We have a hate/love relationship with our cooling racks. On the one hand they are indispensable for helping cakes and cookies to cool faster and more evenly. One the other hand, they get tangled in a maddening way in our baking cupboard. Lee Valley has one solution to this dilemma: An expandable cooling rack.
This cooling rack expands from 14" x 14" to a fully extended length of 14" x 35." That's pretty big! That would be big enough for a major batch of cookies, and yet take up a nicely compact space in your cupboard. The racks are made out of nickel-plated steel mesh panels, and they slide like drawers to nest into each other for storage.
Do you have an expandable cooling rack? What do you think of it?
• Find it: Expandable Cooling Rack, $19.95 at Lee Valley Tools
Related: Quick Tip: How to Build a Make-Shift Cooling Rack
(Image: Lee Valley Tools)
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Comments (8)
I love Lee Valley Hardware. Don't know if I've ever bought anything from them, but I sure do have fun reading their catalogs!
That seems like unnecessary cleaning - I have a hard enough time getting one cooling rack clean, but three together? My sink isn't big enough!
I have one, but it expands to two levels rather than out. Which I find pretty convenient since it doesn't take up as much counter space. I'm not sure of the measurements.. it may end up being slightly smaller than the one here. I think it's probably the size of 1.5 standard cooling racks. And it comes in pretty handy when I need to cool a bunch of things at once! I just try to put the newest batch on the top level since heat rises.. I figure putting them on the bottom would slow the cooling of the ones above!
This looks awesome! I have a stacking cooling rack, which is a pain to store and set up. This takes up more counter space, but is worth it, I bet.
I have a couple of the CIA cooling racks that fit inside of a half sheet pan. They work perfectly for me. I've never needed more cooling real estate than the two of those provide.
Purchased one of these from BBB a few weeks ago, love it! Expanded to fit my dozens of valentine cookies and retracts for my weekly loaves of bread. Couldn't be happier with it.
Oh, don't clean your racks... put paper towels or parchment on them. It absorbs the oil as they're cooling and keeps the good soft ones from falling through.
I always hate cleaning metal racks. This one looks like it would be a nightmare to clean.