The End of an Era.

RecipeSavory

Feb 1

Written By Molly

Well, it was a sad day in Apartment 241-A a few weeks ago when my faithful little toaster oven finally had to be replaced. Now you may ask, "Why are you so sad about your toaster oven going out? They're like $40 what's the big deal?" Well let me tell you, that toaster oven was my first appliance I ever purchased. Okay, so that's not the sad part... hold on. The sad part is that, that toaster oven was part of a highly secretive tool for Maddy, Allie and me to constantly have fresh-baked cookies available anytime we wanted in our dorm suite. You see, at Baylor, it's completely illegal to have a toaster oven in your dorm room, we would have to hide it when we knew the maintenance man was coming, on holidays when they might do a room check, or when we were having anyone over that might tattle to the RA.

side note: as I was adding this picture to my post yesterday, my phone rang... and guess who it was... Allie (on the left)... and guess what she was calling to tell me... At first I thought she was calling to tell me she was going to have a baby. In all fairness she did start with, "I have something to tell you, something big, something huge." I mean what would you think of your married bestie? Anyways, that wasn't the news, which was a big relief, I'm just not ready for all of that! She was calling to tell me, Maddy (the on that's not me) is getting engaged today (yesterday)!

I feel like that toaster oven was my first entrée into the culinary world. College was the first time I realized how much I enjoyed cooking and baking. I mean I had baked dozens and dozens of chocolate chip cookies in high school, but I was served a beautiful meal almost every night of the week for dinner. When I got to college, I had to fend for myself, and I shortly realized that cereal and dining hall food were not going to cut it. I learned how to make a sandwich even more by adding an assortment of spreads, I roasted veggies for the first time, and I learned the importance of a fresh-baked cookie in times of high stress.

Anyways, to honor the passing of the little toaster oven that could, I'm going to share a toaster oven main dish! From start to finish you can make anything and everything in a toaster oven. Personally, I believe the toaster oven is the most underutilized appliance in the kitchen. It's so convenient in the summer when you have a small kitchen like mine and you don't want to heat it up by turning on the stove, or on the weekends when you're trying to get some meal prep done and you have one thing in the oven at 425, but you really want to get the salmon cooked for your salads that week without having to wait you can get both meals ready, just throw it in the toaster oven.

Toaster Oven Salmon with a Homemade Honey Mustard Glaze

Step-By-Step

Preheat the toaster oven - or rea oven...

This recipe is for 2 personal size fillets, but you can double the glaze recipe and cook a huge chunk of salmon if you'd like, I did that the other day and it turned out perfectly!