Great for all Kitchens… a must have for small kitchens, December 23, 2008

Customer Video Review Length:: 5:36 Mins

The Breville Smart Oven is a must-have kitchen appliance. In many/most cases it can serve as a replacement for it larger cousin the conventional oven/range. However, the Smart Oven is much more energy efficient (using roughly 50% less electricity) and can fit into the smallest of kitchens

Things that we enjoy

+ Depending on the setting (Broil/Bake/Toast) you have the ability to manage the temperature zones in the oven. This helps to ensure perfect cooking depending on you individual requirements.

+ The magnetic door helps to prevent any burns (see video)

+ Door seals nicely – reducing energy waste and the unneeded heating of your home.

+ 9 programmable settings – HOWEVER – you also have the ability to tailor the settings to your individual needs.

+ Nice Stainless steel finish will look nice in all kitchens.

+ Despite being stainless steel the surface of the oven does not show too many fingerprints.

+ Three pans included – Pizza – Baking – Broiling

+ Great operating manual

+ Not just a standard toaster oven – this is also a convection oven!

+ AS A OVEN IT WORKS GREAT

Areas to improve

- The cord is a little short (less than 3 feet) – while many people may appreciate a short cord it does mean that you have to have outlet near a space where you plan to use the oven.

- You may not be able to operate other appliances on your electrical circuit – At full heat the Smart Oven will pull between 15-20 amps – make sure that you have at least a 20amp breaker on the plug that you are using.

Final Verdict…. this is an easy 5 stars – purchase with confidence.

Beauty and Function – What more can you ask for?, December 30, 2008

I love this product – it is a pleasure to use, functions beautifully, and is beautifully designed.

The other reviewers have already said much of what I would have written. The ‘Out of Box Experience’ is superb. As another reviewer noted, the packaging is quite a bit like Apple’s (see photos) – attractive graphics on an inner box protected in an outer, recyclable box. The oven itself, when compared to the Cuisinart TOB-165 that we have been using (or even the stainless steel TOB-195 model), is like comparing an Apple Mac to a Dell: visually more stylish and appealing, better engineered ‘guts’, and once operated, functionally very well thought out.

A few years ago, our old toaster oven died and we migrated to the Cuisinart which, like this Breville BOV800XL, is a convection oven / toaster / broiler. We liked it so much, that we gifted several more to friends and family. Ah, if only this Breville had ben available then…

The Breville is so vastly superior in every way – function, capacity, ease of use, and ease of cleaning. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

The timer on the Breville turns the oven off at the end of any kind of cycle as you would expect – toast, bagel, bake, broil, pizza, etc.This is hugely wonderful compared to the Cuisinart unit which only turns itself off after toasting – you have to remember to turn it off when in any other mode. (The Cuisinart’s timer is ‘dumb’ – just a beeper.) Also, each Breville cycle has smart default settings, and can remember your own settings for temperature and time, or slices (toast) and darkness, etc.

The BOV800XL accomodates a 13″ pizza pan (included). We made two pizzas tonight to test the oven, one fresh (deli) the other frozen. I dialed the ‘pizza’ setting, dropped the default 450 temperature to 425, accepted convection mode, and accepted the default 12″ size for the fresh pizza and pressed the on button. Once preheated, the oven beeped for the pizza to be inserted. At the end of the timed cycle, the oven turned off and beeped again: perfect pizza!

I then did a 9″ frozen Amy’s pizza. Similar procedure as above, but dialed the size knob down to 9″ and pressed the ‘frozen food’ button. Again, perfect at the end of the cycle.

Toast setting works great – up to 6 pieces of toast, as does the bagel setting, which toasts the top at a higher temp then the bottom to make the top crispy and the bottom warm but still soft. Frozen waffles come out great – crunchy outside and moist inside, instead of all dried out.

For baking, a 13″ x 9″ baking pan easily fits inside as does, of course, the larger pan that comes with the unit, loaf pans and small muffin pans.

The glass door conveniently labels the three rack positions for broil, toast/cookie/bagel/pizza, and bake/roast/reheat/warm.

The crystalline-looking heating elements (three on top, two on the bottom) seem to heat faster, and more evenly, than the metallic elements in other counter-top ovens. Depending on the mode/cycle, the oven enables or disables certain elements, and changes the wattage of others.

The crumb tray in the front answer another of my big complaints about the Cuininart. No effort to pull the tray out at any time to brush off crumbs, or wash off accidental spills. (The Cuinsart’s crumb tray slides out of the rear of that unit, requiring minor gymnastics – enough to put it off until it is really gross.)

The stainless finish and assembly is of high quality, and the oversized handle and control knobs give a feel of quality as well (and match current upper to high end major appliances).

No doubt I’ll have more comments after we use the Breville BOV800XL for a few months, but for now, I can only sing its praises.

Great investment, October 7, 2007

The Cuisinart TOB-195 costs a little more than most toaster ovens but it is such a joy to use. Some of the things I like about it:

1. Size. You can fit a 12″ pizza in it.

2. Controls below the door. It saves a lot of countertop space.

3. Alarm to let you know when the oven is at the right temperature.

4. Digital temperature setting so you don’t have to guess at it.

5. Convection oven feature.

6. Non-stick walls for easy clean-up.

The Cuisinart takes only a few minutes to warm up to the proper temperature, unlike a regular oven which can take several minutes. Pizzas crisp up nicely and my favorite banana bread recipe baked perfectly. I expect to use my Cuisinart more often than my regular oven, except for times when company is over.

I relied on reviews of the previous model, the TOB-175, before purchasing the TOB-195 and must say that Cuisinart has continued their great tradition of creating wonderful kitchen electrics.

Overall, I love this oven. Unless it breaks down on me, which only time will tell, I cannot think of anything drastically negative to say about it. Yes, it needs an interior light. Yes, the crumb tray slides out from the back. But those issues don’t come close to detracting from the oven and are minor compared to what this oven does right.

Cuisinart is doing this oven a marketable disservice by labeling it a “toaster” oven. Rather, this is a full fledged oven (in reduced size) that also happens to toast your bread too. Cuisinart has established a new category of ovens with this one. It has evolved way past the “toaster” stage.

I’ll try to cover everything I wanted to know about this oven when I was researching it:

AESTHETICS:

Aesthetically, this oven beats ALL the others on the market hands down.

If you are into how your appliance looks as well as how it performs, you will be VERY pleased with this one. It has a professional, sophisticated look about it, which is enhanced by the steel on steel color combination. No black or white plastic look to cheapen it.

FUNCTIONALITY:

Large interior.

The digital control pad is very well labeled and easy to use. The LCD display is a must have. I know most toaster ovens are operated by manual control dials but I would never want one. I like being able to punch in what I want and see it on display. I know more things can go wrong with digital controls but I’ll take my chances.

I do wish the rack automatically slid out when the door is opened. I hate having to use a pot holder just to get a piece of toast out of the oven. On the other hand, it’s no different than using a regular oven and no one complains about that. All in all, not a big deal. I plan on getting some thongs to grasp small items.

It is not as bright inside as it appears in the picture. This oven needs an inside light. I thought my kitchen lighting would be bright enough, but overhead lighting doesn’t reach inside the depths of the oven. It is very dark in there.

The crumb tray is a pain to access from back. Would it have killed the designers to have it slide out from the front?!

TOAST:

I am pleased with the toasting quality of this oven. The preset default setting is #4-Medium for 3 minutes. I generally use the higher setting #5 or #6, as I keep my bread frozen and prefer a darker crust, which require extra time. Incidentally, I do not need to add defrost.

The toast turned out fine. It was nicely toasted on both sides; one side being slightly more toasted than the other. However, it does take a bit longer to toast than I am willing to wait–close to 5 minutes (for setting #6). Rather, I prefer the ease of just dropping my bread in a toaster and less than 3 minutes later, it pops up hot and toasted. For a quick and simple piece of toast, I still use a regular toaster. No big deal because as I mentioned earlier, I do look upon this Cuisinart as more of a mini-oven than a toaster anyway. However, it perfect for toasting larger items like bagels.

PIZZA/BAKE:

I am not sure why they call it “Pizza/Bake” but it is the conventional baking function (not to be confused with “convection” baking). I was eager to test out the baking feature so made some Tollhouse cookies. It only took an amazing 3 minutes for the oven to preheat to 350 degrees. I mean, no sooner had I sat down when it was beeping that it was ready. I was stunned. My big oven takes about 10 minutes to preheat.

The Tollhouse instructions call for baking from 10-12 minutes. I typically cook them for 10 minutes in my big oven so I set the timer for 10 minutes. Good thing I checked on my cookies around 8 1/2 minutes as they were already well done!

I am amazed again at how well this oven heats up. One reviewer complained that their oven heated up 15-25 degrees lower than the stated temperature. However, I experienced no temperature problems at all. If this oven does have temperature inaccuracies, it doesn’t appear to affect its baking performance. In fact, since regular baking cooks so fast, I wonder if I will ever use the convection baking feature.

CONVECTION BAKING:

I haven’t cooked with it yet, but I turned it on to make sure it works and to hear how it sounds. There is a hum from the convection fan but it is no louder than the sound of my refrigerator compressor or my microwave when in use. Between washing machines, dryers, dishwashers, microwaves, blenders, etc., if you aren’t used to hearing noises from your appliances by now, you must be an easily irritated person. LOL!

BROIL: Untested at this time. Will update later when used.

SAFETY:

Generally speaking, the Cuisinart may be a smaller oven but it is still an oven. This sucker does…

Top-notch, October 22, 2004

I bought this product at Sam’s Club the other day. The product is great and I would highly recommend this to anyone interested in a rotisserie. Having a regular toaster oven and a convection oven in the same unit is a great bonus! The unit comes with two wire shelves, two pizza racks (like cookie sheets but with holes in the bottom; great for Hot Pockets) that fit on top of the wire shelves, a 1″ deep backing pan, a wire rack that fits inside the backing pan, two rotisserie forks (for holding the meat on the spic), a rotisserie spic, and a rotisserie handle (for lifting it out of a hot oven).

Installation: A piece of cake. The unit comes packed in Styrofoam with the shelves and pans inside the unit; the rotisserie accessories came loose in the box but bagged in plastic. All I had to do was to wipe it down, wash the racks, and plug the box in.

Performance of the toaster oven: It toasts but boy is there a lot of room in here.

Performance of the convection oven: Never having used one before, I was surprised by the fans going off in the oven. But it did its job well cooking a pair of Hot Pockets to crispy perfection in just a little more time than the microwave. Homemade pot pies also cook very well.

Performance of the rotisserie: Great! I’ve cooked a beef roast and a Rock Cornish Hen and they came out so flavorful, tender, and juicy. The fat melts off this way and the drippings end up at the bottom. Make sure to cover it with a piece of foil.

OK thats it for this Top Rated Convection Toaster Ovens Article!!