Appliances in Space 2: Mission to Mars!

July 23rd, 2012 by

Isn’t it annoying when you’re all psyched to start making dinner, then you realise that there’s no food in the house?  Then you've got to waste a bunch of time heading down to the shops to buy what your need - time that could be spent cooking and eating. Well, what if the nearest shops were around 225 million kilometres away?  And reaching them would involve six ... Read more

8 Appliances We Desperately Need … But Haven’t Been Invented Yet

July 20th, 2012 by

As human progress screams headlong into a golden age of convenience and unlimited laziness ... it’s about time we call out manufacturers on the appliances they AREN'T making! We’re calling it 8 Appliances That Haven’t Been Invented Yet – these are items which will meet specific demand that consumers have been crying out for years. We’ve even given them some helpful names to help prod those lax inventors ... Read more

How coffee at home can solve a country’s welfare problem

July 20th, 2012 by

In a bid to cut household costs, a New Zealand columnist has recently made the switch from cups at the coffee-shop to brewing at home. Charged by caffeine, he had an epiphany: coffee at home can solve his nation's welfare problem. In the hilariously satirical column Bill Ralston describes how and why his wife decided their very frequent trips to the coffee shop down the road must come ... Read more

From wine bottles to kettles, put a cork in it

July 20th, 2012 by

All this talk about today's throwaway culture has inspired a French art student to design small appliances fashioned from cork. Gaspard Tine-Beres, a student at the Royal College of Art in London, is looking into a business model where a range of small appliances can be made from cork, recycled borosilicate glass and recycled electrical components. For the some of the same reasons cork has been used for ... Read more

How to take control of cluttered cupboards

July 19th, 2012 by

In a threatening state of affairs the boarders between nations spill over each other in my spice and hearb tin container. Tumeric spoils the oregano, Chinese five spice gets mixed with Moroccan lamb and beef rendang becomes massaman beef. It's all become quite a confusing mess. This is due to the haphazard state of my kitchen cupboards. The clutter makes it impossible to fit the tin in ... Read more

LG reveals new fridges and washing machines

July 19th, 2012 by

A side by side fridge, a top mount, and two new top loader washing machines will enter LG's home appliance arsenal this week in Australia. Side by side refrigerators are a popular style when it comes to fridges in Australian kitchens and LG has ensured that  alongside fashion there is function. An irksome issue with water and ice dispensing fridges is the plumbing. The new LG GC-L247ENSL is non-plummed. This makes ... Read more

Pop art in the kitchen: Andy Warhol inspires rangehood

July 19th, 2012 by

Stumbling across a Warhol-inspired Campbell's Soup Can rangehood has changed the way I look at my kitchen. What I once thought of as elegant, clean, streamlined and simple has become conventional,  boring, plain and pitiful. A rangehood iteration of the American artist's iconic subject from the 1960s has been fashioned in a kitchen metalworks shop in the US southern state of Georgia. While it is a one-off piece, ... Read more

So long washing machine! Hello, self-cleaning clothes

July 18th, 2012 by

Self-cleaning clothes will give us another reason to smile when the sun is out. In the future, a sunny day might be all we need to clean our clothes, according to a study by Chinese scientists. Mingce Long and Deyong Wu have worked to produce a fabric with a coating of nanoparticles that kill bacteria and break down dirt, in other words, they clean. It works when exposed to sunlight, ... Read more

From flat white to flatstick: Fiat launches built-in coffee machine car

July 18th, 2012 by

On the road and busting for a brew? Fiat's got you covered. The Italian car maker is giving punters worldwide another reason to buzz around in the 500L, a built-in Lavazza-branded coffee machine nestled next to the gear stick for coffee on the go. (And you thought texting while driving was bad...) The Lavazza ‘Coffee Experience’ kit includes cups, a spoon holder and a sugar dispenser. It sits between ... Read more

Siemens: Europe’s number 1 brand of built-in appliances

July 13th, 2012 by

“Progress in the service of mankind” was the aspiration of the founder of Siemens, Werner von Siemens, and 160 years later this motto still holds true. Founded in Germany, Siemens is a global company that specialises in designing and manufacturing high quality household appliances. Why Siemens? Excellence in design Siemens products continue to receive awards from major design names internationally. In the 2012 Red Dot product design awards, 25 out ... Read more

Landfill or recycling – What happens to your old appliances?

July 13th, 2012 by

So you’ve bought something new from Appliances Online.  Maybe you’ve replaced the oven that was on its last legs, or that old fridge with the noisy compressor. Our delivery drivers have brought your new appliance home in a shiny truck, plugged it in, and given you a once-over of how it all works.  They've cleaned up all of the packaging and mess, packed your old appliance up ... Read more

Oldest appliance in the world found in China

July 12th, 2012 by

A 20,000-year-old pottery fragment from what archaeologists think was a cauldron or wok-like pot has been unearthed in Southern China. Found in Xianrendong Cave, Jiangxi Province, archeologists believe it was a large bowl used to cook food, or possibly to brew booze. The discovery has been published in the last June edition of the journal Science. Archeologists estimate the pot was 20 centimetres high and 15-25 centimetres in diameter. It has been confirmed as the ... Read more

Carbon tax causes unremarkable number of complaints

July 12th, 2012 by

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has received 250 complaints from consumers who think their energy retailers may be taking the mickey. This is due to the double digit percentage price hikes in electricity bills across Australia since the newly implemented Carbon Tax. In total, the ACCC has received 630 Carbon Tax-related complaints; there were over 8350 general complaints in that period, relatively few, said Rod Sims, ACCC ... Read more

Big W Abode deep fryer recalled, possible “serious burns”

July 12th, 2012 by

Big W has recalled the Abode Stainless Steel Deep Fryer for fear of its handles falling off when lifting oil. It is the fourth recall in the last year for three Adobe products, Big W's home brand. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's recall website warns that the side handles may detach when lifting the deep fryer, "possibly causing serious burn injuries of hot oil splashes on the user or ... Read more

10 crazy things about food you didn’t know

July 11th, 2012 by

This story comes on the back of a blog where we looked at some of the more marvelous and unknown qualities of vegetables. Did you know, for example, celery can make woman horny and in England, large patches of thyme were planted for fairies to play in? So what other interesting facts lurk in the kitchen? If you fancy the idea of baffling somebody with your peculiar knowledge of foodstuffs, here's a list ... Read more