Sanford 0.6L Rice Cooker - SF1157RC

The Sanford SF1157RC is the smallest cooker in Sanford's drum range — a 0.6 litre pot rated at 300 watts, built for one or two people rather than a household. That is the whole point of it. A 1.8 litre cooker asked to make a single portion wastes both space and power, while this one cooks the amount a couple actually eats in a sitting and then gets out of the way.

Operation is a single lever. Rinse the rice, add water, press down, and the cooker takes it from there. A permanent magnetic control system reads the moment the water has boiled off and releases the switch on its own, dropping into Keep Warm so the rice holds at serving temperature until you come back to it. Two indicator lights, one for Cook and one for Warm, tell you which mode you are in without having to check the lever.

The aluminium inner pot is coated non-stick and lifts straight out of the base, which matters more on a small cooker than a large one — a thin layer of rice is exactly what catches and burns on a bare pot. Grains release cleanly and the pot goes to the sink. Above it sits a steamer tray that uses the steam already at work on the rice, so a piece of fish or a handful of vegetables cooks at the same time, on one socket. The glass lid lets you follow all of it without lifting off the heat.

On safety, the outer body is cool-touch so it can be handled while it is running, and the element is protected by a thermal fuse backed by a built-in temperature protection system, which is the part that matters if the cooker is ever switched on dry.

Two things to know before you buy. This is a mechanical cooker — one lever, two lights, no timer and no delay start — so it will not have rice waiting for you at a set hour. And only the pot, the steamer tray and the lid come out for washing; the base holds the element and the switch, so it gets wiped down rather than washed.