Weird fact: My kids are obsessed with kitchen gadgets. Especially my son. His eyes light up when we go into a kitchenware shop and he sees the vast array of spiralisers, decorative cutters, mandolines, herb scissors and other goodies. Honestly, I have to rein him in, or I wouldn’t have enough room in my kitchen to house all the gadgets!

But it was my daughter who prevailed upon me to buy a sandwich press. We were in Officeworks, working our way through her school stationery list, when she spotted a 4-slice sandwich press. I’m usually pretty good at resisting “Please Mum, can we buy that? Please, PLEASE, PLEASE????”, but this time I succumbed.

I don’t even know why, because I rarely eat bread! But now that I have it, I’m discovering all sorts of interesting and tasty things that you can do with a sandwich press… that don’t involve bread.

Sandwich Press Potatoes

Steam whole, well-scrubbed potatoes until tender, then place in preheated sandwich press and squish the handle down REALLY hard (small potatoes work best for this), until the skin starts to get crispy.

Sandwich Press Eggplant Slices

Slice eggplant about 8 mm thick. Place slices in preheated sandwich press and toast until they start to brown.

Sandwich Press Zucchini Slices

Slice zucchini about 8 mm thick. Place slices in preheated sandwich press and toast until they start to brown.

Sandwich Press Tofu

Slice firm tofu about 8 mm thick. Place slices in preheated sandwich press and toast until they start to brown.

My son made a gorgeous Buddha bowl out of our sandwich press creations, along with some salad vegetables: