Tuesday, 30 October 2018
Great British Bake Off finalist Richard Burr puts Triton Tools to the test...in the kitchen
We know Triton Tools excel in the workshop, but how do they perform in the heat of the kitchen?
We teamed up with The Great British Bake Off finalist Richard Burr to find out.
View full video now! Building a Bake with Triton Tools
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When I was on the Great British
Bake Off in 2014, Mary Berry remarked how surprised she was that my builder
hands were able to produce such dainty bakes. But as most builders know,
working with your hands is second nature and having precision with the tools
you use is particularly important.
I recently had the pleasure of
working on a fun baking project with Triton Tools. Triton make woodworking
tools – chisels, planes, drills, sanders and the like. They asked me to make a
tool box cake, simple enough. However, they asked me to make it using
woodworking tools. Now, as a builder, I am very familiar with the tools of my
trade and what constitutes appropriate use for them. So, armed with my trusty
pencil, an orbital sander and the all-important can-do attitude I set to work.
I’m in the middle of rebuilding my
own kitchen, and Triton’s tools have come in so useful for this. As my home
kitchen is a work in progress, we were filming across the road in my parents’ house
this time, in the kitchen where I learned to cook years ago. My Dad and I built
a new kitchen here recently, so gone is all the evidence of my youthful cooking
disasters including (but not limited to) pan burns in the lino, burn marks on
the ceiling, gouges in the worktops, and one broken window. Sorry Mum!
If you’re going to construct
something out of food, gingerbread is a good place to start. Not only is it
strong, stable and easy to shape, but when made correctly it is delicious –
especially if you have a good supply of tea for dunking. Sticking with the
ginger theme, I made a ginger sponge cake to line the toolbox.
I used a Triton cordless electric
drill to whisk the cake mix but fitted it with a balloon whisk attachment. This
was the first time I’d mixed a cake with a cordless drill but it worked so well
I might end up keeping one in the kitchen permanently.
With the sponge in the oven, it
was time for the main event – the gingerbread. No matter the time of year, as
soon as I smell gingerbread in a kitchen it makes me think of Christmas. The
gingerbread recipe in my book, B.I.Y. Bake It Yourself, is perfect for building
bakes – it’s both delicious and stable.
I always roll my gingerbread out
on a piece of parchment paper to about 3mm thick – the thickness of a pound
coin. For this Triton project, I pre-made templates for the box and the tools
and dusted them with flour, so they didn’t stick to the raw gingerbread. Once
the shapes were cut and in the oven it was time to get the kettle on again –
baking is always thirsty work! My top tip for gingerbread construction: half
way through the bake, take the gingerbread out of the oven, put the templates
back over them and cut away any gingerbread that has expanded beyond their
original shapes. Then pop them back in the oven and finish baking.
When the gingerbread had cooled,
Triton’s gear came into play. I set the toolbox pieces in a massive Triton SuperJaws
vice and set to smoothing off the edges. For this I used an orbital sander,
like all bakers should! Seriously – the fine, straight edge an orbital sander
gives to a piece of gingerbread is astonishing! If I’d had one of those in the
tent I would have been a happy man. I used the Triton orbital sander again at
work today to sand some oak worktops and I can assure you the saw dust wasn’t
as tasty this time around. The sides of the toolbox were designed to slot
together so with my gingerbread still clamped I used my sharp chisels to tidy
up the interlocking parts.
Once I had built the body of the
box I reinforced it with a little royal icing – mixed up using my balloon whisk
and drill combo again – and left it to set while I decorated my gingerbread
tools. The easiest way to decorate gingerbread (or any biscuits) is using the
flooding technique. To do this, I pipe the outline of each tool, along with a
little detail and leave the icing to dry for 10 minutes – the exact time it
takes to make and drink another cup of tea. Once the icing had set, I flooded the
biscuits. I made some more icing and coloured it. This icing needs to be a
looser mix that will flow when piped. I piped this directly on to the gingerbread
tools and it sets with a smooth glossy surface. With the edible tools now set
aside to dry I could crack on with my toolbox.
The ginger sponge I made at the
start of the day had well and truly cooled so it was its turn to go into the
Triton vice for cutting to shape, which now seems like a perfectly normal thing
to do with a sponge cake! I used a tape to measure the inside dimensions of the
toolbox and marked them on the sponge. Using a Triton handheld oscillating saw I
cut the sponge exactly to size. Honestly, I don’t reckon I’ll ever need a knife
in the kitchen again! I laid the sponge in the toolbox box with some ginger
buttercream and filled it with the gingerbread tools. The final touch was
slotting the rice-crispie and marshmallow handle through the toolbox holes and
we are done. Without a doubt, the most precise baking job I’ve completed in a
while – thanks Triton!
Saturday, 20 October 2018
Triton goes BOOM!
We visited BOOM Festival in Portugal to see how Daniel Popper and team used the Triton Range to create his 12-metre tall wooden masterpiece ‘Emergence’.




Creative Director /Lead artist : Daniel Popper Crew: Brett Blake, Marinus Kriek, Brian Tompkins, Robert Bernicchi, Samuel Murgatroyd, Daniel Graham Projection mapping : Wayne Ellis Check out Daniel Popper's other work: http://www.danielpopper.com/




Creative Director /Lead artist : Daniel Popper Crew: Brett Blake, Marinus Kriek, Brian Tompkins, Robert Bernicchi, Samuel Murgatroyd, Daniel Graham Projection mapping : Wayne Ellis Check out Daniel Popper's other work: http://www.danielpopper.com/
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