I make McDonald's-style breakfasts for £1.62 with cut-price kitchen gadget

When the craving for a warm, hearty breakfast strikes, a sneaky McDonald's sausage and egg McMuffin often becomes our family go-to on busy weekend mornings. Always a crowd pleaser, it's so much quicker than cooking a fry up at home.

As a family, we generally aim to maintain a healthy diet, but occasionally, a breakfast treat from McDonald's is just the ticket to kickstart the day. For fast food enthusiasts keen on keeping their budget under control, an electric breakfast sandwich maker promises to whip up a cheaper alternative at home. Currently on offer on shopping platform Yimbly (owned by the Express' parent company Reach Plc), shoppers could snag one for £29.99 - potentially less than a MacDonald's Big Breakfast for four.

Originally priced at £39.99, Yimbly has already dropped the price of the Drew and Cole Breakfast Sandwich Maker. With a limited-time deal offering 10% off everything using the code SUMMERDAYS10, the price drops even further - making it one of the most affordable muffin makers I've found online.

Having had the pleasure of trying the Drew and Cole gadget for myself last year, we've become pros at whipping up McDonald's-style breakfast treats at home. With frozen sausage patties, eggs, English muffins and American-style cheese slices, creating these delights at home is a doddle.

The method couldn't be simpler - pop your muffin on the bottom, stack it with your chosen pre-cooked fillings, then crack an egg into the upper compartment to fry on the sizzling plate. Once the egg is fried to your liking, just twist the lower plate and hey presto, your breakfast muffin is ready to tuck into.

I've found that the egg fries up in a jiffy and the cheese melts to perfection swiftly, so aside from the time taken to cook the sausage patties and bacon in advance, you can indeed rustle up "perfect English muffins in less than five minutes."

But here's the rub: while the muffins look smashing, we mainly use the Drew and Cole for frying the egg, melting the cheese, and putting together the final masterpiece with a bit of flair - for pre-cooking the sausages and bacon we still use the air fryer.

That said, it can prove to be much cheaper than buying from the drive through. To give you an idea of how much it costs, here's a run down of my usual ingredients:

• Tesco frozen sausage patties - £2.50
• Tesco cheese slices - £1.39
• Tesco medium eggs x 6 - £1.40
• Tesco English muffins x 4 - £1.20

With just the above, I manage to create four fantastic breakfast muffins at £1.62 each, which is a lot cheaper.

Compact at just 14cm tall and 16cm wide, the sandwich maker is a cinch to stow away when it's not in use. Plus, it's a breeze to clean - a swift wipe of the plates is all it takes.

If the breakfast muffin maker isn't quit right, Amazon is offering the Breville Sandwich Press for £27. This versatile appliance boasts a spacious, flat plate perfect for whipping up an array of sandwiches, paninis, muffins and more.

Alternatively, Argos is selling the Giles and Posner Crepe Maker. The easy to use electric hot plate is on sale for £25 and is a great choice for anyone who likes pancakes with their breakfast.

Fellow fast food enthusiasts who have switched to making muffins at home have left reviews for theDrew & Cole Breakfast Sandwich Makeron Google.

One buyer described the gadget as being "Brilliant." They continued: "I love, love, love this little gadget. It's just like buying from McDonalds.A word to the wise - use small eggs, otherwise they leak out. Very easy to clean, just wipe it down when you're finished cooking"

A second added: "Great gadget. Takes a bit of getting used to. Made some wonderful things with it. I love experimenting with different fillings."

Another shopper was delighted with their purchase, exclaiming: "Every sandwich I have cooked in this has been perfect. I've used it with bread, English muffins and crumpets, as well as fried and scrambled egg and a variety of cooked meats and bacon."

Sadly, not everyone was quite so impressed with one buyer saying: "Quite disappointed with this to be honest. Its a little fiddly to use. On one run the egg took way longer than 5 minutes to cook. All the levels are fiddly to use and by nature of its design its quite ricketty. Nice idea that is not quite perfected."

For the most part though, buyers like me love it. Another summed up the ease of use, adding: "This breakfast sandwich maker is the best thing since sliced bread. It is so easy to use and makes a brilliant sandwich. I wish I'd had one of these years ago."

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