Description
What the George Foreman GR0040B is
This is the smallest and simplest grill in the George Foreman range: a two serving contact grill with fixed plates, a cool touch handle, a power indicator light and nothing else. There is no thermostat, no timer, no temperature dial and no removable plates. It plugs in, it heats up, and the light tells you it is on.
Published dimensions are 8 inches deep by 8.5 wide by 9 high and the weight is 3 pounds. The housing and handle are plastic, the finish is black, and no assembly is required. The listing dates it to May 2013, and the manufacturer is recorded as Spectrum Brands.
The whole design rests on one idea, which the listing calls the exclusive fat removing design. The cooking plates are set at an angle so fat rendered from the food runs down and off into a tray rather than pooling around it. Combined with the George Tough nonstick coating, which means no oil is needed to stop food sticking, that is the entire proposition: less fat goes in and some of what was already there comes out.
How a two serving contact grill behaves
Both plates heat and the hinged upper plate rests on the food, so cooking happens from above and below at once. That roughly halves the time compared with a single sided pan and removes the need to turn anything. For a burger, a chicken breast, a sandwich or a piece of fish, it is fast and it is hard to get wrong.
Two servings is an honest description. This is a grill for one or two people, and it will take two burgers or two modest chicken breasts. It will not cook for a family and it does not pretend to.
The absence of a temperature control is the defining limitation. The plates run at one fixed temperature, so the only variables available to the cook are how thick the food is and how long it stays in. That is fine for the foods this grill is aimed at and it is a real constraint for anything that wants gentle heat. A model with sensor cooking such as the Tefal OptiGrill GC712D54 sits at the opposite end of that scale.
Cleaning and the fixed plate problem
The grease tray is listed as dishwasher safe, and it is the only part that is. The plates are fixed to the appliance and cannot be removed for washing, which means cleaning happens at the counter with a damp cloth or a paper towel while the plates are still warm and the residue has not set hard.
Anyone who has owned a contact grill knows this is the point at which they either stay in use or go into a cupboard. Fixed plates are the main reason grills at this price get abandoned. The nonstick coating helps considerably, and warm wiping works well if it is done immediately, but there is no route to putting the cooking surface in a sink.
Nonstick coatings on fixed plates are also a wear item with no replacement path. Metal utensils and abrasive cleaning will shorten the life of the surface, and once the coating goes the appliance is finished.
Two data problems in the listing
The wattage is recorded as 1.5E+3, which is a spreadsheet rendering of 1500 watts. Fifteen hundred watts is a high figure for a grill with a cooking surface this small, and given the notation has clearly been mangled it should be treated as unverified rather than repeated as fact. The voltage is listed as 110 volts, which is the older way of describing the same nominal 120 volt North American supply rather than a different requirement.
The UPC field contains roughly thirty different codes. That is a sign the Amazon record has been merged across a long history of variants and color options, and it means the specification shown may not correspond precisely to the unit that ships. Confirm the model code on arrival.
What the fat removing claim means
The sloped plate is the design the brand was built on, and it does something real without doing what people sometimes assume. Fat that renders out of meat during cooking runs down the incline and off the plate into the tray, so it is not reabsorbed and is not sitting in the pan. That measurably reduces the fat in the finished food compared with frying in a flat pan where the same fat pools around it.
What it does not do is remove fat that is bound up in the meat itself. A fatty burger cooked on this grill is still a fatty burger, just with some rendered fat drained away. The larger contribution is the nonstick coating, because it removes the need to add oil at the start. Between the two, the honest description is less added fat and some rendered fat removed, which is a genuine improvement and not a transformation.
Highlights
- Sloped plates that drain rendered fat away from the food.
- George Tough nonstick coating, so no oil is needed.
- Dishwasher safe grease tray.
- Cool touch handle and a power indicator light.
- Cooks from both sides at once, roughly halving cooking time.
- Very compact at 8 by 8.5 by 9 inches and 3 pounds.
- No assembly and nothing to set up.
- Free standing, so it can be stored upright in a cupboard.
Things To Consider
- The plates are fixed and cannot be removed for washing. Only the grease tray goes in the dishwasher.
- There is no temperature control at all. One fixed heat, and nothing else.
- No timer, no indicator for when the plates have reached temperature beyond the power light.
- Two servings is the real capacity. It will not cook for a family.
- The wattage is recorded in corrupted scientific notation and should be treated as unverified.
- Closing plates flatten food, and delicate items suffer.
- The nonstick coating is a wear item with no replacement path.
- Around thirty UPC codes appear in the listing, indicating a heavily merged record.
Who it suits
This is a good buy for one person, a student, a small office or anyone who wants a fast hot surface for a burger or a sandwich and nothing more complicated. It costs little, takes almost no space, needs no setup and does its one job quickly. For a first appliance in a first apartment it is hard to argue with.
It is the wrong grill for anyone cooking for more than two, for anyone who wants temperature control, and for anyone unwilling to wipe plates by hand after every use. Buyers who want an open grilling surface should look at the Starfrit The Rock smokeless grill, and those who mostly cook breakfast should compare the Bethany Housewares electric griddle. Anyone feeding a crowd should read the VEVOR hot dog roller review, and the full range sits in the electric grills category.
