and get your mouth watering immediately. Baking it yourself requires a fair bit of elbow grease, but a bread maker can take care of all the steps involved.

Top Tips for Brilliant Breakfast Bread

• Take the bread pan out of your bread maker to add the ingredients so that you don’t accidentally spill flour or egg into the inside of your machine.
• Measure out the ingredients carefully – too much flour or water will make sub-standard bread. Check the dough once it has been kneaded. If it’s too dry and stiff or too sticky and watery, add a touch more water or flour as needed.
• Putting liquids in the bread machine before the dry ingredients yields the best results.
• Wipe any excess flour out of the bread pan before baking for a better crust.
• Cool the bread in the machine and then take it out as soon as it’s cooled to stop the bread going soggy.

Sandwich Toaster

Bacon sarnies are a tried and tested way for us Brits to set ourselves up for the day ahead. However, we see your bacon sarnie and we raise you a melted cheese and bacon toasted sandwich, fresh out of the toastie maker. Any takers?

Top Tips for Tasty Toasties

• Butter the outside of your bread on all sides (including the crust) for a lovely crispy sandwich.
• If your sandwich sticks, don’t use metal utensils to remove it as you run the risk of scratching the non-stick coating on your toastie maker.
• Use cooked ingredients in your toasted sandwiches as the heat produced is enough to melt cheese, but won’t cook ingredients like meat thoroughly.
• Cheese lover? Don’t just stick to cheddar in your toasted sandwiches, experiment with different cheeses like brie or mozzarella.
• Clean your toastie maker whilst it’s still warm, otherwise, any cheese or fat that’s leaked out will harden and be trickier to shift. But take care not to burn yourself!

Fruit and Vegetable Juicer

A healthy, refreshing glass of juice in the morning is great. It’s greater still if the juice is brought to you by someone else. And it’s greatest of all if the juice is freshly squeezed. With a juicer, you can pop fruit in whole and easily treat your SO to some delicious OJ.

Top Tips for Juicing

• Drink your juice straight away after preparing it. Nothing beats fresh juice and if the juice oxidises it can go brown and look rather unappetising.
• There’s no need to peel and core. A good quality juicer will extract the juice from your fruit without the need for time-consuming prior preparation.
• Don’t be afraid of incorporating veggies into your juice. Vegetables are packed full of healthy nutrients and can combat the sweetness of lots of fruit.
• Word to the wise, some dense fruits and vegetables like avocados or bananas can’t really be juiced. However, they’re a great addition to healthy smoothies instead!
• Rinse your juicer parts as soon as possible after juicing; otherwise, they can get very sticky!

Breakfast is served! Our last little tip to score you even more brownie points is to indulge your love with breakfast in bed. Even if you don’t think your culinary skills are up to scratch, armed with a breakfast tray and some helpful kitchen gadgets you can’t go far wrong.

Tags: appliance tips, Breakfast Appliances