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Popcorn Machine Review - Whirley Pop 6-Quart Hand-Cranked Stovetop Popcorn Popper

Author: Stephen Turner, for www.machinepopcorn.co.uk

When making popcorn, there are a number of ways to skin the proverbial cat: you can do it in the microwave, get a plug in electric popcorn machine, perhaps one of the smaller capacity air popper popcorn machines, or you can go for the traditional stovetop technique - which this model does. This popcorn machine retails at around $22-25 dollars on amazon.com and, as with the review of the West Bend 82306X, I kept this pricing in mind in providing this review. When a popcorn machines is this cheap, I am not critical unless the popcorn machine has clear faults - which in my view this one does. But first, the plus points. What attracts some people to stove top popcorn machines - that they look like something grandma used - is the very thing that puts some people off them. It all comes down to personal visual taste. I'm going to leave my view on looks out of this review and focus on the results - that is to say, the taste it leaves in your mouth. This aluminum stove top popcorn machine (like other stove top machines I have tried) does produce popcorn that tastes just like grandma used to make. For this reason alone, this product will do its bit to ensure the continuing popularity of stove top popcorn machines amongst good ole boys like me. The machine also works extremely quickly, producing popcorn in about 3 minutes. Results in the popcorn world do not come much faster.

So what is wrong with this machine? Well, I think the problem stems from the fact that to keep the price down, too many corners had to be cut on design and materials. The bottom of the pan is very thin and the aluminum warped after reheating and cooling; the stirring mechanism on the top of the popcorn machine did not run smoothly. I did a bit of Internet research and I found a number of reviews that pulled the product up on this point. In some instances, the stirring mechanism seized up once in a while- in others it packed up all together. Further, I found that even if you do use the stirring mechanism as instructed, you still have to time it just right to pop most of the kernels without burning anything. To be fair, however, this is a drawback of all stove tops and not just this one.

In summary, if traditional tasting popcorn is what you are after then this product will deliver what you are looking for. However, looking at the product as a whole it suffers from poor build quality and really needs a bit more money spent on it in development.