The Smartest Gadget In The Room: 12 Best Kitchen Appliances To Make Your Life Easier

While early 20th century was big for small appliances (think: Frank Shailor's electric toaster in 1909), today, the smartest toasters don't just pop up perfectly toasted bread ... they are programmable, have touch screens, and can even scroll through your family's favorite photos. Since the dawn of kitchen appliances, gadgets have steadily become smarter, sleeker, and more helpful.

The smartest of the bunch create efficient prep and workflow on your coveted kitchen counters. Favorite tools make a home cook's life better in ways they may not have imagined prior to using the appliance. Many of the smartest gadgets solve a perplexing problem, but the best resolve issues before they even arise. Here's 12 super cool and smart kitchen appliances that will make your life easier.

Nothing quite says "home" like the smell of freshly cooked bread. And while I love making bread from scratch and investing all the time into making a crunchy loaf, I have found that a bread machine is the perfect middle ground between simply-available-from-the-store and freshly made. The Zojirushi Home Bakery Virtuoso Plus Breadmaker is an excellent bread machine, and with all the settings and features, it's one smart little tool.

One of the best parts about making bread at home, aside from all the smells, of course, is that you know exactly what's going in your loaf. There's no mystery ingredients here, and once you find your go-to bread recipes, they'll be on repeat. I'm a big fan of The Ultimate Bread Machine Cookbook, and the recipes work well in this Zojirushi machine.

With the Home Bakery Virtuoso Plus Breadmaker, you're at no loss for the many different types of breads you can create. In fact, there are 14 pre-programmed course settings, so this smart machine can make everything from white bread for a sandwich to sourdough for the perfect soup bread. The bread machine can also make unexpected treats like crave worthy coffee cake and even jam to share with your neighbors. The Zojirushi also offers a 15th course that is a homemade setting. This one is a highly customizable cycle with the ability for you to have the machine memorize up to three different homemade courses. This allows more flexibility for bakers who want more control over what the machine does and for how long. There's no need to limit your bread machine to loaves.

The Breville Barista Touch Espresso Machine is one smart espresso machine. Technology and coffee? Yes, please! Like most all-in-one machines, the Barista Touch is outfitted with a built-in grinder, espresso maker, and steaming wand. Its tech update comes in the form of a touch screen where you can select your specific beverage. Normally, I don't love espresso machines that simply do it all; I'm more of a manual espresso and separate grinder fan, but if you want the smart espresso machine experience, check out Breville's Barista Touch.

There are certain parts of coffee making that really feel best when done by hand — like tamping, for example. Even though much of this machine is automated, you still get that tactile tamping experience. Practically zero barista experience is necessary for your Breville to make quality coffee, and that's part of what makes this machine so bright. It knows everything, so you don't need to, and your home could become your favorite coffee shop. Add some great coffee syrups, and you'll be whipping out lattes made with beautifully foamed milk in no time. It might just be time to study up on tips to make beautiful latte art.

Preparing large meals has plenty of stressors, but the MEATER takes one concern off your plate and monitors the temperature of your cooking protein for you. After prepping your meat, you'll insert the cleaned MEATER into your protein and from your phone, tell the thermometer what kind of protein you're cooking, the desired temperature you're aiming for, and it'll start working. Now, while you work on the different elements of your meal, you can touch base with the temperature of your perfect ham, chicken, turkey, or roast anytime.

This is helpful, especially for lengthy cooking endeavors. Through the app, you'll see roughly how much time you have before you pull from your grill, smoker, or oven, and allow it to rest. If you have an Apple Watch, you can even monitor the temperature from your wrist, all while mashing potatoes, tossing salad, or doing whatever else needs to be done. After use, you'll clean the MEATER and return it to the bamboo charging base. Smart, convenient, and super helpful. 

There is such a difference between beer from a bottle or can and the fresh-from-the-tap experience. Short of purchasing a keg system for your home, replicating the feel of a pint with the perfect foamy head is nearly impossible — but Fizzics helps change that. This handy gadget will be your kitchen's favorite beer accessory. While the keg life can be limiting, Fizzics works with cans, bottles, and growlers, so you can use favorites you already have.

To use, insert your bottle, can, or growler into the device, feed a hose into the container, and close the top. Outside of the Fizzics, prepare your glass to get an initial pour of the beer by pushing the lever on top forward. Then when you're ready for the topper, pull that same lever backward, and the Fizzics puts out a nice balance of foam. This trick is achieved through the use of sound waves, and it's powered by batteries, allowing for cordless, portable use. So while we love a smart kitchen gadget, this one could be a smart cookout, tiki bar, or even campfire side gadget.

I'll fully admit that making rice on the stove stresses me out. There's always stuck or mushy grains in my pot, and it gets a little frustrating. Needless to say, my Zojirushi Neuro Fuzzy rice cooker and warmer is one of my favorite smart gadgets in the kitchen, especially when that craving hits for a burrito bowl.

Unlike rice preparation on the stove, the process here is as simple as washing rice, adding liquid, and selecting your setting. From there, the cooker knows how to get rice to the perfect tenderness for the specific style of rice. For an easy meal, I like cooking rice then adding beans and protein to the machine, closing it, and allowing everything to warm together. It's an ideal, quick lunch that requires almost no effort on my part. Of course, you can also use a rice cooker in less conventional ways, like using it to cook orzo, for example. 

Very first time I heard of a Ninja Slushi, I knew I wanted one. I anticipated I'd enjoy plenty of sweet frosty alcoholic beverages from it, and it would be the star of any holiday get together. It is, but it's also much more than that — for example, I had no idea how well the Ninja Slushi would work for milkshakes.

The best part about the slushy machine is that it freezes liquid without adding ice to it. The cylindrical cooling unit and rotating auger that turns the liquid in the machine moves it around the cooling chamber, and before long, you have the perfect slushy. With five settings for various slushies, this machine is smart enough to know exactly how cold the chamber and liquid around it needs to be in order to achieve the desired slush level. It takes a whole lot of guesswork out of making some of your favorite frozen drinks. Two of my very favorite things to make with a Ninja Slushi are grasshoppers and chocolate milkshakes. In fact, with Hershey's chocolate syrup, the chocolate milkshake is a dupe for my favorite fast food milkshake from Portillo's.

When you think about all the parts that go into a breakfast sandwich, the prospect of making each item from scratch is slightly daunting: Bread needs to get toasted, eggs cooked, protein warmed — and the cheese must melt for perfect cohesion. The Hamilton Beach Electric Breakfast Sandwich Maker does all of these at once, and you'll have your new favorite breakfast sandwich in little time, without dirtying a single pan or turning on your stovetop.

The genius of this sandwich maker and the real magic works with the heat radiating through the different plates built into the sandwich maker. After cooking, the plate in the middle slides to the side so everything can combine, right on the machine. Your first few times assembling everything, you might have a few flops — but once you get the hang of it, you'll be slinging breakfast sandwiches and creating some pretty unique mixtures of your own. One of my favorite tricks is to put some hot sauce in with the egg as it cooks, because it flavors the entire sandwich. For a fun bread swap on your breakfast sandwich, you could use waffles (cut into circles) instead of English muffins or bagels.

If you were to bring the power of fresh herbs and veggies indoors and supercharge it, you'd have something like the AeroGarden Bounty Elite. Growing your herbs, flowers, and even veggies indoors through this smart garden, you bring your plants lighting that grants them a growing speed roughly five times quicker than they might experience outdoors. Plus, there's no dirt to worry about, since your plants will grow in water.

As someone with a brown thumb, I need all the help I can get to allow plants to thrive. If you're the same, then the automation of water and even plant food reminders will make the process much easier. Not to mention, the seeds come in their very own pods and you just slip them in their appropriate slots. There's nine places, so you have lots of room to add your favorites.

I love the touchscreen and ability to connect to wifi and Alexa devices. Not to mention, there's a vacation mode you can activate to keep your plants happy while you're away. Whoever heard of plants "babysitting" themselves? The AeroGarden Bounty Elite is smart enough to make it happen.

For a time, my family really only drank Nespresso coffee, and we had an Aeroccino to use for latte preparation. While the Nespresso machine has been put away and replaced by new coffee toys, our Nespresso Aeroccino remains a favorite device for frothing milk. The newest frother in the line is the Nespresso Aeroccino 4, and though it seems rather unassuming, it's a pretty smart frother. Pour in your milk, select your setting, and wait for your perfect temperature and froth level.

One of my favorite features of the Aeroccino is that its four different settings produce different kinds of foam. There is a cold foam button, hot milk, light foam, or thick foam. The cold foam obviously doesn't warm your milk and just produces heavily whisked milk. Creamer works very well with the cold foam feature and goes especially well on cold brew. I've also used the Aeroccino for warming apple cider and even eggnog for tasty holiday drinks. One of the most important parts about using the Aeroccino is carefully cleaning it between each use to keep it performing at its smarty pants best!

I simply adore coffee, but I'm terribly bad at drinking it in any kind of timely fashion. Ice melts in my cold drinks and drinks go cold in mugs. That is until the Ember Mug, the one mug I can actually drink my hot lattes out of without fear of the drink going cold.

The big difference is that this mug connects to your phone and through an app where you can set your perfect temperature. After it achieves your temperature, the mug will maintain that temp until you turn it off. For a fun accent, there's even a lit ring that you can change the color of. The mug itself has a charging saucer you charge the mug on, but the battery lasts long enough to enjoy a cup away from the coaster charger. If travel mugs are more your game, Ember also makes a travel version. This on-the-go mug comes in a version with the ability to connect to Apple Find My so you don't need to worry about misplacing your coffee (or expensive mug).

It's hard not to love crunchy ice. The texture it adds to iced coffee and sodas can't be beat (even if your nugget ice doesn't particularly love cocktails). Bringing that experience into your home might feel like a small upgrade, but your family and houseguests will appreciate it. The GE Profile Opal 2.0 XL machine will do just the trick, and it's far more of an upgrade than just new ice trays.

The Opal is a programmable ice machine that recycles its own ice. After you turn the machine on — or it starts up according to the scheduled start time you arrange from your phone — it will produce ice in only a few minutes. In no time, the drawer will fill completely with ice. As you scoop ice and put the drawer back, it will make more ice to add to the top. Whatever you don't use melts and goes right back into the water reservoir.

Think pour over, but made by a robot, and you have xBloom coffee makers. This machine creates pour over coffee with a few touches on the machine and your phone. It's the perfect mix of technology and specialty coffee — and for those who straddle these two worlds, the xBloom Studio is a joy to use. Through the grinding, pouring, and sipping process, the xBloom is smart enough to be your personal robot barista (carefully grinding, dosing, and pouring water to bloom and brew coffee) or relinquish control to you.

The machine can work at a few different levels of automation so baristas with a firm grasp on their precise preferences can enjoy the machine as much as the busiest among us who view coffee as a necessity. Plus, if you are a coffee drinker who enjoys the same bean every day, you can still use your favorite coffee with the xBloom by employing a reusable dripper and fine tuning the recipe for your specific coffee over the xBloom app. Alternatively, the maker has partnerships with many roasters that offer pods for xBloom, including Onyx's Tropical Weather, one of my favorite coffees.

Appliance shops and online retailers are stuffed with tools for your kitchen, and these gadgets are getting smarter. Some of them connect to apps, many are programmable, and they all aim to improve your kitchen experience and develop efficient workflows. To choose the best of the best, I researched each item through reviews and company information on the products. 

In many instances, these are tools I know well because I use them on a regular basis and love how well they work. In the instances where I don't own the product, reviews and product information were convincing enough to help me grow quite the wish list for my kitchen.