 "Nice deisgn features, easy to use" | 2007-08-10 |
| - Reviewed By User: A1JBQ1RPC5TRI0 |
My De'Longhi fryer was purchased for me from Sam's Club. I had been frying with an old Fry Baby that my husband and I affectionately referred to as "Ol' Sparky" because of its tendency to spark where the plug attached to the fryer. The Fry Baby was so poorly designed that we made a list of what we wanted in an fryer and went looking for it.
1. Size. This fryer uses about 1 gallon of oil at a time, and in that oil can cook several cups of French fries (at a time). This means that we can have guests over and finish fries in two batches. The Fry Baby would take over and hour to make a comparable pile of fries.
2. Oil removal. We reuse our oil several times, and the Fry Baby required that we pour the oil over the top and through a funnel. The De'Longhi fryer has a spout neatly tucked behind the front door of the fryer so that once the oil is cool, you can simply open the valve and drain it into the container of your choosing. No more spilling, funnels, and mess.
3. Temperature control. Ol' Sparky had a dial marked "1-10" and we could choose our setting. This, of course, is meaningless and required us to rig a thermometer to the hot oil, and adjust manually. The De'Longhi has a thermocouple attached to the heating element that reports the temperature to a thermostat and automatically readjusts the temperature when you add food items to the oil.
Since we purchased our fryer, we noticed some other nice features.
4. The plug is magnetically attached. If you accidentally pull it, it comes away from the fryer rather than knocking the fryer and hot oil off the counter. (We operate ours further out on the counter than other appliances to allow the steam produced from frying food to escape.)
5. The loosely attached lid allows steam to escape (the Fry Baby had a nearly-sealing glass lid). Allowing steam to condense on the lid and the water to drop into the oil can cause it to boil violently.
6. This fryer comes in many parts. There is the outer housing (the silver base with blank handles and door), the heating element with electronics, the plug, the lid, the basket, and the inner container for the oil (with the spout). Initially, this seemed like a lot, however, because you can take it apart, it is very easy to clean. You can remove the heating element and clean it (it securely latches on). Once you've drained the oil through the spout, you can remove this part and clean it. And of course, the basket is removable. Usually, this is all that gets dirty when we fry.
I highly recommend this fryer. We have done lots of frozen French Fries (maybe 30 pounds worth) and other appetizers (such as jalepeno poppers) at room temperature. The De'Longhi responds well to the addition of frozen items by quickly readjusting the temperature.
Cheers! |
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 "err message too often" | 2007-05-29 |
| - Reviewed By smacrae4 |
| Like many, I had a problem with display showing an Err message. This was intermittent at first, but a real pain because it shuts off unexpectedly. Finally it became unusable. It was out of warranty, and for the price, wouldn't have been worth the hassle for me to return for service anyway. Nice when it worked, although not having a hinged lid is a real design flaw. I gave it two stars because it cooked well and was easy to clean when it worked. Otherwise, I would've given it zero stars for unreliability. |
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 "Chicken Wings NOT GOOD in this Product." | 2007-05-15 |
| - Reviewed By packerman8 |
| My usual recipe for Chicken Wings which are highly raved about by all friends were not good when using this as a deep fryer. My FryDaddy does a much better job, and I could buy 3 of those for the same price as this thing. Would not recommend this product. Did Return Product to Amazon! |
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| "Junk Fryer" | 2007-05-14 |
| - Reviewed By User: A3MOXONV78HO7X |
| This is a terrible excuse for a deep fryer. Recovery time after immersion is a joke. Its AOK if you are trying to fry about ten { small} pieces of potato. Try a fresh egg roll and see how slowly this thing recovers. Think grease is tasty?? That's what this fryer gives you. The temperature gauge was 20 degrees off in the wrong direction. It is however a great item to heat oil up to transfer to a real stovetop deep frying setup. The drain feature works just great to get the old oil out - which I used it for before discarding the entire unit. It works great if you intend to make a couple of french fries at a time and produces consistently greasy crab cakes, oily bolhinos and grease saturated french fries each and every time. Yes - I read and understood the directions. Jesus H... why can't anybody make products that work anymore??? Safety garbage to save morons from themselves has screwed up yet another product. This product was definitely NOT worth the money. A Pan on the stove is still the best bet. |
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| "Absolutely LOVE it!" | 2007-05-06 |
| - Reviewed By User: ASKDMO8CYVLGB |
| This is my 4th deep fryer over the years and this one is absolutely my FAVORITE! It is sooooo easy to clean especially with the drain spout at the bottom of the front. My parents bought one first and since they loved it so much, I decided to replace my other fryer with it. The cost was perfect from Amazon. The only caution that I would want to point out is that the MAX food line truly is the MAX! If you put too much food in, it will boil over. (I came close, luckily I didn't have a disaster.) This fryer is a great product for a reasonable price. |
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| "Amortize it quickly, it failed after 2 uses." | 2007-04-22 |
| - Reviewed By User: APWFW5E7FRZT5 |
I was given the fryer as Christmas gift. We used it twice - worked perfectly, great features - pretty idotic proof in being able to set time and temp.
Third try, the LED on the control unit started flashing random numers, letters and symbols. The reset never functioned @ all, heating element failed - essentially a total meltdown. Called DeLonghi, they requested I send the unit to a service center in New Mexico which I did. A month later, no unit, no response from service center. |
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| "Best Lil Deep Fryer" | 2007-04-04 |
| - Reviewed By User: AITTJ4OL2NH1J |
| I have waited a long time to buy one ... not sure why. I was going to go with a T-Fal product. Glad I didn't. Got this one home and waited awhile before I actually used it. Then I deep fried chicken patties and french fries. What a dinner we had. It was gr8!! The frier heated up quickly ... made the food fast ... did everything I wanted it to. It has continued to work as expected ever since I picked it up. Even easy clean up. Nice! |
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| "Deep Fryer - Safety Hazard?" | 2007-02-10 |
| - Reviewed By User: A24XW6TVL9O3WE |
| We purchased the DeLonghi based on its ease of cleaning (4 of 5 parts can be placed in the dishwasher). After the third use, the plastic part that holds the heating element in place MELTED off the base. DeLonghi service was apologetic, and promised to send a replacement part ASAP, although the part was out of stock. That was in September, almost 6 months ago. Parts are still backordered! I returned the unit to Lowes in frustration, got a new unit, and it too melted on the First use. Returned it for credit. Do not consider this unit. |
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 "Not perfect, but best in this price range..." | 2007-02-06 |
| - Reviewed By dealsnoop |
The DeLonghi Esclusivo Dual Zone Deep Fryer is not perfect, but when purchased at Amazon's $80-$90 price range it's likely the best you'll find in this price range.
I have mad mixed experiences with DeLonghi products in the past. Some of their small appliances have been excellent and have far exceeded their expectations, while others have died prematurely. I'm not sure which category this fryer will fall into yet as I've only used it a few times, but so far it does the job well.
The Good:
- Relatively compact design. Unusual rectangular shape works well and will fit into spaces a traditional round style will not.
- Digital controls and display work well and are easy to read.
- Drain system well thought out and works well.
- Cleaning is very easy (for a greasy fryer that is).
- Power cord uses a magnetic connection for safety (breakaway). This works well.
- Most importantly, of course, it fries very well. For what I've used it for (french fries and southwestern Tex-Mex egg rolls so far) it cooks perfectly.
The Bad:
- Control system is weird. For example, you need to set the temp AND the cook time before the heating element will turn on. This is not intuitive, especially if you don't want to use the timer. Once you figure out these little caveats, the controls work fine and are easy to use.
- Smaller than you might think. I expected the "3 pound capacity" to be larger. But I suppose the advertised "3 pounds" is relative. DeLonghi may have used a chunk of lead for that "3 pound" measurement. This wont hold 3 pounds of onion rings for example. The capacity is "average" in my opinion. For my family of 5 it's on the smaller end of the spectrum, but usable.
- The cover works well, but a hinged cover would have been better.
- Heating element does not disconnect from the control unit. If it did so it would be easier to clean (can not immerse the control panel obviously).
- The drain valve can, conceivably, be left in the "open" position. A better design would use a self-closing valve - one that you need to hold in the open position for draining, then would automatically close when you let go of it. Just sayin'... (If I were an engineer at DeLonghi...).
Overall, I feel this fryer is worth what I paid ($89). If I had paid MSRP ($140) I don't think I would be able to say the same.
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| "Works well, excellent design." | 2007-01-28 |
| - Reviewed By cpemberton2 |
| Someone deserves an award for the design of this deep fryer. It comes completely apart for easy cleaning and can be reassembled in less than two minutes. Seriously! It makes crisp fries, because it gets very hot, the basket is relatively large and the price is right. All in all a great product. I replaced an older Delonghi which was impossible to clean and I am so glad I got this one. |
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