Oh, and it's LARGE. That's my range it's sitting on, and it covers about 2/3 of it.
That is a Crock Grill with the burner and grill missing. I had one back in the early 2000s. The hole is for where the burner plugs into the power supply/thermostat thing. Was actually a great cooking implement, and you should try to find the rest of the parts.
Edit : heres a link to an eBay listing of the model I had.
More edit: this looks like your model
Something like this
THAT IS IT!
I knew the second I scrolled it into view. I miss mine. Might buy one off eBay now than you have reminded me of their existence.
My wife said I bet the burner and grill were either sitting close to it or in the store at the same time.
These things get separated at the thrift store and you never know they go together
Only one sensible person out of like 30 hare brained suggestions.
"mAyBe It'S fOr SqUeEzInG dOuGh From." -everyone else
People just can't resist the urge to say something, even if it's useless. Especially if it's useless. (Even me, here I am saying something.)
But in this particular community, if you don't actually know with certainty what something is it doesn't seem to hard to just shut the fuck up. There's no value whatsoever in conjecture. I had no idea what the hell this thing was but I was interested to find out, but I sure as hell didn't feel the need to speculate...
Engagement helps posts in various algorithms, though I'm not sure that Lemmy uses comments for Hot or anything else. More importantly, I think there's truth to the meme that the quickest way to get an answer to your question on the internet isn't to ask the question, it's to tell someone else the wrong answer. People will then chime in with the right answer if they know it. Wrong answers can be useful in that respect.
I can
But should you?
Should anyone?
Eh, guessing is fun and you could only know by having had one. I did enjoy just how silly some of the wrong answers were. This might be the first time I was the only one who knew a thing, too, so that was cool.
The shipping cost on that listing lol. So very eBay
Yeah I totes just posted the first good examples that came up.
I had no idea this was a thing. Super interesting, thanks for sharing!
Basically a countertop upside down electric broiler. I used the hell out of mine until my X-w broke it.
I love that they call it smokeless. Sure it is, as long as you never cook anything in it! All you need is a drop of grease or juice from your food to drip on the element and it smoked. Mine had an aluminum reflector/liner in the bottom that stained like a bitch. I stopped using it because it was too much of a headache to keep clean.
Yeah, so not smokeless, but it was effective. I used mine a lot when I had it.
Wrong answers only in reply to this one ⤵️
Viewing hole for your miniature otter museum.
It's an Icelandic Fairy house with the roof missing. The hole is a window, and you're supposed to give them a south facing view for good fortune.
It was not supposed to be used, the hole is to hang it at the store.
I know this one! It's a bed pan!
Don't put your privates in it.
Some sort of detachable handle would be my guess
It's so big and ceramic, and the hole is just that one side, It's a good idea but I think it would be impractical.
The inset ridge at the top makes me think maybe it had a lid at one point? Looks like you could cook a turkey in it, I wonder if it was itself a small electric oven, but now is missing the lid, rack, and heating element? That would explain the hole and the size.
The feet on the bottom really don't seem practical for an oven rack, completely unnecessary if that's what it's for.
So you can look in and see how the pie is cooking and if the center is done yet.
Except that the crust where the window is would bake completely differently from the parts of the crust that would be touching the stoneware.
Some people say handle. I think it’s to have an electronic device slotted in to do something inside while it’s in the oven. Not sure it was intended for baking food.
Are you sure it’s a food item? It this was used as an electrical insulator, it could have trace amounts of highly toxic and carcinogenic oil. I would not use it for anything before positively identifying it.
Frankly, we aren't planning to use it for cooking. It's been holding hair stuff, brushes and hair ties and pretty little frilly things.
It's a Crock Grill missing all the electric and grill pieces. I had one. There's no mistaking it
That’s a relief.
Could be the lid of a deeper dish.
Does it say where it was made anywhere on it? Like which country? That may give us a clue
This is the bottom and there's only this one number on it. It also would appear that it's supposed to rest on these pegs so it's probably not a lid.
Could it be a lid and the hole is for steam to escape?
Someone else said that but there's "feet" on the bottom.
Any stamp of any sort on the bottom?
I guess for storage, so you could hang it on a hook at the wall
Whatever you bought there: It's not usable for much with that hole.
It looks like a slow cooker insert, but I can’t for the life of me figure out the hole.
Maybe it’s a drainage pan of some sorts and the hole is overflow?
might be a bedpan. hole is for your thumb. I heard of bedpans making it to thrift stores before
Let us help you identify that mysterious object you’ve found.
Currently in CHALLENGE mode: If you've got something obscure knocking about, post a picture, and let's see how we do. Please prefix such posts with "CHALLENGE:" so we know we've got a fighting chance.