We bought a Tesco Value Sandwich Toaster to replace a rather old and dodgy Breville one that had served us well for many a year. The Tesco Value products usually offer very good value for money, so we saw no reason to doubt the effectiveness of the sandwich toaster.

I think we paid £5.99 for it, which is a real bargain price for a toastie maker to my mind. It came in a basic but sturdy box which was fine as the box doesn't do the toasting, so was soon disposed of by recycling it.

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The sandwich toaster is a nice soft white colour. The outside is durable plastic which is not a glossy white but not a matt white either. It is neat and compact enough to look ok if left out on your kitchen work top if you have space. There is nothing to indicate that its a Tesco Value sandwich maker once out of the box.

The size of the toaster is neither too bulky or too small, it can manage to toast 2 rounds of toasties as it has a set of plates suited to making 2 lots at a time. The metal plates are an almost matt black and have diagonal cuts across them. When a fully loaded sandwich is placed across them and the lid is pushed down and locked, the slices of bread are divided in to 2 pieces, sealing in the filling at the same time.

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The plug is already to go and is firmly attached to the power cord. The lead is a little short but then its safest and best to plug in your toastie maker near to a socket, rather than risk getting things tangled in long power cords. Once switched on the plates inside the machine begin to heat up.

I have found they heat a little slower than our old Breville sandwich maker, but haven't minded that much. I think it gives you more time to prepare as many sandwiches as you want, that way as soon as one lot are cooked you can pop another batch straight in.

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The sandwich maker has a series of helpful lights which let you know when the machine is ready to use. The toastie maker shows a green light at first, when ready to toast, once your toastie is cooked the red light shows.

I find I prefer to leave the machine cook a little longer with some fillings, so that they are cooked better. This also allows the finished product to have a crisper browner finish on the outside.

A little bit of butter on the outside of each sandwich makes a better crisper and more moist toastie. Do be careful when putting fillings in as too much will mean that the filling leaks down the back of the machine, causing a nasty greasy and rather hot mess for you to clean up.

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The cooking plates on this machine do not lift off for cleaning, but they can be wiped down with a damp cloth as long as the machine is unplugged at the time for safety reasons. Over all I have been pleased with this product. It is much better than the Tesco Value Toaster we had, which had to go back, as it was very flimsy and cheaply made.

Making toasties this way is a bit fiddly and messy and whilst we still use it sometimes, we have found that using a panini press gives much nicer results, with less mess, even on plain sliced bread. Over all this product deserves at least a 4 star rating as it does the job and is very cheap to buy!