Review - Electric Salt and Pepper Mills and Recipe - Summer Chicken Traybake

 AD: I was sent the salt and pepper mills for review: all thoughts and opinions are my own. 

I was recently approached by Oliver, of Oliver's Kitchen, to see if I would like to review one of his range of kitchen appliances. Oliver's Kitchen is a small, family run business and you can read about them (and see some gorgeous baby photos!) here. 

They sell a small but very useful range of kitchen items,  the kind of practical workhorse items every kitchen needs rather than the snazzy stick-it-in-a-drawer-and-forget-it stuff. I chose to review the electric salt and pepper mills, as they looked so smart and stylish. The pair is currently on offer  at £16.99. 

The brushed steel finish is very smart - and having already splashed turmeric on them I can reassure you that it's very easy to clean too. 

The box says 4 x AA batteries are required, but that's for each mill, so you need a good supply of batteries to get started. Because of the moving parts, I'm guessing the battery life will be pretty short,  but as the batteries I used claim to have a lifetime of up to 10 years it may be a long time before I can confirm or deny that. 

So, I had my mills, I had my batteries, my salt and pepper were ready -  but then came the time to put the batteries and seasonings into the mills. It took me and Mark several minutes to work out how to open the mills and where to insert the batteries; an instruction leaflet in the box might have made things easier. However once you have the knack, filling them is very easy. 

There is a base plate on each mill to save mess on the worktop. At the moment, we are still not used to taking it off before using the mills, so nearly every time we use them, one or the other of us is puzzled to see nothing coming out, but that aside they are very easy to use and have the huge advantage of being easy to operate with one hand, perfect when you are seasoning a sauce that needs to be stirred. 

As you can see, you get a nice even scattering although you can't adjust the size of the grind. 

These mills would be perfect for anyone with dexterity problems - my mother has arthritic hands and had to stop using her pepper mill several years ago because she could no longer grip and twist it. They might need help with filling them and changing the batteries, but for daily use the simplicity of use would be a real boon. 

Now on to the recipe - you can see it before cooking in the photo above. 

Summer Chicken Traybake 

On the few hot days we had last month (please don't say that's all the summer we're getting this year!) the last thing either of us wanted to do was spend ages in the kitchen, so an all-in-one dish that pretty much looks after itself would have been perfect. Unfortunately I didn't come up with this until the weather had turned wet and distinctly chilly - but there are still several months of summer to come! 

Ingredients (to serve two) 

2 chicken breast portions, skin on (If you can only get skinless ones, wrap the chicken in the bacon rashers instead of making the bacon into rolls, to stop the meat drying out) 

6 rashers streaky bacon

new potatoes - however many you expect to eat (we all seem to have different capacities for new potatoes!) halved if large

2 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

2 torpedo shallots, peeled and halved keeping the root ends of each half intact

1 lemon, cut into quarters

2 large cloves of garlic, peeled and left whole

3 bayleaves

3 large sprigs of thyme

2 tablespoons sunflower, rapeseed or light olive oil

seasoning

½ cup frozen peas, defrosted. 

Preheat oven to 190 C (170 C fan), 375 F, gas mark 5. 

In a large roasting tin, mix together the veg (except the peas), herbs, lemon, garlic and oil. Toss until everything is coated then spread evenly over the tin. Place the chicken breasts on top of the veg. Roll the bacon into little rolls and tuck in here and there around the tray. Season and place in the oven. 

After 45 minutes remove from the oven and use tongs (they sell those at Oliver's Kitchen too!) to remove the lemon, garlic and herbs. Scatter the peas over the veg and return to the oven for 5-10 minutes. 

I made an onion gravy to serve with this but it didn't really need it, it's a complete one-dish meal.