Long prized by professional cooks for their culinary firepower and versatility, it’s unlikely that the combination steam oven (often shortened to just “combi oven”) is this year’s Instant Pot or air fryer, but that hasn’t stopped Anova from taking a swing. Meet the Anova Precision Oven, the first combi oven meant for the home cook.
The Precision Oven is available for pre-order at $600 a machine, or roughly 10 percent the cost of a commercial equivalent. What does a a combi oven do?
Combi ovens use convection (hot air), steam and a combination of steam and convection; the inclusion of steam being the chief difference between a combi oven and the oven in your kitchen. The culinary applications for steam are many, but its most effective attributes are its ability to stabilize temperature and keep food moist. Because water (steam) is a better conductor of heat than plain old air, combi ovens can cook food at significantly lower temperatures without adding extra time to the cook, while also maintaining far more consistent heat levels. A whole roasted chicken, for instance, takes about an hour to cook at 350° F in a standard convection oven but can be cooked at 165° F for the same time in a combi oven. Lower cooking temperatures mean less moisture, nutrient and flavor loss.
Though secondary to cooking, combi ovens are also especially suited for reheating foods, as the steam injected air revitalizes leftovers rather than drying them out.
As with Anova’s best-in-class sous vide circulator, the Precision Oven will land with full app support and plenty of tutorials to train its users into cooking with a new tool. The brand says units will ship by the end of September.