Sage The No Mess Waffle Maker review: The ultimate breakfast companion

Sage’s No Mess Waffle Maker is a stylish, premium option aimed at true waffle aficionados. Not only is it guaranteed to add a touch of class to your countertop with its sleek, stainless steel design, it also produces tasty waffles quickly and effectively.

Alongside the handy batter overflow channel, from which it gets its name, The No Mess Waffle Maker includes temperature control settings and a number of other well-thought design touches and features, all of which help it stand out from more straightforward, budget-priced waffle makers. If you’re willing to spend that little bit extra, choosing the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker will allow you to whip up tasty breakfast treats with ease and style.

Sage The No Mess Waffle Maker review: What do you get for the money?

The Sage No Mess Waffle Maker has a stylish brushed stainless steel body and sits fairly compactly in your kitchen, with its countertop footprint measuring just 29.2 x 24.1 x 14.6cm (WDH). The exterior of the appliance has two lights, one to show the waffle maker is on and one to signal it has reached temperature. There’s also a temperature control dial with seven settings to help you achieve your perfect level of crispness. Lifting up its hinged lid, you’ll find a circular waffle plate split into four sections. This plate is made from die-cast aluminium treated with a non-stick coating and can produce a waffle approximately 16.83 x 14.29cm in size. Running around the waffle plate is a non-stick overflow channel, which catches any excess batter which would otherwise spill onto your countertop. Other notable physical features include the handle clip, which allows you to lock the waffle maker shut for simpler storage, and the “Thermal Pro” internal heating coil which, according to Sage, is designed to distribute heat more evenly and make sure all parts of your waffle cook at the same rate.

While the premium look and feel of this appliance match up well with its £110 price tag, we do have a number of cheaper models we recommend if you simply don’t feel comfortable spending over £100 on a waffle maker. Utilising a similar overflow channel system to Sage, Lakeland’s No Mess Waffle Maker (£60) is a great budget-friendly alternative. Regularly retailing at just over half the price of the Sage model, Lakeland’s waffle maker can produce four well-cooked waffles at a time with minimal fuss, though it does have a bulkier, plastic body and lacks the temperature control settings you get with the Sage.

Coming down even further in price, some great sub-£50 options include the VonShef Waffle Maker (£30), a no-frills quad waffle maker, and the Salter Deep Fill Waffle Maker (£24), a compact twin waffle maker designed to produce thicker waffles than the other models listed above.

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Sage The No Mess Waffle Maker review: What’s good about it?

The short answer? Pretty much everything. But to go into a little more depth, the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker looks and feels like a premium product straight away. Its sleek circular shape and sturdy stainless body make for a very aesthetically pleasing piece of kit, with the waffle plate inside looking similarly sturdy and well-designed.

While testing, I was pleased to find that the Sage No Mess had a nicely long power cord, measuring a little over 1m, making it easier to find a spot to set it up in the kitchen compared to many other appliances I’ve tested. Getting started, I clicked the waffle maker on at setting four using the dial. It felt much smoother and more controlled than most waffle makers I’ve previously tested, which simply start heating up the moment they’re plugged in. The waffle maker took just over five minutes to reach temperature after being turned on, which isn’t the fastest times we’ve seen but things moved quickly from there. Handily, the machine lets out three audible beeps to notify you when it has reached temperature, and to let you know when your waffles are cooked, meaning you don’t have to stand over the machine waiting for a light to change.

I tried out three temperature settings on the Sage No Mess for my first run, setting four, setting one and setting seven – the Maximum. Each setting took an average of three minutes to cook the recommended 125ml of batter to completion. While the machine is designed to cook one waffle after another in quick succession, for testing purposes, I changed the temperature setting in between cooks to try varying levels of brownness on my waffles. In between batches, the machine took four and a half minutes to cool from setting four to setting one and heated up from setting one to the maximum in just two minutes and twenty-five seconds. This means it won’t take you a significant extra amount of time if all the members of your household want their waffles done a little differently. One standout thing I noticed while making the various batches was the excellent design of the appliance’s handle. Unlike many waffle makers, the handle didn’t heat up during use, sitting up and out from the main body and kept my hands clear of any steam clouds being released when opening up the waffle maker.

Of course, all the design touches in the world wouldn’t matter if it didn’t make great waffles. Thankfully, there’s no need to worry there, as all three waffles I made turned out really well. The No Mess produces thick circular waffles, with the four segment design of the plates making them easy to split up and share. The setting one waffles were soft and bouncy, while the setting seven waffles were beautifully crisp throughout. Being a bit of a Goldilocks, I was most taken with setting four, where the waffles had a nice exterior crispness while maintaining some softness inside.

Once all the waffle making was finished, the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker left minimal clean-up to be done. The exterior moat caught and cooked off any excess batter that escaped the plates – even when I deliberately overfilled the machine for testing purposes – so my countertops were saved from needing a cleaning. The plates themselves have an effective non-stick coating, meaning that a simple wipe down with a damp cloth suffices to tidy them up after use.

Sage The No Mess Waffle Maker review: What could be better?

Outside of its three-figure price, the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker leaves very little to complain about. At this price, it would be nice if the appliance’s plates were removable, for situations where it may need a more thorough clean. But as noted above, the non-stick coating is very effective and the crevices on the plates are shallow enough to be easily reached into and cleaned with a damp cloth.

If I were to reach for a true complaint, I would say that the handle on the waffle maker can slam shut a little abruptly from a lifted position if it’s bumped or moved. For safety’s sake, a soft-close hinge or something similar would be a welcome addition.

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Sage The No Mess Waffle Maker review: Should you buy it?

If the price doesn’t put you off, then the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker is easy to recommend, being the best waffle maker I’ve tested to date. The appliance is gorgeously designed and feels solid and sturdy in use, the overflow moat and effective non-stick coating mean that it lives up to its name and the range of temperature settings available on the device make it a doddle to cook your waffles to your preferred level of crispiness and browning.

If you’re looking to make beautifully textured, tasty waffles with a minimum of fuss and hassle, you won’t do any better than the Sage No Mess Waffle Maker.