How to choose a roaster? Tips for choosing a mini oven for the kitchen

Roast­ers are attrac­tive for their com­pact­ness and ver­sa­til­i­ty. Such devices allow you to cook var­i­ous foods and have a num­ber of addi­tion­al fea­tures. There are sev­er­al impor­tant cri­te­ria for choos­ing such equip­ment that should be con­sid­ered when buy­ing.

What is a roster?

Roast­ers are also called mini ovens or mini ovens. Trans­lat­ed from Eng­lish, the name of the device means a bra­zier. These devices are com­pact in size. The appear­ance of such equip­ment resem­bles microwave ovens, and the set of func­tions resem­bles ovens.

The roast­er is usu­al­ly rec­tan­gu­lar in shape. The door of the device is glass, which allows you to see the meta­mor­phoses with prod­ucts tak­ing place inside. Usu­al­ly the door opens down­wards, as with stan­dard ovens.

Roast­ers are attrac­tive for their com­pact­ness. This allows you to replace a con­ven­tion­al oven with such a device, which is espe­cial­ly impor­tant in small kitchens, where every square cen­time­ter counts.

Device and principle of operation

The oper­a­tion of the device is pro­vid­ed by quartz heat­ing ele­ments. In most roast­ers there are two of them — one is locat­ed below, the oth­er is above. These heat­ing ele­ments heat up, trans­fer­ring the tem­per­a­ture to the prod­ucts inside the device.

For uni­form cook­ing, it is nec­es­sary to turn on all the heaters installed in it. If you want to cook food on the grill, then turn on only the upper heat­ing. To reheat dish­es, only the low­er heat­ing ele­ment must be turned on.

Most mini-ovens have a ther­mo­stat that allows you to main­tain the required tem­per­a­ture inside the unit. The tem­per­a­ture can be set to dif­fer­ent. Usu­al­ly there is a lim­it of 60–300°C. High tem­per­a­ture is used for bak­ing, low tem­per­a­ture is used for heat­ing food.

The roast­ers have a timer. It allows you to set the required cook­ing time, after which the device will turn off (if such an option is pro­vid­ed).

What can be cooked in a roaster?

Roast­ers are mul­ti­func­tion­al. In this device, you can cook var­i­ous dish­es:

• bak­ing;
• sand­wich­es;
• toasts;
• meat;
• a bird;
• fish.

A skew­er can be pro­vid­ed with the mini-oven. It is used for grilling food.

Some appli­ances have a built-in fan. Such a device allows you to use the roast­er as a con­vec­tion oven.

The mini-oven may have a cold door. This term implies the pres­ence of a spe­cial ther­mal insu­lat­ing gas­ket. Thanks to it, the appli­ance door prac­ti­cal­ly does not heat up, so there is no risk of acci­den­tal­ly burn­ing your­self.

Device functions

The main pur­pose of the roast­er is to cook and heat food. Usu­al­ly the unit has 2–3 modes: oven, grill and light (del­i­cate), used to heat up or main­tain the tem­per­a­ture.

Addi­tion­al­ly, the device may have a func­tion defrost­ing. This add-on is very attrac­tive and allows you to replace the microwave. With a built-in fan, the prod­uct is defrost­ed even­ly, which a stan­dard microwave oven can­not pro­vide.

If there is a built-in fan, the device must have con­vec­tion mode. It is usu­al­ly used for bak­ing. In this mode, due to the fan, air flows through the cham­ber, even­ly affect­ing the dish from all sides.

Addi­tion­al­ly, it may be pro­vid­ed Boost­er option. It is used to heat up or quick­ly cook a small amount of food. This func­tion allows you to get a crust on a dish.

Some mini ovens pro­vide self-clean­ing func­tion. It is pyrolyt­ic, hydrolyt­ic and cat­alyt­ic. The first option involves clean­ing at high tem­per­a­ture, the sec­ond — by heat­ing the water in the pan. Cat­alyt­ic clean­ing is sim­i­lar to pyrolyt­ic clean­ing, but is car­ried out direct­ly at the time of cook­ing. Due to fat-absorb­ing sub­stances (cat­a­lysts) on the walls of the device, fat breaks down into water, car­bon and organ­ic sub­stances.

Types of mini ovens

Mini-ovens are elec­tric, gas and induc­tion. A roast­er is usu­al­ly under­stood as an elec­tri­cal appli­ance, while gas and induc­tion mini-ovens mean com­pact ovens.

There are mini-ovens accord­ing to the prin­ci­ple of oper­a­tion — due to heat­ing ele­ments or con­vec­tion. Most devices com­bine both options. In this case, the device pro­vides for the modes of sep­a­rate inclu­sion of heat­ing ele­ments and joint oper­a­tion with a con­vec­tor.

Mini ovens vary con­sid­er­ably in vol­ume. There are appli­ances that are the size of microwave ovens. Large units are close in size to ovens.

There are also such tech­niques in terms of pow­er. It is direct­ly relat­ed to the capa­bil­i­ties of the device. If it pro­vides a grill and con­vec­tion, then the pow­er should be max­i­mum.

In mini-ovens, the guides of the bak­ing sheets dif­fer. They are tele­scop­ic and lat­tice. The first option means that when the appli­ance door is opened, the tray will auto­mat­i­cal­ly slide out. The sec­ond option is more com­mon and cheap­er, but increas­es the risk of burns.

General recommendations for choosing a roaster

The choice of any house­hold appli­ances should be approached care­ful­ly in order to choose the best option with all the nec­es­sary para­me­ters and func­tions. When buy­ing a roast­er, it is impor­tant to con­sid­er the fol­low­ing cri­te­ria:

• Pow­er. This is one of the most impor­tant para­me­ters, choos­ing which you need to focus on how the roast­er will be used. If the device is nec­es­sary for the full prepa­ra­tion of var­i­ous dish­es, then you should choose equip­ment with a pow­er of 2.5–3 kW. If the roast­er is need­ed only for heat­ing and mak­ing sand­wich­es, then pow­er up to 700–900 watts is enough.
• Cham­ber vol­ume. The amount of food that can be cooked in the roast­er depends on this indi­ca­tor. The min­i­mum vol­ume is 5–6 liters. Such devices are very com­pact, but you can cook a dish in them only for 1–2 peo­ple. For a fam­i­ly of 3–4 peo­ple, a 15–25 liter mini-oven is suit­able. The vol­ume of the roast­er can reach 40 liters. In large units, you can bake a large num­ber of prod­ucts, whole poul­try. The size of the device direct­ly depends on the vol­ume of the cham­ber.
• Cam­era cov­er. The cham­ber inside can be met­al, enam­eled or ceram­ic. The first option is cheap­er, but los­es its orig­i­nal appear­ance faster. When choos­ing a met­al coat­ing, you should focus on stain­less steel — it is safe and reli­able.
• Timer. It is impor­tant to pay atten­tion to the max­i­mum time that can be set using the timer. For sim­ple mod­els, this fig­ure is min­i­mal — up to 20–30 min­utes. More func­tion­al options are designed for a cook­ing time of up to 120 min­utes.

These are the basic para­me­ters that must be tak­en into account when choos­ing a ros­ter. You should also pay atten­tion to the addi­tion­al fea­tures of the equip­ment, which will ensure its more com­fort­able use:

• auto­mat­ic shut­down;
• sound noti­fi­ca­tion;
• self-clean­ing;
• pro­tec­tion from chil­dren;
• cold door;
• remov­able heat­ing ele­ments (easy to clean);
• crumb tray;
• addi­tion­al acces­sories (skew­er, bak­ing sheet, grills, molds).

TOP of the best models of roasters

There are many mod­els of mini ovens on the mar­ket. Out­ward­ly, they look about the same, but dif­fer in func­tion­al­i­ty and addi­tion­al fea­tures. A large selec­tion of mod­i­fi­ca­tions and man­u­fac­tur­ers pro­vides a wide range of prices. In stores you can buy such equip­ment from 2000 to 26000 rubles.

When buy­ing, you need to focus on indi­vid­ual needs, but if it is dif­fi­cult to make the final choice, our TOP of the best mod­els will help.

Bork W500

This mod­el is designed for a vol­ume of 22 liters. The pow­er of the device is 2.4 kW. The door opens down. The inner lin­ing and body are made of stain­less steel.

This roast­er fea­tures elec­tron­ic con­trols and a dig­i­tal dis­play. The tem­per­a­ture can be set inde­pen­dent­ly up to 230°C.

The device offers 9 modes to choose from, includ­ing oven, grill, keep warm, pre-defrost. Con­vec­tion pro­vid­ed. This choice of modes is pro­vid­ed by the pres­ence of five heat­ing ele­ments. Grill quartz.

There are sev­er­al indi­ca­tors — on, oper­at­ing mode, select­ed tem­per­a­ture, time until the end of cook­ing. Shut­down is auto­mat­ic, an audi­ble sig­nal is pro­vid­ed.

The pack­age includes two bak­ing sheets, a met­al grate, a piz­za stand.

Steba KB 23 Eco

This roast­er is designed for a vol­ume of 23 liters. The pow­er of the device is 1.4 kW.

The door of the mini-stove opens down, the glass is dou­ble-lay­ered. The inner coat­ing of the cham­ber is enam­el. The case of the device is made of stain­less steel.

There are two heat­ing ele­ments. A sep­a­rate inclu­sion of the upper heat­ing ele­ment involves work­ing with a spit or a spit and con­vec­tion. The low­er heat­ing ele­ment can be switched on sep­a­rate­ly. When both heaters work at the same time, you can select the con­vec­tion mode or con­vec­tion and spit.

Mechan­i­cal con­trol. There are three rotary switch­es. One allows you to set the required tem­per­a­ture up to 230°C. Anoth­er switch allows you to select a pro­gram — oven, grill, keep warm, pre-defrost. Con­vec­tion pro­vid­ed. It is pos­si­ble to set the oper­at­ing time up to 90 min­utes. The device turns off auto­mat­i­cal­ly, there is a sound noti­fi­ca­tion.

The set includes a fry­ing pan, a han­dle for it, a grill grate, a skew­er, a crumb tray.

De Longhi EO 20792

This mod­el is designed for a vol­ume of 20 liters. Pow­er is 1.3 kW.

The door of the device opens down, dou­ble glass. The cham­ber has a non-stick coat­ing.

The roast­er has a mechan­i­cal con­trol. There are three rotary switch­es. One pro­vides for set­ting the tem­per­a­ture regime in the range of 80–240°C. Anoth­er switch is designed to select the cook­ing mode (6 in total) — bot­tom heat, grill, con­vec­tion, pre-defrost, reheat. The third switch allows you to set the oper­at­ing time of the device up to 120 min­utes. Shut­down occurs auto­mat­i­cal­ly.

There is an oven light, a pow­er indi­ca­tor, a sound sig­nal when the work is com­plet­ed.

The pack­age includes a skew­er with a han­dle, a bak­ing sheet and a grill.

Rolsen KW2626

This mod­el is designed for a vol­ume of 20 liters. Pow­er 1.5 kW. The door opens down, the glass is tem­pered. The inner lin­ing is metal­lic.

The device pro­vides three rotary switch­es, mechan­i­cal con­trol. One switch allows you to set the tem­per­a­ture in the range of 100–250°C. The sec­ond switch is designed to select the oper­at­ing mode. Two heaters allow you to choose the low­er or upper heat­ing, simul­ta­ne­ous oper­a­tion, addi­tion­al acti­va­tion of con­vec­tion and spit. The third switch pro­vides time set­ting up to 60 min­utes. Shut­down occurs auto­mat­i­cal­ly, an audi­ble sig­nal is giv­en.

The stan­dard com­plete set is pro­vid­ed: a bak­ing sheet, a lat­tice, a skew­er, han­dles-hold­ers.

Panasonic NT-GT1WTQ

This mini-stove is attrac­tive for its com­pact­ness. The vol­ume of the cham­ber is 9 liters. The door of the device opens down, the glass is sin­gle-lay­er.

This mod­el has mechan­i­cal con­trol. There are two rotary switch­es. One allows you to set the tem­per­a­ture — 4 modes with a range of 65–205 ° C (3 speeds, one mode for toast­ing). The sec­ond switch allows you to set the cook­ing time, up to 15 min­utes.

The body is made of met­al. The set includes a deep bak­ing sheet, a met­al grate and a remov­able crumb tray. The ros­ter works in one mode. Pow­er con­sump­tion — 1.3 kW.

Caring for your mini oven

Mini-ovens are attrac­tive because they can be installed in any cor­ner of the kitchen with access to the elec­tri­cal net­work. The device must be installed accord­ing to the rules. This includes adjust­ing the legs, keep­ing the dis­tance from the wall and oth­er appli­ances.

In oper­a­tion, roast­ers are quite sim­ple, but they require some care, since fat and oth­er par­ti­cles of cooked food invari­ably get on the walls of the device. When car­ing for equip­ment, it is impor­tant to observe the fol­low­ing rules:

• when clean­ing the roast­er, be sure to dis­con­nect it from the elec­tri­cal net­work and wait until the device has com­plete­ly cooled down;
• do not use abra­sive com­pounds to clean both the inter­nal and exter­nal sur­faces of the device;
• all remov­able parts can be washed with run­ning water, after which they must be dried;
• the inner sur­face should be cleaned with neu­tral prod­ucts, as their residues can get into the pre­pared dish.

Roast­ers are quite mul­ti­func­tion­al and com­pact. They are pow­ered by elec­tric­i­ty, so this tech­nique is suit­able for both home and gar­den. A large assort­ment and a wide range of prices allow you to find a suit­able option for any con­sumer. When choos­ing a unit, it is impor­tant to con­sid­er the basic para­me­ters and addi­tion­al func­tions.