What better topic for a tea room than kettles? My electric one conked out this morning. It's been used most days for several years, so I suppose it hasn't done too badly. Most of its use is to make instant coffee, which I can also do perfectly well in the microwave. But I also use it to fill my hottie bottle at this time of year, so a replacement is required. I'm just summoning the will to do battle with the Christmas shoppers in Argos.
Ours is a Bosch, 3Kw fast boil job. Does what it's supposed to but quite wasteful if you always fill it. If I just wanted cups of instant then perhaps one of these: http://www.bosch-home.co.uk/product-list/kettles-toasters/hot-water-dispensers/THD2063GB My mother had one as towards end of her life even a small kettle was to difficult to handle. No good for hotty bottles and even at 'boiling' not hot for tea if you're enough of a connoisseur to be bothered.
Interesting device. I'm no tea connisseur - PG bags is about my mark - but I have noticed tea needs just boiled water.
I have a Dulce Gusto that you put pods into for better coffe. Everyday i use a morphy richards kettle. Its only small as normally there is just the 2 of us. Does a decent job, and didn't cost a lot of money. Not much good for hot water bottles, then again, i have an electric blanket so i'm not bothered.
We have a Breville hot cup dispenser thingy and it's fine. We got it because the wife was finding lifting heavy kettles difficult. No good for filling hot water bottles though.
I have electric blankets in the caravan, well, and a hot water bottle for when mummy comes to stay. For some reason I've never bothered with an electric blanket in the house. The conked out kettle was a Morphy Richards. Bewildering choice of new ones, as you may imagine. Argos own brand at about £12 look alright. Morphys/Russell Hobbs seem to be £20 or more. Not sure if it's worth paying the extra. http://www.argos.co.uk/browse/home-and-garden/kitchen-electricals/kettles/c:29560/
A good point was made recently that plastic kettles impart a foul taste to water over time - this explained all the foul cups of coffee I've had over the years. Get a stainless steel kettle to avoid this.
That is an interesting point. Plastic kettles should be made of food grade plastic, which should not taint even if it's brightly coloured. However, you do read of plastic kettles that do taint. White is the least susceptible colour. Plastic buckets need not be food grade, but most home brewers will go for a white one for taint reasons.
Decided to side step the taint issue by going for a twenty quid steel one. It does look a bit smarter than the previous plastic kettle, but it's hard to get enthusiastic over it, boils water acceptably quickly, so hopefully that's job done for another few years.
Reasonably soft water around here, so stuff like kettles tends to last quite well. I did have to descale the old one occasionally. Be interesting to see if the steel one requires fewer treatments.
