Tofu with Spicy Peanut Sauce is among the many dishes to emerge from the toaster oven. Here, writer Peggy Grodinsky brushes on the marinade before baking the tofu. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

I have been cooking and baking in a toaster oven since late March, when the power went out during an ice storm. The power came back on three days later. But my oven, as the repairman explained later, was toast.

So as I write this, and assuming my math is correct (a big assumption when it comes to me and math), I have been making breakfast, lunch and dinner in my toaster oven (admittedly, breakfast rarely) for about one-third of 2024, including, just today, roasted cherry tomatoes, baked haddock with pesto, and an almond cream cake.

The funny thing is, although I am a passionate home baker, and a food writer, I am only just now, after a period that is roughly equal to the gestation of a red panda, beginning to miss my “real” oven. But before I go and brag about all the fabulous things I have managed to coax out of a mere toaster oven, I should come clean about a few things.

For one, the stovetop on my GE range still works, so I’ve had burners this entire stretch.

Next, I have (mostly) been cooking for just two, so the much smaller toaster oven (mostly) works out. That said, I have hosted my book club, had friends over for brunch, cooked food for occasional photo shoots, brought dishes to plenty of potlucks and continued to produce an array of pies and cakes as usual, all from my toaster oven.

Who needs a stove, anyhow? After her oven broke, Food Editor Peggy Grodinsky has come to rely on her toaster oven. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

One more thing: That toaster oven, a Breville Smart Oven, is bigger than many other brands, and it’s top of the line. It costs quite a bit more ($150-$300, depending on the features) than many others, too. I’ve tried to explain that whenever someone has said to me something like, “YOU BAKED THIS BLUEBERRY PIE IN A TOASTER OVEN?!?!?!” But I confess, whenever I heard that unspoken “fantastic” ahead of “blueberry pie” and “you’re awesome,” after “toaster oven,” I didn’t try that hard to explain.

Baking, by the way, is where it really shines, but maybe that’s just me. Now, can I brag? Here is a very partial list of items that have successfully come out of my toaster oven: the aforementioned blueberry pie, also blueberry muffins, crispy spiced chickpeas, chocolate-raspberry cake, rhubarb-cornmeal cake, apricot-almond-cherry cake, fish of all sorts, ditto chicken, cannoli layer cake, rhubarb upside-down cake, miso-marinated tofu, spicy peanut-butter marinated tofu, sourdough whole wheat sandwich loaf, sourdough multigrain sandwich loaf, a wide assortment of roasted veggies, toasted almonds, toasted pumpkin seeds, toasted sunflower seeds, you get the idea, baked potatoes (the reason I bought it in the first place, i.e., why am I heating up the entire oven for two baked potatoes?) and, well, toast.

Toast has, in fact, been a rare disappointment, even though it also factored into my purchase of this particular model. Neither past toasters nor past toaster ovens that have passed through my kitchen have ever made proper toast. Proper toast is one of the great small pleasures of life, so I had high hopes. But my smart toaster oven is not, it turns out, so smart when it comes to toast. It produces toast as erratically browned as with every other toaster and toaster oven I have ever known. By flipping the slices periodically and moving them back to front, I have found I can produce a respectable slice. I guess every relationship has its compromises.

Seeking more creative ways to put my toaster oven through its paces, and remembering my college days, I sought out a few dorm-dwelling students to ask about their toaster oven creations. I waited for the onslaught of toaster oven tacos, ramen, baked feta pasta … At Bowdoin, though, “Toaster ovens are a prohibited item on campus,” the communications office promptly answered my inquiry. Same story at Bates, where the appliance appears on a banned list alongside hot plates, air fryers, gasoline and Hoverboards. Hoverboards?

Apple-Blackberry Pie, made in Peggy Grodinsky’s toaster oven, topped with vanilla bean ice cream. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

If I can quantify the number of meals I have enjoyed from my toaster oven, it is harder to quantify exactly how much energy I have been saving since March. The EPA’s Energy Star website is inconclusive, noting that “Energy consumption in toaster ovens can be strongly influenced by user behavior.” The answer will change depending on such things as how long the oven is on, what temperature it’s set to and how often the impatient cook opens the oven door to check on things. In sum, though, “According to industry representatives, a toaster oven uses about 1/3-1/2 less energy than a conventional electric oven for cooking small meals.” Not bad!

Add to that, to avoid phantom energy use, I try to remember to unplug the appliance when I am not using it, something that wasn’t possible, at least as far as I know, with my full-size stove. “The vampire draw for each appliance with standby power can represent up to 15 percent of its total energy use,” according to Efficiency Maine.

Beyond these, where it might take my full-size oven 20 minutes or so to heat up, the toaster oven usually beeps to tell me it’s reached temperature within just a minute or two. I lower the temperature any recipe calls for by 10 to 20 degrees, and still the food cooks more quickly. I am able to shave about 10 minutes off the average cake I bake, for instance. The thing the toaster oven doesn’t heat up quickly? – and it’s been a godsend in this often sticky, sweaty summer – is my kitchen.

It turns out that my colleague, food writer Tim Cebula, is familiar with the Breville Smart Oven. He’d owned one himself for about a dozen years. I asked him how often he used it. “Oh, I rode that horse!” he said. “Size,” he added, “is the only limiting factor.”

It’s true. My toaster oven can do an awful lot, but it can’t do everything. And as summer moves inexorably toward fall, as the season nears for hearty, cheesy, ample casseroles and stews and braises gurgling in sizable Dutch ovens, I am coming to the realization I probably can’t put off a new stove purchase forever. Lately, as I go about my daily business, dishes that I cannot make in the toaster oven keep popping into my head.

Houdini himself couldn’t squeeze a pizza stone into the toaster oven, so pizza has been off the menu for months. I can’t get a full tray of cookies in there, either, or make a batch of granola big enough to be worth the trouble. I dream of baking a dozen muffins at once, without having to re-load once the first six are golden and cooling. And it’d be nice to bake scones without their edges touching, which screws up the crust-to-crumb ratio.

If you don’t count the time I brought an armload of rhubarb and a pie crust to my sister’s house and demanded use of her oven, I’ve gone an entire summer without baking a fruit galette. This very week, I have promised to bring a full-size lasagna to an event I am attending. I like to think of myself as a gal who keeps her promises, which means I will need to beg, borrow or steal a full-size oven. These so-called problems are, I realize, the sort that in my childhood would have brought forth a sarcastic remark from my girlfriends: Ahhh, let’s have a pity party.

I already know just what I’ll be serving: Toaster Oven Apple-Blackberry Pie and ice cream.

Toaster Oven Apple-Blackberry Pie. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

Apple-Blackberry Pie

Just after college, I lived in Devon, England, for a time, where late in the summer, I first ate a slice of apple-blackberry pie, served with a runny custard sauce. I’d never before seen the combination of apples and blackberries. While I regularly forget where I’ve put my keys, my glasses, my iPhone, my hat, I still remember the deliciousness of that pie. This recipe is from “Good Housekeeping: Baking,” though in my experience apple-blackberry pie recipes are all more or less the same. (That said, Nigella Lawson calls for the unusual addition of rosewater in her recipe in “How to be a Domestic Goddess.”) I’ve made a few slight adjustments to the recipe. Impress your friends and family with pie from your toaster oven!

Yield: One (9-inch) pie

Dough for 1 double-crust pie, divided in 2, 1 disk slightly larger than the other
2/3 cup granulated sugar (I used vanilla sugar, as I happened to have some)
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 ½ pounds apples, thinly sliced (I used transparent apples from Dow Farm in Standish, which I picked up at the Portland Food Co-op)
1 pint blackberries, about 2 cups
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Smattering of fresh breadcrumbs
1 tablespoon butter, cut up
1 whole egg beaten together with 1 tablespoon milk, for egg wash
Turbinado sugar, for sprinkling

Preheat oven to 420 degrees F.

Roll out the larger dough disk and line a 9-inch pie plate with it. Refrigerate while you make the filling.

Combine the sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon and salt in a large bowl. Add the apples, berries and lemon juice. Toss gently to combine.

Remove the bottom crust from the fridge and sprinkle the breadcrumbs over it. This will help soak up the blackberry juices, so the bottom crust doesn’t get soggy. Spoon the filling into the pie shell. It may look like a lot, but it will cook down while baking. Dot with butter.

Roll out the top crust (or make a lattice) and gently lay over the filling. Cut a few 1-inch slits so that steam can escape. Form a decorative edge. Brush the top pie crust with egg wash, sprinkle with turbinado sugar and bake 20 minutes in the preheated toaster oven before turning the oven down to 370 degrees F. (Confession: I forgot to turn the oven to the higher temperature to start for the pie in the photographs. I’m not advising this, the high heat sets the crust, but if you’re a worrier, relax. The pie seemed to work out fine anyway.) Bake 1 hour or less longer, depending on your toaster oven, until the filling is bubbly in the center of the pie. Protect the edges of the pie with aluminum foil if they start to get too brown.

Cool the pie completely before serving. Actually, the recipe says “1 hour to serve warm,” but I’ve found that pies need a longer cooling time or they’ll slump all over your plate.

Stuff pita bread with Tofu with Spicy Peanut Sauce, broccoli florets, crisp bacon and shredded carrots for a satisfying lunch. Gregory Rec/Staff Photographer

Tofu with Spicy Peanut Sauce

This recipe comes from “Cooking One on One” by John Ash. I have modified it slightly by adding a bit of grated ginger root. Also, the original recipe called for hot pepper sesame oil. I used ordinary toasted sesame oil in its place because that’s what I had on hand, supplemented with a few squirts of sriracha. The recipe is far from fussy, so you need not follow it religiously. My toaster oven came with a fitted baking tray, which is what I used to bake the tofu. When baking in my toaster oven, I always lower the oven temperature instructed in a recipe by 10 to 20 degrees. Ash suggested several uses for Tofu with Spicy Peanut Sauce, including served warm atop a salad or tucked into a pita sandwich with shredded carrots, bean sprouts and bacon.

If you’ve leftover marinade, you can use it to brush the insides of the pita sandwich or to make peanut noodles. The tofu itself is also a nice addition to peanut noodles.

Serves 4

3 tablespoons natural peanut butter, excess oil drained away
1 tablespoon chopped garlic
Small knob of ginger root, grated
2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil
Sriracha, to taste
2 tablespoons maple syrup or honey
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
12 ounces firm or extra-firm tofu, pressed firm or frozen, well drained, and cut into 4 slices or fingers

Combine the peanut butter, garlic, ginger, sesame oil, sriracha, honey, soy sauce and vinegar in a blender or food processor and puree with enough water (1/4 to 1/3 cup) to make a thick sauce. In a shallow bowl, coat the tofu well, and marinate for at least 2 hours and as long as overnight, refrigerated. Be sure to turn the slices a few times so they are well-coated with the marinade.

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (that’s the original temperature; in my toaster oven, I use 380 degrees F). Lightly oil a baking sheet or line it with a silicone mat (my silicone mat is too big to fit in my toaster oven). Arrange the tofu on it and bake for 15-18 minutes or until the peanut coating has firmed. Serve warm or at room temperature.