My teenager saw this toaster in a catalog and thought it sounded like an easy way to make tasty hot dogs, but he is sorely disappointed in its performance. The instructions state that the hot dogs should be room temperature when inserted into the toaster. Who keeps their meat at room temperature? If the hot dogs are cold when put in the toaster, the outside gets warm but the inside remains cold. Thus, they need to be toasted several times to get them warm all the way through, or else they need to be warmed up in the microwave first-what a pain! Setting the heat for the highest temperature does a better job of heating the hot dog, but also a better job of burning the edges of the bun. He has had problems with the regular size hot dogs expanding and being difficult to remove. Also, during one of the repeated toasting episodes, he pushed the stop button and it fell back into the machine, so now he must use a chopstick to activate the stop mechanism. I found this toaster online for $12.95, but wish I had bought a toaster oven instead-it would have done the same job and been much more versatile.