12
USING THE FAN OVEN
The Fan Oven
The air inside the oven is heated by the element
around the fan situated behind the back panel. The
fan draws air from the oven, the element heats the
air which is circulated into the oven via the top, base
and sides of the back panel. The advantages of
cooking with this function are:
Faster Preheating
Because the fan oven quickly reaches temperature, it
is not usually necessary to preheat the oven
although you may find that you need to allow an
extra 5-7 minutes on cooking times. For recipes
which require higher temperatures, best results are
achieved if the oven is preheated first, e.g. bread,
pastries, scones, souffles, etc.
Lower Temperatures
Fan oven cooking generally requires lower
temperatures than conventional cooking.
Follow the temperatures recommended in the charts
or remember to reduce temperatures by about 20-
25
°
C for your own recipes which use conventional
cooking.
Even Heating for Baking
The fan oven has uniform heating on all runner
positions. This means that batches of the same food
can be cooked in the oven at the same time.
However, the top shelf may brown slightly quicker
that the lower one.
This is quite usual. There is no mixing of flavours
between dishes (see Fig. 7).
The oven is supplied with two anti-tip shelves.
IMPORTANT: The anti-tip oven shelves must be
positoned as shown in Fig. 6.
HINTS AND TIPS
Runner positions are not critical, but make sure the
shelves are evenly spread.
When cooking more than one dish in the fan oven,
place dishes centrally on the shelves rather than
several dishes on one shelf.
When the oven is full, you may need to allow slightly
longer cooking time.
A shelf may be placed on the floor of the oven. Place
dishes on a shelf in this position rather than on the
oven base, to allow air circulation around the food.
When the oven is full of the same food, e.g. equal
trays of small cakes or equal size victoria sandwich
cakes, then they will be cooked in the same time and
removed from the oven together. When different
sizes of trays or types of food, e.g. biscuits and
cakes are cooked, they will not necessarily be ready
together.
The fan oven can be used to heat foods through
without thawing first, e.g. fruit tarts, mince pies,
sausage rolls, and other small pastry items. Use a
temperature of 190-200
°
C and allow 20-40 minutes
(depending on the quantity of food in the oven).
The use of too high temperatures can cause uneven
browning. Check with the recommendations for oven
temperatures given in the cooking charts, but be
prepared to adjust the temperature by 10
°
C if
necessary. Remember to reduce temperatures by
about 20-25
°
C for your own conventional recipes.
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
FO 0171
FO 0351
