****** - Verified Buyer
4.5
I purchased this two years ago exactly. I had owned one previously, back in the 90's which I gave away when I moved. This is why I purchased it several years later online two years ago. Despite this I am purchasing a new one. Now, about the item: It is fairly easy to keep clean. But, after time oil works its way down between the hot plate and the plastic shell, and with lots of use you'll have drips of old oil leaking out of the bottom and a sticky mess on your counter top under the popper. I was very, very careful. There is nothing you can do to prevent this that I know off. And the hulls also sink down into that gap. I plop the bowl, stir rod and the little screw knob that holds it down into the top rack of the dishwasher without bad results. The settings it has survived is "extra hot water, steam sanitize."Do be careful how you handle the bowl, it could crack a little when hot and it wobbles. Especially during hand washing. Better to put in the top rack of the dishwasher. The edges of the bowl tend to get little cracks over time, but it still is pretty solid regardless. Just handle it with care as it gets older so as not to crack it. The little lid you put on the bottom of the bowl still stays on after all this time! One note: Do not fill the bowl up with water when washing, then try to move it, or pick it up, to dump out the water - that's how I cracked my bowl, about a 2 inch crack by one of the handles. Even so, I was surprised, with basic gentle care, how the cracked bowl held up for another year. :) The crack did not get an worse. Thank-goodness! If you immerse the bowl in a sink full of dishwater - be very careful when picking the bowl up. Even with the holes in the bottom, and water leaking out, the weight of the water could cause your bowl to crack.I have made kettle corn in this. Place a warm wet rag on the cooking plate while still hot to prevent the sugar from glue on to it. Remove the stir rod and the screw down knob and plunk those in some water till you wash them. Also, it would be best to use a separate bowl for serving so you can quickly wipe off the sugar from the popper's bowl because if you don't, melted clear miniscule sugar drops will stick all over it and harden by the time you finish the bowlful of corn, and be very, very difficult to remove when you wash it. Especially since you can't fill the bowl with water and leave it to soak. The bowl can't handle the weight of the water. You could immerse it in a sink of sudsy water to soak, just be sure to gently turn it sidewise to remove the bowl from water!The instructions say not to add salt to the oil. If you do add the fine pop corn salt I noticed that there is a drag of the stir rod, and even the fine pop corn salt sounds like it is scratching the popper's cooking plate. Because of that I do not add salt and spices to the oil unless I need a certain flavor through out.Using butter on the top works, if you cut the butter up into small little bits and distribute it evenly over the holes. My butter was cold and hard, straight out of the fridge. I would help it along by moving the parts that were melting too slowly over a hole every once in a while. Eventually I decided it was much easier to melt the butter in the microwave and mix it in after popping.We used this frequently - sometimes twice a day but also had several months go by when we didn't use it, and decided to use a hot air popper. So, I can honestly say it didn't get used daily over the two years I had this. I was quite sad when I had to chuck the popper out with the trash.What happened is that the popper started having more and more unpopped corn kernels. Over the past month I would sometimes have a failed pop, and when I did a second batch, it was okay. Then one day, I had to pop corn 5 times in a row, and leave it popping even when normally I would have stopped it, (left on even when it popped once ever couple of seconds). I ended up with 1/2 a bowl of popped corn accumulated from the 5 poppings. About 75 percent of the kernels didn't pop. Normally the popped corn would scorch when popped so long. This time not a bit of the corn burnt at all. To me this indicated that the heating elements were not heating the pop corn enough. And out in the trash it went that very day.It seems that the old one I had in the 90's kept better than this one I bought two years ago. I must admit, it probably didn't get as much use as the one I bought two years ago. I did buy a similar, very good brand name pop corn popper,(not a hot air popper type), and it broke after a week or so. It was very poorly designed. I probably have a review of that somewhere on Amazon. So, in comparison with that - I feel this popper held up fairly well. And at the price, I feel it is worth purchasing it again.I am keeping the old bowl, lid, and removable parts and cord as spares for the new one I am ordering given the flimsiness of the bowl. And it will be nice having two bowls when family comes over and wants lots popped corn!
