Last Friday our Cuisinart toaster (model CPT-120) caught on fire.

Fortunately we had not wandered too far from the kitchen and realized that the crackling sounds were not those of burning toast. Even more fortunate was the fire extinguisher at hand to douse the flames that had already burned a good portion of the plastic housing along one side of the toaster adjacent to the electronics inside. But, the bread was barely warm!

Here is a close up of the burn zone.

You may be thinking that this fire was caused by sloppy housekeeping here. But, in fact the crumb tray had been cleaned within the last month and this picture of the crumb tray clearly shows no evidence of fire. It didn’t get started there. From the location of the fire right where all of the electrical components are, the obvious conclusion is bad design and/or manufacturing by Cuisinart.

I sent off an email with a picture to Cuisinart last Friday. Still no reply from them.

Saturday morning we went shopping for a replacement toaster. This time we bought a model by Hamilton Beach that has an all metal housing instead of the obviously flammable plastic housing.

By the way, if you want to replicate this experience at your house, the very same Cuisinart toaster is for sale at Lowe’s where we bought ours.

Fire Extinguisher Is Handy

One lesson is clear – the value of having a fire extinguisher in the kitchen ready to go. make sure it is one designed for the kitchen environment.