Tramezzino, which means "to eat between two pieces of bread" in Italian, is a hot sandwich cooker made of die-cast aluminum, which has excellent thermal conductivity. Just heat the sandwich over a burner until it is lightly browned, and your hot sandwich will be ready in no time.
The Tramezzino can make two hot sandwiches at a time, and you can remove one of the plates and use it like a frying pan to fry fried eggs or sausages, or to fry different ingredients on each side. Because Tramezzino is so easy to use, users have come up with a wide variety of recipes, which are helping to further spread the product's appeal.
There is a story of overwhelming passion behind the creation of Tramezzino.
In 1999, Snow Peak staff, including current Chairman Tohru Yamai, visited a campsite on the border of Kochi Prefecture for the camping event the Snow Peak Way in Shikoku. At the time, many of the staff were not good at cooking, so breakfast at the Snow Peak Way was traditionally French toast that Tohru himself would make for the staff. However, it was a little cold that day, so Tohru wanted to feed the staff something warm.
In response to Tohru's question, "What should I have today? I want to eat something warm," one staff member suggested, "I want to eat a hot sandwich!" and that was the idea that was adopted.
If you want to make hot sandwiches, you need a hot sandwich cooker. So, Tohru and the sales staff in charge of the Shikoku area at the time drove about an hour to the city center to buy a hot sandwich cooker.
However, despite visiting several stores, including outdoor shops, they couldn't find the ideal hot sandwich cooker. They had no choice but to purchase several products from other companies and tried using them when they returned to the campsite, but they were very dissatisfied with how they felt to use. They were difficult to store and food burned easily. And they were difficult to clean when they wanted to remove the burnt food. Most of the hot sandwich makers on the market at the time had long handles that made them inconvenient to carry around.
"I want a hot sandwich cooker that's easier to use and can make delicious hot sandwiches." This desire from the user's perspective led to the development of the Tramezzino hot sandwich cooker.
The aims were that it be easy to store and make delicious food
To make a delicious hot sandwich, it is important to transfer heat well and prevent the bread from burning. Determining the thickness of the cooker body that holds the bread is a crucial factor that affects the taste, and this required precise testing. If it is too thin, the bread will burn, and if it is too thick, it will not transfer heat well.
The material used is also important for transferring heat, and we used aluminum die-cast, which has excellent thermal conductivity.
Aluminum die casting is a material whose density changes depending on the manufacturing process, making it very complicated to balance factors such as thermal efficiency and processing. However, it has the advantage of having good thermal conductivity and being able to heat ingredients evenly throughout, resulting in surprisingly delicious food.
After pouring the aluminum into the mold, gas pressure is used to push the aluminum from the bottom to the top, allowing the aluminum to be distributed throughout the entire mold. The excess air becomes what is called burrs. These burrs are knocked off and polished to make them even.
The Tsubame-Sanjo craftsmen were proud to overcome difficult challenges.
The two tabs that allow the product to be attached and detached were particularly difficult to create. They had a stopper that would lock in when the product was opened to a certain extent, and they tried to express this in the castings, allowing the product to be removed halfway.
To achieve this, the skills of the craftsman were essential. The temperature control of the raw materials was also an important factor. If the temperature was too high, the material would burn, and if it was too low, it would not flow, so the temperature had to be adjusted to the right level.
The pursuit of design of functionality for excellent storage.
Furthermore, to make it suitable for outdoor use, it had to be designed to fold easily when stored.
Firstly the handle was shortened to the bare minimum. While long handles were the norm for hot sandwich cookers up until then, the decision was made at an early stage to make the handle short and compact.
However, shortening the length of the handle allowed heat to reach the handle. To solve this problem, they used bamboo, which is easy to hold and provides a gentle grip. When you grip the handle, there is just the right amount of tension, so you can feel that it has been pressed firmly.
The handles could move about. So by adding metal fittings on the end of the handle, the handle can lock when folded, allowing you to hold it in place while sandwiching it - giving you peace of mind.
The Tramezzino was also designed to be foldable. When folded, the concept was that it would fit snugly against the cooker body, resulting in a very compact shape.
This is how a long-selling product that has been on the market for over 20 years was born.
Adapted from the original blog on the Snow Peak Japan website
