One complaint sometimes lodged against the modern American male is that every project is an excuse to buy a new tool. I'm worse than that—I don't actually need a project: I'll buy a neat tool and then find a project for it. When I saw the hand-held infrared themometer on the shelf at Costco (only $50! It's CHRISTMAS!!!), I knew with a certainty far beyond faith, experience, or divine revelation that I needed it. The fact that I didn't know what I needed it for was completely immaterial.
The thing itself is kind of like a hand-held barcode reader, but it displays the temperature of whatever you point it at. It has a 10-to-1 cone ratio, so if you have it 10 inches from an object, it measures a 1-inch diameter circle. You just pick it up, pull the trigger, and one second later, it displays a temperature.
There are cooking applications, but it also just great fun. I live in a loft with 15 foot high ceilings and when I heat the place, there is a big temperature differential. When I point the "gun" at the floor, it may read 70 degrees, but if I point it at the ceiling, it is likely to read 85 degrees or so. When I point it at a cloudy sky it reads close to the ambient temperature. If I point it at the blue sky, it reads about 15 deg F! It always makes sense, and it is SO cool.
As a cooking tool, I've used it to measure water temperature for brewing different types of teas. Green teas should be brewed at about 160 deg, oolongs, 175, and black teas at 200+. And if I was the outdoor grilling type, I'm certain it would be useful for measuring coal temperatures and getting some real feedback on grilling results. It is also good for checking the temperature of the freezer and the refrigerator.
A hand-held infrared themometer is the best kind of gadget, it seems to have an almost limitless number of uses, one just needs to be experimentive and creative to discover them. I'm pretty sure that if you've got a copy of "On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen," you need an infrared themometer.
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