Cuisinart Combo Steam/Convection Oven (Part 1)

[weinoo]

I think a higher temp than 300 would be more applicable for crisper skin.

Yeah, I'd be pushing 400 for a shorter period of time.

 

More importantly, how'd it taste?

[SJMitch]

Yeah, I'd be pushing 400 for a shorter period of time.

 

More importantly, how'd it taste?

 

The chicken meat was moist and flavorful, the aroma from the pepper/onion bed was good.  Couldn't tell the effect of the vinegar marinade on the chicken, but it added slight tang to the peppers.  We ate two thighs right away and on the next day I shredded the meat from the other two thighs to make a chicken salad (with greens, fruit, and nuts; not a mayo based salad).  The meat was still moist.  The temp/time cooked the thigh meat fully, with no parts overcooked.

[weinoo]

 

Decided to try wings bought at the green market...seasoned with Olde Bay, salt and pepper and nothing else.

 

400°F - Steam/Bake - set for 45 minutes, chicken wings put in at 40 minutes, rotated at 20 minutes. These were great (though the iPhone picture sucks).

Edited September 8, 2014 by weinoo (log)

[SJMitch]

So I ordered a second shelf to try reheating two plates of food at once (since it does it so much better than the microwave and I often want to heat two plates of food). 

 

Alas, the spacing isn't quite right.

 

Here is the shelves in the low position with our dinner plates, leaving not enough room to put food on the bottom plate, and the top of the plate usually scrapes as you put it in:

 

 

Here are the shelves with the top one inverted:

 

 

This might work as long as the food is very flat, but still very little clearance to top heater elements (a closeup):

 

 

And no, you can't fit two racks into the same slot.

 

Haven't tested the heating ability for two plates of food yet, just the clearance issues.

 

A straight rack in the top slot would be ideal.  I went to Bed Bath and Beyond and they had a Cuisinart Steam oven on display with the other ovens.  I tried the racks from the other toaster ovens they had and none fit.  The mini Breville was so close, but just a little too wide.  Anyone know a source for a straight, rather than offset, rack that might fit?

[flippant]

I'm doing bbq pork shoulder tomorrow, and thought I'd experiment with low-temp (225f) steam/grill as a way to finish it off after 4-6 hours on the grill. CuisiCrutch!

 

Does this sound reasonable or advisable? Anyone have experience doing it?

[rotuts]

let us know please

[weinoo]

So I ordered a second shelf to try reheating two plates of food at once (since it does it so much better than the microwave and I often want to heat two plates of food). 

 

Alas, the spacing isn't quite right.

 

Here is the shelves in the low position with our dinner plates, leaving not enough room to put food on the bottom plate, and the top of the plate usually scrapes as you put it in:

 

low position.jpg

 

Here are the shelves with the top one inverted:

 

high position.jpg

 

This might work as long as the food is very flat, but still very little clearance to top heater elements (a closeup):

 

closeup high.jpg

 

And no, you can't fit two racks into the same slot.

 

Haven't tested the heating ability for two plates of food yet, just the clearance issues.

 

A straight rack in the top slot would be ideal.  I went to Bed Bath and Beyond and they had a Cuisinart Steam oven on display with the other ovens.  I tried the racks from the other toaster ovens they had and none fit.  The mini Breville was so close, but just a little too wide.  Anyone know a source for a straight, rather than offset, rack that might fit?

 

Looks  like you took one for the team, SJMitch!

 

One idea - can you put a rack (inverted) directly on the oven floor? Probably not. 

 

Also, if you're heating with steam, you should remove the crumb tray from the bottom of the oven.

 

My guess is if Cuisi wanted you to put 2 racks in there, you'd be able to.

[SJMitch]

Looks  like you took one for the team, SJMitch!

 

One idea - can you put a rack (inverted) directly on the oven floor? Probably not. 

 

It's not a complete no go.  The inverted position does allow some room for food.  Will see how it reheats with two plates later.

 

As you suspected, no you can't put a rack on the floor: the lower heating elements are in the way.

 

Also, thanks, I hadn't even noticed the manual advised removing the crumb tray "for convenience" during steam. They did transfer the drain hole to the crumb tray, so you can use it when steaming, but leaving it in is just more surfaces that can get dirty.

 

Reheating fridge-temp plates of food turned out to be the most used function when we installed a Gaggenau plumbed-in steam oven after we tried it.  And it had already become the most used appliance in the kitchen generally (where there is also a Capital open burner range with gas oven+rotisserie and an electric convection oven).  We never even bothered to put the microwave back in the kitchen.

 

It just does such a much better job than the microwave and for not too much longer wait.  The Gagg can fit many plates of food, of course.  I'm cooking at a friend's house as well, and that is where the cuisinart steam oven is being used right now.  The little toaster oven version heats/steams up much faster than the Gaggenau, so is even better for one plate of food.  You could steam plates in a bamboo steamer stack on the stove, but that setup/cleanup is more of a pain and more steam is released into the kitchen during cooking.  You could also steam in the oven with a bain marie, but it takes a lot longer to get to high steam levels that way.  So a steam oven is perfect for this task.

 

I'm also not giving up on finding a straight rack that fits.

[gfweb]

Thermador has a new steam/convection 48" range for about 14K. Woof!

 

http://www.ajmadison.com/cgi-bin/ajmadison/PRD48JDSGU.html?mv_pc=gg&utm_source=google&utm_medium=adwords&utm_campaign=pla&utm_term=&gclid=Cj0KEQjw1s-gBRCKwOKQ1sWonvsBEiQA8qALFc79YDAAf9z6hpLK8UVSFJgq04w-AtUeevlcaGQkiwcaAg6w8P8HAQ

[rotuts]

Wow  Wow   Wow  !

 

that is Soooooooooo talking to Me !

 

Ooooooooooooo

 

but wait !  No Induction Top  at about a bazziion Amps ?

 

 

deal breaker for me.

 

but thanks

 

like to stay informed.

[flippant]

I'm doing bbq pork shoulder tomorrow, and thought I'd experiment with low-temp (225f) steam/grill as a way to finish it off after 4-6 hours on the grill. CuisiCrutch!

 

Does this sound reasonable or advisable? Anyone have experience doing it?

 

Right. I had about 10lbs/4.5kgs of pork shoulder divided into 4 pieces, trussed up After 4 hours at ~225f (105-110c) in the smoker, I took them out and put them straight into the CSO at 230f/110c Steam Bake.

 

 

After an hour I turned the pieces, letting it go for another 50 minutes, at which point the probed meat hit 203f/95c. I put the juices that had come out (around 3oz/1dl) in a cup. Since my total time at that point was 6 hours, I set it to 176f on the Keep Warm setting for two hours, checking now and then with a fork to see how tender it all was. After about an hour, the smaller of the pieces was noticeably tender and yielding, so I started taking them out and pulling them apart with salad forks. After that, I poured the reserved just back onto the pulled pork, salted it and mixed well.

 

The largest piece had a bit of resistance in the center, so I put it back in on Keep Warm to gelatinise the collagen for a while. Will keep it in there for a full two hours extra to see what difference it makes in tenderness—if any.

 

The bark seemed to have survived the steamy environment very well, and it powered right through the stall, going from 176f/80c to 230f/95c in 1:50. Granted, these pieces were just around 2lbs/1kg each, so they were quick to heat up. My thinking was that I could get away with smaller pieces now that I was finishing with steam. I was right. More bark equals more deliciousness!

 

 

Will definitely do it again!

[gfweb]

Home steam ovens have had a spike in choices. Six months ago I searched steam oven and combi oven and only got Steam Boy, a defunct Sharp model a built-in Electrolux, and commercial stuff. Now there are another 4 table-top models, two ranges and wall models to choose from.

 

I give Rotuts the credit.

[rotuts]

it would probably be a very bad idea to post a ref. to the 4 table top models.

 

very very bad.

[SJMitch]

Home steam ovens have had a spike in choices. Six months ago I searched steam oven and combi oven and only got Steam Boy, a defunct Sharp model a built-in Electrolux, and commercial stuff. Now there are another 4 table-top models, two ranges and wall models to choose from.

 

It is really good to see so many more choices now!

 

The residential Gaggenau and Miele wall steam ovens have been around since 2001 or so, or were you considering them 'commercial'?  In 2001, the Gaggenau steam oven went for $3500.  Now it's what, $8k? Yikes. We put one in before the last 3 rounds of Gaggenau price hikes.

Edited September 15, 2014 by SJMitch (log)

[FauxPas]

Home steam ovens have had a spike in choices. Six months ago I searched steam oven and combi oven and only got Steam Boy, a defunct Sharp model a built-in Electrolux, and commercial stuff. Now there are another 4 table-top models, two ranges and wall models to choose from.

 

I give Rotuts the credit.

 

gfweb, I'd love to see links to the other table-top ones. Rotuts, cover your eyes!   

[gfweb]

Out of respect for Rotuts...no links for you.

 

Just go to Amazon and search "steam oven".

[rotuts]

Well, Lets just say this :

 

Some One I Know

 

Took A Peek a the Amz listing

 

They Said to Me

 

Crap.

 

except the CuisiSB

 

but thanks for Informing  My Friend.

 

[pbear]

Over in the Palate Smart Grill thread, rotuts mentions using the CSO for low temp cooking (sous vide without the bag, if you will), which would indeed be a wizard application.  Has anyone tried it?

[rotuts]

go back to the early parts of this thread.  someone I recall did steaks and said they were the best they ever had.

\

 

look at post # 52, if you can stand it !

Edited September 16, 2014 by rotuts (log)

[pbear]

Interesting.  For others, here's a link to Post #52.  I notice Unpopular Poet avoided most of the tricky issues of low temp by cooking two hours at 140ºF.  A complete protocol for other times, temps and proteins would be rather more complex.  In which regard, has anyone had success operating the CSO with a remote probe thermometer?  That would be the easiest and most reliable way to do this, but I'm worried about the gasket.

[rotuts]

Ive used a remote probe for the CSB outside. 

 

see # 305.  I used both channels but that's not in the pic.

 

its extremely important to memorize this thread.

 

this cannot be over emphasized   

 

even if you do not have a CSB

 

 

[Unpopular Poet]

I can report that I have done those steaks on a few occasions now, and they have been great every time.  I have also done some pork in a similar fashion, and that turned out delicious.  All of my "sous vide style" steam tests have pretty much all come back as successes -- I am trying to decide if I should do some lamb chops sous vide or just throw them in here at 140 as well...I will report on them if I decide to put them in here.  Or maybe I will split it up and do a side by side.  

[pbear]

Ive used a remote probe for the CSB outside. 

 

see # 305.  I used both channels but that's not in the pic.

 

That's encouraging, as being able to measure internal food temp (and monitor oven temp) would simplify the pasteurization guidelines considerably.  Seems to me there should be a way to make this work, but there'd be a lot of trial-and-error, A/B tests and data collection before it would be ready for prime time.  All of which, if it gets done, will be done by someone not me.  I don't have a CSO and aren't likely to get one.

[Raamo]

Thermador has a new steam/convection 48" range for about 14K. Woof!

 

http://www.ajmadison.com/cgi-bin/ajmadison/PRD48JDSGU.html?mv_pc=gg&utm_source=google&utm_medium=adwords&utm_campaign=pla&utm_term=&gclid=Cj0KEQjw1s-gBRCKwOKQ1sWonvsBEiQA8qALFc79YDAAf9z6hpLK8UVSFJgq04w-AtUeevlcaGQkiwcaAg6w8P8HAQ

 

The 24" Thermador  Steam/Convection is much more reasonable at about 3k

 

And it's one awesome steam oven / convection oven. We've had ours since spring.

 

My wife was doubtful at first - now she can't live with out it - she uses it to reheat left overs - with the steam oven it's like eating it fresh all over again.  And it makes darn tasty bread.  I've made fish in it and steamed veggies.

 

Here's a picture if anyone's curious: https://www.flickr.com/photos/26508103@N05/13424623865/in/set-72157642922040434

 

The oven it's above is no joke either - but that's not a steam appliance

[AnneN]

I've been following this thread for quite awhile and am trying to justify purchasing one! Is it large enough for a family of 4?