Great alternative to microwave or standard oven
Pros:
Works great, attractive, convenient
Cons:
Burns food fairly easily until you figure it out
The Bottom Line:
Food turns out better than in the microwave, more energy efficient than full sized oven
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Overall Rating:
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Author's Review
I've had my KA countertop oven for a year now and I love it. I use it at least a couple times a week, sometimes for reheating, other times for cooking lunch or dinner.
My kids are famous for not finishing their food and the countertop oven does an awesome job reheating and making things appetizing again. Pizza and french fries are two things that crisp up so nicely vs. the soggy, unevenly warmed results you get from a microwave.
With just 2-3 of us eating dinner, I find I use the countertop oven to make lunch or dinner quite often, especially in the summer when I don't want to use the big oven and heat up the house. The use and care manual has some really yummy recipes - the Asian Chicken Drummettes are finger licking good. But since I use mine so often, I wanted more recipes, so I even bought a toaster oven cookbook to give me more options.
The broil feature works so well that it brought broiled food back into our lives. I have a gas oven at home and HATE the broiler down by the floor so I had not made any broiled foods in 8 years. Now nachos and open face sandwiches are an option again!
The oven does tend to cook faster than recipes recommend, so I always reduce the time by about 1/3 and check it at that point to be sure it is done. So far, that has kept my food from burning and worked most times as a good rule of thumb.
Clean-up is a snap in the oven itself, and the broiler pan that is comes with cleans up fairly easily as well. And after mulitple uses, it is wearing well, with none of the finish wearing off or getting scratched.
The timer only goes up to 30 minutes, but since the oven is fairly small, that hasn't been a problem. Nearly everything small enough to fit in the oven will be done cooking within 30 minutes anyway.
If you have limited counter space as I do, I have found that this fits well sitting on top of my microwave. Just be careful not to run both at the same time if they share an outlet, since they both draw high wattage and it will blow your fuse. It doesn't get too hot during cooking to keep it on top of something else, so I've not had any problems with this at all.
I've looked at some of the negative reviews and am truly surprised by them. The one thing I can't vouch for is the toasting ability of the countertop oven, since I have a toaster and always use that and have never tried toast in this unit. I can truly say this is one the most useful and most used gifts I have ever received!
