Utensil to thaw meat A very long time ago, I was at a friend's house where her father took out this piece of ribbed metal from the cupboard.

It was a dark piece of metal about the size of an adult hand. It had grooves on one side, and was smooth/flat on the other.

He asked me to touch it and it felt cold to my touch.

Next, he placed an ice cube on it and it began melting immediately. It did not require plugging in, it was just a slab of metal.

At that time, I was just amazed at how it worked and forgot to ask him what it is called. He tried to explain to me the physics behind it but I was just gobsmacked at the thing.

Now many years later I realized that its a thawing utensil and I am trying to search for it but as you can guess from the question, I don't know what to look for.
How nice to have a question I can just answer. I remember the ads for that thing. You can still buy it, it is called The Miracle Thaw. Now there are knock offs.

I am so pleased that you didn't ask how. It's too close to my bedtime for that.