If you ever went to college and were starved for the taste of a homecooked meal, you probably wished for an oven. However, ovens are not a common amenity in most college dorms and take up a lot of time and space. Fortunately, you can make all the same foods in a fraction of the time in a halogen oven right on your countertop!
You should never use the halogen glass bowl for cooking your food. This bowl is meant to hold the baking dish while the food cooks. It also helps regulate and hold the temperature of the oven so your food cooks evenly.
How can you cook in a halogen oven? Is it okay to bake goodies like cookies and cakes in a halogen oven? If you want to know all there is to know about a halogen oven, then you came to the right place!
How Do You Cook With a Halogen Oven?
Cooking with a halogen oven requires you first to prepare your food and select your dish of choice. Halogen ovens use a halogen heating element that works best with either foil, tin, or pyrex glass. Use the menu on the heating element to select the proper temperature and cooking time.
Halogen ovens use an intense heating lamp with halogen technology. Halogen lighting uses a system similar to traditional incandescent lightbulbs, with the addition of a fan that blows the heat over the food.
This creates a compact heating zone that is much faster and energy efficient than an oven. And, since it is so compact, it is a uniform heating system for all the food inside. This is a step up from the microwave for several reasons, including even heating and a crisp exterior.
Microwaves often leave certain portions of the food cold and may make your food rubbery. This is not an issue with halogens and thus makes food crisp and thoroughly warmed. This heating system makes the way you cook your food extra important.
To cook in your halogen oven, you must:
- Select the appropriate cooking dish
- Prepare your food
- Select the defrost setting on your machine if necessary
- Follow the recipe
- Select the appropriate cooking time
- Select the appropriate temperature
- Observe the progress through the glass cooking dish
- Remove carefully with gloves or tongs
You can cook with a glass oven-safe dish, which is a preferred dish of many halogen oven users. These are great because they compliment the see-through nature of the oven, allowing you to watch your food cook.
However, you can also use a baking tray, sheet, or disposable cooking container. As long as they fit the halogen perfectly and are oven safe, they are perfectly fine for your halogen oven.
What Can You Cook in a Halogen Oven?
You can cook almost all of the same foods in a halogen oven as you would in a traditional oven. However, they are not as large as conventional ovens and may not be able to accommodate all types of traditional oven-baked dishes.
Precooked, prepared frozen foods warm and cook very quickly in a halogen oven. However, you can also bake homemade meals such as pies, chicken, lasagna, quiche, etc. But, you must be mindful of the size of the dish you wish to prepare.
Halogen ovens come in a variety of sizes, but most do not accommodate the quantity of a large oven. You can bake pastries and baked goods such as cookies in a halogen, but it may not be efficient.
Unless you only want to make a few at a time, otherwise you can bake a couple of dozen cookies in a traditional oven rather than only a few in a halogen.
Therefore, if you want to make a bulk meal to feed several people, it is better to use your larger oven. But, you can cook the same foods in a halogen oven as in a traditional oven with some minor alterations.
Do You Need to Preheat a Halogen Oven?
There is no need to preheat your halogen oven as you would in a conventional oven. Halogen ovens warm much faster than other ovens and do not become warmer once they reach the set temperature. Since they warm so quickly, your food will not cook any better when preheated.
Although preheating your oven is unnecessary, you can use the defrost option on the halogen to thaw your food. This will help you cook your food evenly or season it properly once it is thawed.
It is especially useful for seasoning meats such as chicken, steak, and pork chops. This is because it thaws the food and prevents the meat from becoming burnt while the inside cooks completely.
You can also use this setting for cooking frozen vegetables. It’s especially useful since it prevents the vegetables from becoming too crisp on the outside while remaining mushy and frozen on the inside.
Can You Put Tin Foil In a Halogen Oven?
You can use tin foil in a halogen oven, especially for cooking meats and greasy foods. Tin foil and aluminum foil can be used to wrap your food or cover the cooking dish to prevent your oven from getting dirty. It can also help ensure your foods are cooked thoroughly on the inside.
It is best to add foil either directly under the food, wrapped around the dish, or wrapped around the food itself. You will not want the foil to get caught in the wind draft of the halogen oven and blow about while cooking.
It helps keep both the oven and the cooking dish clean. Or, if you want to cook hard vegetables such as yams, potatoes, or yucca, you can wrap the foil around it to keep the insides warm. It will also prevent the exterior from becoming too crisp while it bakes.
What’s a Halogen Oven Good For?
Halogen ovens are a convenient method of cooking small or personal meals. They are quicker and more efficient than conventional ovens and bake more evenly than microwaves. They use less power than traditional ovens and do not require you to preheat them.
Halogen ovens can be used to:
- Bake
- Fry
- Dehydrate
- Steam
- Roast
While the foods you choose to bake may not cook as well as others, halogens are versatile and capable. To fry your foods in a halogen, you will need only to do light frying. They cannot handle deep-fried foods, and you should never add a pool of oil inside of a halogen oven.
Dehydrating foods like mushrooms, peppers, and tomatoes can help you save perishable foods for years. Never turn the temperature above 300 degrees Fahrenheit (149 degrees Celsius) when dehydrating your food in a halogen.
If you turn it up higher, you will only have burnt foods rather than dry, preserved foods. Beef jerky and turkey jerky are also popular dehydrated foods for halogen ovens. Just remember dehydration takes longer than baking due to the slow, drying process.