As we are clearing out the cupboards ready for our impending move, we keep coming across gadgets that were either given to us or we purchased as we thought they would be useful. It's amazing how much junk we have accumulated and got stuck into the back of one drawer or the other. We are now packing them up and either giving them to our daughters, taking them to the charity shop or just binning them.
For example: A garlic peeler. Not a garlic crusher (which I can find some use for) but a gadget for peeling garlic. TBH you can peel the garlic quicker than it takes to search for this thing in the back of the drawer. Can't remember if we bought it (can't imagine why) or acquired it along the way.
A teabag strainer. Why? God only knows. A quick squish with the teaspoon does the job just as quickly.
A yogurt maker. Now, I'm told this was a wedding present (41 years and counting). Why would you need a plastic machine that makes milk go off when the supermarket sells them for 10p each? (Probably 1d each when we were given this).
A pineapple corer. OK, we did use this a couple of times (many years ago, I must admit). You stick it on the top of the pinapple and it both peels the pineapple and removes the core at the same time. ISTR the pineapples were either too small (thus wasting half of the fruit) or too big and the prickly pointy bits were still left over.
A multi-slicer. One of those plastic things you see advertised on the shopping channel. It's supposed to slice all sorts of veg and cheese etc. Unfortunately, after a couple of washes, the plastic started coming off in the food you grated so you ended up with sliced carrots and plastic or cheddar and plastic. It also used to get clogged up so you had to spend most of your time cleaning it.
A bread maker. OK, I admit these could be useful. Trouble is, it was rather hit and miss on whether it came out soggy, hard or just right. I think it depended on the amount of liquid you put in it. I think we ended up using it to mix the dough and then sticking that in the oven.
A soda stream. Yep, remember them? You stick water in, add a rather dangerous cylinder of CO2 and add the flavour of your choice. The flavours cost about as much as a decent can of coke and the CO2 cylinders kept changing and not fitting properly. I think the fizz lasted about 10 minutes! This has been in the back of a cupboard (dusty, unused and unloved) for about 20 odd years.
A fondu set. A fondu set? Again, I'm told another wedding present. Apparently you melt cheese in it and then dip bits of bread into on the end of a fork it thus scalding the inside of your mouth and bringing your tongue up in blisters. Can't ever remember using this thing.
A teasmaid. No, not the branded one (which may have been quite good) but a cheapo knockoff. Fill it with water the night before and set the alarm. It's supposed to wake you up with a fresh cup of tea. The only few times we tried it, it bubbled over thus causing staining to the wooden bedside tables, gave a tepid wishy-washy cup of tea which hadn't brewed correctly and, anyway, I can never drink a cup of tea in bed. Might as well get up and make a fresh one.
A set of fluff removers. These are stick, plastic things on a roller that you're supposed to rub over your clothes to brush them off. Once you have used them, they become useless because all the stuff you rolled off becomes stuck to the sticky stuff. A clothes brush did a far better job.
Apart from the above, which I admit are nearly all kitchen gadgets (I haven't even mentioned the electric jar opener, the electric can opener that will only open baked bean tins which now come with a ring pull or the myriad of special "mops" which promise much and deliver little) there are the scented candles, the bags of pot pourri, the extra long shoe horns and wardrobe "tidies" that just keep your junk in one convenient place.
Anyone else got junk in the cupboard gathering more dust than the Labour election manifesto?