Cost: $50.30

Attention! This ain’t no toy. It’s a lean, mean, flame-throwing machine. Of course, while not a toy, we still have a lot of fun with ours. All that glorious butane makes us feel powerful. And, the many ways we use our kitchen torch make us feel like the culinary avant-garde.

Once upon a time, we’d see a kitchen torch on a wedding registry and scoff. “How many times can one couple make crème brulee?” we’d ask. It seemed like a novelty: one of those things that people got, then immediately lost forever in a drawer. How wrong we were.

First, we discounted the awesomeness of homemade crème brulee. It’s legit. Second, and more importantly, we underestimated the kitchen torch’s utility, especially when it comes to modernist cooking.

Last year, we got a Sous Vide Supreme. Sous vide, a method using vacuum-sealed food cooked in a temperature-controlled water bath, is so simple yet so flawless that it feels like cheating. It delivers meat cooked inch-to-inch to the desired temperature. If we want a medium-rare steak, then we get one at precisely 134°F. We still need to caramelize the meat’s crust and render its fat. We usually do this with a hard sear in a cast-iron skillet. But, enter the kitchen torch. Flame directly on meat. A tale as old as time, a song as old as rhyme, (Beauty and the Beast.)

Here’s a flame-finished Rack of Lamb:

If someone you know enjoys fire and cooking, especially combined, they’d probably like a Rösle Kitchen Torch. Don’t believe us ? It has near perfecti ratings on Amazon.com.