Watch the , "The Great Potato Race", (UTube).
There you will see the Miele and the Elux Icon Speed Oven in actual use.

We have the Elux (about 5 years now). It is our most used appliance. It "Defaults" to the MW mode,---to nuke something just enter the time and hit start. It has the other typical MW options---popcorn, defrost---power--etc.

I use it to make toast, I choose the grill function.
It can roast, bake, grill, and convection bake. It also "speed cooks"---a combo of convection and microwaving
in the case of a potato, it is about 4 times faster than doing the potato in a conventional/convection oven. (15 minutes versus about an hour for our regular 30" Elux Oven)--This includes preheat times.

We like the "fully automated modes it has, both when choosing "Speed Cooking" as well as "Recipes". (Example---to speed cook a potato, you choose potato, it asks you how many, you answer, it sets up the preheat time, baking and MW time and baking temp. Then it tells you No food in oven, does the preheat, beeps at ya and tells you to put in the tater and press start---beeps when done.) So except for grabbing the tater, the thing is pretty much automated.

There is no broil on ours---not a problem for us as we dont even use the broil on our bigger oven(we do that outside).
A poster has said they think the new Elux speed oven does have the broil---but if you really need the broil---You better double check that!!!

Anyway, like I said , It is our most used appliance, and we really like it. It does need 240 volts.

Good luck on your pending decision!

Gary

Thanks - this was precisely the kind of feedback I was looking for (and the video was quite entertaining!). The Elux does sound like a good fit.

Hey Capt...Gary is a wealth of information abt Elux and induction. I've learned a lot from this forum.

I chose the Miele for several reasons..the biggest was that I went with the Miele oven and I wanted it to match but I didn't like the door on the Elux at all. I found it hard to operate and didn't find the controls very intuitive.

Find a local store where you can play with them and press all the buttons, open the door, pull out the racks, etc.
My appliance contact tried his best to sell me the Advantium. I just did not like the looks of it and I fell really hard for the Master Chef functions. My kids are the perfect market for no thinking cooking functions!

I know you ruled the Miele out but there are some deals on a few of them out there if you are still interested. There are quite a few Advantium owners here, too....hopefully they'll chime in.

Good luck...you'll be thrilled with any of them I am sure!

Since you mention that microwaving is a priority (for the kids), I'll mention my preliminary impressions of the Miele speed oven's microwaving function.

Currently, my beloved toaster oven and the old Sharp microwave are sitting in the pantry -- as if in purgatory -- waiting for me to sort out if they stay or go.

Using the Miele speed oven's microwave on high power is straightforward; just put in whatever you want to cook and press the "Minute +" button on the front: each press gives you 30 seconds' power. This bypasses a more convoluted menu-based approach, which would allow specifying power level. Just stop it early if you've set up too much time on the clock.

The Miele is a 1000 watt microwave, so its generally comparable to my old Sharp (maybe 1100 watts, I forget) for most stuff. But the Miele does not have -- maybe doesn't need? -- a rotating turntable.

The one exception I found, where the new microwave fell short of my old one, was for microwaved corn on the cob. This was fine in the Sharp, but the corn didn't cook fully in the Miele, even with an extra 30 cooking time. I'm not sure if it had to do with the lack of automatic rotation in the Miele, the corn's position on the glass tray (too low?), or something else (including operator error!).

As for the other options, I wasn't able to see an Electrolux Icon *anything* here. I really liked Advantium (i.e., the 240 v model), but at 30" it was too large for my island. So I ended up with the Miele -- and overall I'm very pleased with it, so far.

I certainly agree with the poster who suggested that you see and play with -- even better, cook with -- these models before you buy.

This is excellent advice. We did get a chance to play with the Miele Classic unit but our local place doesn't have the MasterChef installed. We did not find that the knob selectors suited our preferences and, if we were to with Miele, we'd want to explore the MasterChef more. We have, however, had a chance to see the Elux but have not yet played with one.

One big advantage we see with the Miele right now is their September promotion: throwing in 'Miele Advantage Plus' at no additional cost - a $500 feature on the Diamante+ DW we just bought and an $800 feature on a MasterChef.

We're still looking - and acquiring feedback like what we're getting here.

Thanks to all!

The Miele Advantage Plus promotion appears to be only for Miele Canada (which is great for those to our northern border).

Do you have information about its availability in the US?

Thanks!

same boat here - we now use a microwave and separate toaster oven. I can make room for a 30 inch speed oven, and want to replace/upgrade both of these heavily used appliances.

How tall are these? I'm thinking of space under a raised counter, with the counter for landing space, and debating height. Do I have to pick a model before I know how high?

These all seemed designed for a 30" w cabinet and the Miele & GE Advantium require an aperature of approx. 18" h whereas the E'lux requires a few inches more of height. In our case, going with the E'lux requires us to give up a 6" deep drawer - we've decided to not allow this to be a determining factor in our selection.

Were gonna do turkey thighs tonight along with some dressing. The elux has a turkey setting, both for bone and boneless. It sure makes it easy for an old Fa** like me.
I dont needs a recipe book, just choose turkey(bone in). It asks me how many pounds (1.5, 2 3 lbs etc).It will set the preheat time, temp, Nuking time, and baking time.
I will let ya all now how it comes out!
Later.

Gary

Well, Turkey and dressing came out great. During the last bit of baking, I added the stove top dressing to the turkey as I prefer the dressing drier, and with a lil crust.
Turkey skin had a nice golden brown.

I tell ya, for those of us that don't have the cullinary skills of some of the folks here, this thing is hard to beat! Saves time and power too.
HTH's

Gary

I got a Miele Chef Speed oven. The reason it won over Electrolux was due to the fact that I can do undercounter(E'lux does not allow undercounter) installation AND that it is only 24 inches wide. For me, the space constraint was very important. I thought the functionality was quite similar; minor differences here and there.

MW function works like a standard MW... We use is as MW quite a bit to reheat food/coffee. My kids don't eat baked potatoes. With all due respects to the great potato race.... no need for that function.

regarding above post....I have never MW'ed corn on the cob. I rarely use the MW to actually cook food. I don't think the food tastes very good when cooked in the MW, IMHO. We tend to roast the corn on the cob in its husk on the BBQ... Try that sometime. The corn is moist and sweet. It takes about 15 minutes but worth every minute of it.

I have Viking gas range with gas oven. I find that the amount of heat generated from the gas oven is far suprerior to the Miele speed oven even though it has 240V for roasting vegies and meat. This is what I noticed years ago when I first transitioned from electric oven to high powered gas oven; higher heat output even though the temperature was the same. However, Miele bakes pastries better/more evenly than the gas oven. I actually love having BOTH gas and electric ovens. They behave very differently!

The reason I got a Miele versus a MW with convection oven was its 240V baking ability. I am not sure how cookies/pies would bake with 120V convection oven. Does anyone know?

The Miele bakes very evenly and functions superbly as a second oven. I bake pastries/cookies etc with the Miele preferentially over my gas oven.

I don't use the Miele to toast bread. I like the toaster's ability to pop up the bread when done. If I use the Miele speed oven to toast bread, I have to watch it or "program" it for a few minutes. It just is too much trouble when I can slide the bread into the toaster and push a button. I still have the toaster oven on the counter, but the only time I am using it is for toasting bread.... We have not quite decided what to do with the toaster oven. The space is not a premium so we are keeping it for now.

Hope my own reasoning/experience helps with your decision making.

I did not get the Advantium because it really seemed to not work quite as well as a pure baking oven. It also seemed to have cavity that is not as tall. I can bake two full trays of cookies quite evenly in the Miele. I need to experiment with three trays.

All I can say is that I use the Miele now to bake everything except pizza, for which it sucks. Other than that, it can't be beat. I pretty much stumbled on the concept of a speed oven while looking for a built in microwave, but now that I have seen how great a microwave, broiler, oven, and combination of all three the Miele is, I could never go back.

Nope , we wern't MW ing. I agree, not fond of microwave food. The Speed function is a combo of Convection baking and MW (Mw to speed the process up roughly 4 times faster at least with potatoes and turkeys). It preheats just like your big oven (not sure how hot for the case of turkeys) but felt pretty hot when I opened it (I would guess 350-400) but the Speed oven sets the temp and time automatically.

So unlike just "Nuking Something" such as a piece of meat that would come out an ugly gray colour (Yuk), Speed cooking you get the nice brown color and depending on how long you choose to cook it you can get the chrispness too.
I also find that some thing reheat better using the speed cook option instead of just MW, rice for example isn't as mushy when speed cooked.(reheated)

Glad you are enjoying your Miele!!

Gary

All of the comments here have been really helpful in driving our decision on this and we enventually concluded to go with a speed oven based on the power and versatility of these units.

In the end, we decided to go with the Miele MasterChef and pulled the trigger yesterday. The decision was facilitated by Miele's Canada September promotion event (free upgrade to Advantage Plus with a 10 year extended care certificate) and our recent positive experience with Miele. We'll pick it up next week and hope to share our experiences here at some future point.

Thanks again to all for your helpful advice.

Hi Captsmethwick, I am wondering how you like your Miele Master Chef Speed Oven now that you have had it for several months? I am struggling with the same decision -- teenage kids will be using it for microwave, wondering whether it could replace toaster oven, too? THanks