The Masterbuilt Butterball Professional Series Indoor Electric Turkey Fryer makes %u201Cthe best turkey you%u2019ve ever tasted,%u201D the box notes, and it is %u201Cgreat for frying, boiling and steaming all foods.%u201D It%u2019s made to hold a turkey evaluating to 14 pounds. We paid $117 to the fryer, plus shipping.

The check

We deep-fried turkeys weighing almost 12 pounds. We followed instructions, filling the fryer%u2019s porcelain-coated inner pot approximately 2 gallons of peanut oil and setting the thermostat to 375%uFFFD F. (The oil took about half an hour to arrive at that temperature.) We placed the turkey inside cooking basket and used the included handle extender to lift the basket, then lower it in the herbal. We closed the lid, set the timer (4 minutes per pound), and waited. We also deep-fried an entirely chicken, chicken parts, and pizza dough. So we steamed mussels.

Bottom line

Should you favor deep-deep fried foods, consider gobbling inside the Butterball fryer. Though a smallish turkey fit snugly within the basket, the meat was nicely browned and incredibly juicy. Thighs were somewhat oily other areas weren%u2019t. Chicken cooked well, and cooking proved less messy than stovetop deep-frying. Pizza fritta cooked evenly. Steaming was a reduced success. The product wasn't powerful enough to steam mussels quickly: With a stove, 2 pounds steamed perfectly within 2 minutes, in the fryer, only about one-third in the mussels from the fryer had opened after almost ten mins.