West Bend Popcorn Machine, Stir Crazy Black

I don't like microwave popcorn. The stuff has some sort of heavy oil that coats my mouth afterwards and I'm turned off by all the warnings I've read of many health concerns over microwave popcorn, the stuff they use to coat the bag and the unnecessary added chemicals. I became a stalwart stovetop popper, generally requiring that I use too much oil, making too much mess with spattered oil all over the stove, unavoidable burning of at least a few kernels and smelling up the house that brought complaints from the rest of the family. I finally bought the Stir Crazy popper after looking around a bit for a plug-in self-contained table-top unit. I was heartened by all the positive reviews here, on Amazon, and once it arrived, I eagerly fired up my first batch. 2 tablespoons of oil and a half-cup of popping corn (and I've only used the store-brand supermarket popping corn) yielded a huge batch of popcorn in four minutes with either one or two, or more often, none at all, un-popped kernels. It works perfectly every time! No burning, no big mess, just excellent popcorn! For a unit under $30, it is a wonderful value. I would not hesitate to buy another. My only concerns are minor and they would not deter me from buying this again, but I'll state them nonetheless, The dome cover gets very hot. It rests directly on the perimeter of the cooking surface. Although I don't smell any chemical odors, I wonder about the risk of the plastic becoming unstable when heated and possibly out-gassing chemicals. The domed cover is a little thin and flimsy feeling. The cover that presses onto the top (which would be the bottom if you were to use it as a bowl) is just a press fit, it doesn't snap on or screw on or anything. That cover is left off during popping so that the released steam can escape and can be pressed on to use the domed cover as a bowl. I've resigned myself to not using it. I do not use the dome as a bowl and put the press on cover back in the box. The unit is not immersible. It would be nice if the cooking surface were removable for cleaning or if it was better sealed to the base so that water could be sprayed onto it without the fear of water leaking into the electrical area where the motor and heating element is. It does clean up easily by wiping with a damp sponge or cloth but I'd still feel better being able to give it a periodic washing. Aside from my minor criticisms, it's perfect. It performs flawlessly and my greatest concern now is that I'm now eating too much popcorn as a consequence!

For the record, I've only used this popcorn popper once. That said, I spent a lot of time reading reviews before spending the $28 that I did to buy it from Amazon. I also researched the other ingredients I needed to make the Movie Theater popcorn experience I was after, and found using the right ingredients. First of all, what almost no one mentions, or perhaps they don't think about is this has a 1000 watt rated heater, which means it pops the corn quick and efficiently. I looked at the professional models of popcorn poppers and the best (IMO) made in the U.S. uses a 1200 watt heating element, in all of their commercial poppers, so for this consumer model to have 1000 watts, that's saying a lot Anyways, I doubt once the corn kernels started popping, it didn't take but a minute to pop all of the 1/2 cup of white popcorn kernels I added. When I bought this popper, I also bought these ingredients in the same order: Flavacol Seasoning http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004W8LT10/ref=oh_details_o00_s01_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1 4 lbs. Snappy White Popcorn Kernels http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00382UXU4/ref=oh_details_o00_s01_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 1 gallon of White Coconut oil (Snappy's) http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00A2A88ZW/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 And a Gallon of O'Dell's Super Kist Two Topping http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002YLNUL4/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1 the O'Dell's product is a butter topping you add after the popcorn is popped. I bought a plastic mustard squeeze bottle to pour the O'Dell's topping into then I ran it in my microwave oven for about 45 seconds to heat the oil up. This oil is soybean oil with flavor enhancers added. As I read others say and I agree with them, you use this topping for the texture it gives the popped corn, and you squirt it on like you would add melted butter to your popcorn, but this has no water content like butter has so your popcorn wont get soggy I also followed the advice of others when I made this first batch of popped corn. What I did was to add 3 tablespoons of coconut oil directly to the popper before plugging it in. I then added 1 teaspoon of Flavacol Seasoning on top of the coconut oil, then I plugged the machine in which turns it on as there isn't an on and off switch. When you plug this machine into a wall socket, it's running and wont stop until you unplug it. That said, I did a short dry run with my popper by plugging it in and observing how the wand rotated in relation to the bottom of the popper. Some have had the turning wand arms touch the base of the popper and remove the non stick coating after so many uses. Mine did not touch but if they did, the gage of the metal wand is light enough you can bend the metal to eliminate a rubbing possibility. On that note, on these newer Stir Crazy corn poppers, the center nut which holds the wand in place is a threaded cap, is spring loaded, and enables the metal wand to not touch the popping surface, so the new models like this one have been improved Okay so the dry test run was completed, making sure the popper got hot and the wand wasn't rubbing...I added the 3 tablespoons of coconut oil, 1 teaspoon of Flavacol and only 4 kernels of popcorn. I then plugged it in. I didn't add the entire 1/2 cup of popcorn as I read it's best to get the machine up to operating temperature before adding the popcorn, and by adding only 4 kernels of corn while it warmed up, once the 4 kernels popped, I knew it was hot enough to add the rest, which I did and that 1/2 cup of pop corn popped in under a minute. Yeah!, it went that quick. Pre-heating your popper eliminates the possibility of over cooking your popcorn I want to mention. You don't want to leave the center removable lid on the clear inverted bowl/cover on while the corn pops. The top of the bowl with the holes drilled in it acts as a vent so steam from the corn kernel can vent. If you keep the cover on the vent, that moisture wont escape and you will have soggy popcorn, so leave that lid off while you pop your corn So how did the popcorn taste? IMO?....it tasted better than what you buy at the movie theater. I was concerned that 1 teaspoon of the Flavacol seasoning might be too much, giving it way too much of a salty taste, yet my biggest critic (Mrs. Jake) told me (when asked) how my popcorn rated on a scale of 1 through 10 with 10 being the highest score. She told me she rated my popcorn a 20. It doesn't get any better than that, and she's hard to please Another point worth mentioning...you want to add the Flavacol to you oil and not shake it on the popcorn after it's popped. It's flavoring salt (giving the popcorn a buttery salty taste) but this salt is flaked salt and not granular. It's designed as a cooking salt and meant to be added to the oil while the corn pops Seriously, if you research how to make Theater Popcorn at home, you can do it with this Stir Crazy popper and it only costs $28 and not $300 like the better home theater popcorn machines start at. Plus, the Stir Crazy has a smaller foot print, and is much easier to store in a cupboard than a professional popcorn popper for the home, which most leave out in their home theater. I thought about all of this before deciding to buy the Stir Crazy instead of a home theater popcorn machine. I like quality cooking gadgets, but I also like simplicity in my life and I doubt you can get any simpler than a Stir Crazy corn popper, if you want a plug and play corn popper and not the type of machine you have to attend to every second while it's running like you do with the hand crank poppers you use on top of your stove I also researched what type of oil to use and my research led me to use coconut oil. I also bought the white instead of the yellow coconut oil as I didn't want the beta carotene food coloring that comes with yellow coconut oil, the type that is used for popcorn popping. I'm sure the yellow colored coconut oil is fine for popcorn but I will also use this coconut oil for other cooking tasks, hence the desire to not have yellow enhanced coconut oil for other types of cooking In closing, it might seem on the surface that buying a gallon of coconut oil and a gallon of O'Dell's Super Kist Two topping is a bit over board, and you can buy smaller containers, but the smaller sizes end up costing a lot more per ounce and if you like to make popcorn, you will be using all of these oils up before they go bad. Same with the Flavacol Seasoning, but I have not seen a smaller container of it for sale. Coconut oil will store for two plus years if stored correctly. Even if I don't use up the entire gallon of topping within the year pull date it comes with, it's still cheaper buying it by the gallon than buying the 16 ounce container of it. I'm totally happy with all of these Amazon purchases

並行輸入の意味が購入してからわかりました。購入から自宅に届くまで時間がかかり、プレゼントだったのですが予定の日に間に合いませんでした。商品自体は全く問題なく、とても喜んでいただけたので星５の評価にします。

子どもが集まってのパーティーでも、見た目に楽しく、美味しくできて大活躍です。 価格変動が大きいですね、、。9500円ぐらいから目をつけていたのですが、数日で、11500円程になり、 また9800円ぐらいに下がったときに購入。でも、購入後8500円になってる。。。

前から欲しかったんです！とうとう買っちゃいました。早速キャラメルポップコーンを作ります！

見ていて楽しいです。味付けが難しいかな… 子供達には、喜ばれてます。