Induction ovens

You're obviously better at finding these things than me....my Googling for induction ovens only brought up lots of induction hobs and ordinary ovens (I have to admit I didn't have time to work through all the results though). I've never come across one of these before, even when I was researching for my new oven last year - its an interesting concept. Also interesting is that it has a page on the UK Whirlpool website, but doesn't appear to be on sale here at the moment.

Reading the manual it appears to be a standard multifunction fan oven with a removable induction plate/shelf that plugs in to an electrical socket inside the oven and a steel cooking pan designed to be used on the induction shelf. Note that the photos of the ceramic dishes are on standard oven shelves rather than the induction one. As far as I can tell its a bit like cooking something in a pan on the hob, and then browning under the grill to finish (what the manual calls "top finishing"). They claim it cooks things faster which I can see could be useful, but I'd love to see some real demos of the results cooking different dishes. The only demo video I could find is this one:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA9ZA9bALlc
(and the pizza he produces doesn't look that great to me!), I haven't managed to find any user reviews yet.
 
I love these invisible induction tops
INFINITY-INVISACOOK-01-1-1024x1024-1.jpg
 
MrsDangermouse said:
You're obviously better at finding these things than me....my Googling for induction ovens only brought up lots of induction hobs and ordinary ovens (I have to admit I didn't have time to work through all the results though). I've never come across one of these before, even when I was researching for my new oven last year - its an interesting concept. Also interesting is that it has a page on the UK Whirlpool website, but doesn't appear to be on sale here at the moment.

Reading the manual it appears to be a standard multifunction fan oven with a removable induction plate/shelf that plugs in to an electrical socket inside the oven and a steel cooking pan designed to be used on the induction shelf. Note that the photos of the ceramic dishes are on standard oven shelves rather than the induction one. As far as I can tell its a bit like cooking something in a pan on the hob, and then browning under the grill to finish (what the manual calls "top finishing"). They claim it cooks things faster which I can see could be useful, but I'd love to see some real demos of the results cooking different dishes. The only demo video I could find is this one:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KA9ZA9bALlc
(and the pizza he produces doesn't look that great to me!), I haven't managed to find any user reviews yet.
Click to expand...

Pocofan gave us a brief review in his original post. Hopefully we'll get a more extensive review after the "getting used to it" phase is over.

CD
 
caseydog said:
Pocofan gave us a brief review in his original post. Hopefully we'll get a more extensive review after the "getting used to it" phase is over.

CD
Click to expand...
Yep I hope so.....I'd love to see a comparison of say a cake baked on the normal fan setting Vs one baked using the induction setting...to see what the differences are in terms of baking time and end result.

I have a fairly advanced oven but while some of the fancy functions are extremely useful and do deliver much better results than a standard fan oven, they're only really good for their specific applications so at least 50% of my oven use is just on the standard fan setting.
 
MrsDangermouse said:
Yep I hope so.....I'd love to see a comparison of say a cake baked on the normal fan setting Vs one baked using the induction setting...to see what the differences are in terms of baking time and end result.

I have a fairly advanced oven but while some of the fancy functions are extremely useful and do deliver much better results than a standard fan oven, they're only really good for their specific applications so at least 50% of my oven use is just on the standard fan setting.
Click to expand...

I don't even have a convection (fan) oven. :(

CD
 
caseydog said:
I don't even have a convection (fan) oven. :(

CD
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Is that by choice, or are they just not that common in the US?

I can't remember last time I saw an electric oven that wasn't fan...even the cheapest ones here (around £160 for a single oven) are fan-assisted.
 
MrsDangermouse said:
Is that by choice, or are they just not that common in the US?

I can't remember last time I saw an electric oven that wasn't fan...even the cheapest ones here (around £160 for a single oven) are fan-assisted.
Click to expand...
I don’t really know for sure myself. It seems that convection is offered as an add-on as the ovens hit about mid-price range - so it’s seen as a feature here, I suppose, and not a necessity.

Interesting side note, I just discovered that, surprise surprise, American convection ovens and UK/Euro convection ovens are slightly different beasts. Well, of course! :laugh:

For me, I find it somewhat bothersome, because most recipes here aren’t written for convection, and there’s just this rough guideline to lower the temp 25F and shorten the time by an unspecified amount. I just find it easier to go by what the recipe says upfront.

Also, and I know it’s not the same there as here, since convection is seen as a feature, there’s a whole mythology, I suppose, surrounding what should and should not be convected, shall we say. Since an oven here (if it’s equipped with a fan, obviously) can flip between the two settings at the push if a button, a natural suitability scheme has developed. The manual with my oven, for example, has a chart detailing what should be prepared using convection, and what should be prepared conventionally, “for best results.”
 
TastyReuben said:
I don’t really know for sure myself. It seems that convection is offered as an add-on as the ovens hit about mid-price range - so it’s seen as a feature here, I suppose, and not a necessity.

Interesting side note, I just discovered that, surprise surprise, American convection ovens and UK/Euro convection ovens are slightly different beasts. Well, of course! :laugh:

For me, I find it somewhat bothersome, because most recipes here aren’t written for convection, and there’s just this rough guideline to lower the temp 25F and shorten the time by an unspecified amount. I just find it easier to go by what the recipe says upfront.

Also, and I know it’s not the same there as here, since convection is seen as a feature, there’s a whole mythology, I suppose, surrounding what should and should not be convected, shall we say. Since an oven here (if it’s equipped with a fan, obviously) can flip between the two settings at the push if a button, a natural suitability scheme has developed. The manual with my oven, for example, has a chart detailing what should be prepared using convection, and what should be prepared conventionally, “for best results.”
Click to expand...
The oven I have has so many different ways of delivering heat it is beyond daft.

We'd lived here for 2 years before I finally managed to get the darn thing to work properly and not burn the tops and bottom of everything but leave the insides uncooked/raw/cold.

It also doubles as a grill (UK term), and the dial has many different settings. There is a temperature dial that works in tandem to this dial.

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So top is off (obviously)
Going clockwise,
  • light and fan, no heat.
  • Large fan, heat from a 3rd heating element at the rear of the oven
  • Bottom element only with a small fan
  • Bottom and top element only
  • Bottom and top element with small fan
  • Top element with small fan
  • Top element, no fan
From experience, the only setting that actually cooks correctly, doesn't burn food and leave the insides undercooked is actually the 2nd setting with the big fan and 3rd heating element at the rear of the oven (I had to look this up to learn what it actually meant a couple of years ago). It appears to be the equivalent of a fan assisted oven, so remove 20°C from the cooking temp and you've more or less got the correct temp for the time you've been given.
 
MrsDangermouse said:
Is that by choice, or are they just not that common in the US?

I can't remember last time I saw an electric oven that wasn't fan...even the cheapest ones here (around £160 for a single oven) are fan-assisted.
Click to expand...

They're very common in the US. We've even got indoor plumbing now. :D

The oven that came with my house isn't convection, but it still works fine. I'm too cheap to replace an oven that still works. It's only 22 years old!!! :laugh:

CD
 
TastyReuben said:
I don’t really know for sure myself. It seems that convection is offered as an add-on as the ovens hit about mid-price range - so it’s seen as a feature here, I suppose, and not a necessity.
Click to expand...

caseydog said:
They're very common in the US. We've even got indoor plumbing now. :D
Click to expand...
A slight difference of opinion :wink: I think I'm going to interpret this as they're common, but probably not on basic ones, more on mid-range and above? Sound about right?

The main reason I asked is that very few American recipes I've seen have temperature for fan oven, whereas its pretty ubiquitous here for anything written in the last 30-odd years. I don't think I've lived anywhere with a non-fan oven since probably the early 90s.

SatNavSaysStraightOn said:
The oven I have has so many different ways of delivering heat it is beyond daft.
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I mine claims to have 18 different programmes....but in reality there are only 9 actual ways of delivering heat:
  • True fan - rear element and fan. Can be combined with the temperature probe which automatically turns the oven off when the set food temperature is reached (can't wait to try this out on the turkey this year :happy:)
  • Pizza - fan plus rear and bottom elements. Only tried this one once (when we ran out of gas for the pizza oven) and it works pretty well.
  • Conventional - top and bottom elements. Don't think I've ever used this one.
  • Frozen foods - bottom element, fan and grill. Another one I've not used
  • Grill - grill only
  • Turbo grilling - top element, grill and fan. I use this one a lot for gratins and shepherds pie etc... It browns the top nicely without the bottom drying out.
  • Bottom heat - bottom element only. The manual says this one is for baking cakes with a crispy bottom - though I've never actively wanted a cake with a crispy bottom. I probably need to experiment with this one a bit.
  • Moist fan baking - to me it seems pretty much the same as True Fan, but its designed to save energy and apparently uses residual heat in some way so it can reduce the heat in the cavity. I most recently used it trying a new cake recipe...which wasn't a great success (though I can't be sure whether it was the oven or the recipe at fault).
  • Humidity Low - steam. I mostly use this one for bread.

The rest are what they call "specials" - 9 programmes which combine one of the heating methods with a recommended temperatures and pre-programmed time for specific activities (eg. defrost, keep warm, slow cooking, plate warming etc...) To be honest I don't use most of these....they aren't anything that you can't set up yourself. The only one I use with any regularity is the bread proving - which is very convenient and delivers good results.
 
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