Samsung combination microwave review

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As you might expect from the tech experts at Samsung, this multi-function microwave covers all the bases, including some you never even knew you needed, and does it with panache.

Most of Samsung’s home appliances come with trademarked features, and this is no exception, with an Easy View™ door which allows you to see how your food’s doing, and HotBlast™ technology which blows air across your food during convection cooking for a crisper finish.

Once you've disentangled it from what feels like a slightly excessive amount of plastic, you'll find high and low grill racks and a crusty plate for browning food.

The number of cooking options is impressive – a focus on healthy cooking means it offers 13 presets for cooking things such as quinoa, spinach and grilled salmon, and it also has settings for proving dough and making home-made yogurt – a feature not found on any of the other microwaves we tested.

It also features an auto-reheat setting for items such as ready meals and frozen pizza, and 11 ‘Slim Fry’ options for cooking fries, onion rings and chicken drumsticks with less fat.

There's even an eco button which turns the display off when you’re not using the microwave, and a ceramic interior makes cleaning extra easy.

Despite how much this model can do, it's simple to set up and the instructions, which seem to be aimed at a US market (we wouldn't recommend washing chicken before cooking, for instance) are easy to follow.

There was initial confusion over some of the directions for two-stage cooking – unlike some combination cookers, you can't programme this one to perform consecutive functions, such as microwaving followed by grilling.

But it still defrosted and cooked chicken beautifully, with no drying out – although solo users might find the minimum weights needed to use the presets, which start at 500g for chicken pieces, inconvenient.

A point of contention for UK users might be the jacket potato setting. Instead of the usual instructions to prick potatoes and cook them whole, this model requires you to cut them in half and cook them cut-side up, so they can be microwaved and grilled at the same time. Despite some initial skepticism, the results were impressive, with moist flesh and tasty browning on top.

Other issues include size – this certainly requires measuring up before buying, as it's very large – and the noise as it cooks, which is intermittent instead of constant and can get a bit annoying.

The handle, which runs horizontally across the door despite opening vertically, can be a bit fiddly, and the instruction booklet separates the directions for using the settings and its cooking guides, so until you’ve learned the basics, you might have to use bookmarks.

But for a microwave which offers so much in return, these annoyances are worth putting up with. Costing around £200, you get incredible bang for your buck – tech lovers, especially, will be over the moon playing with all the features.

Available from:

Samsung (£209)
Argos (£220)
Currys (£249)

Samsung combination microwave specifications
Capacity: 28l
Wattage: 900w
Dimensions: H310mm, W517mm, D463mm

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This review was last updated in February 2020. If you have any questions, suggestions for future reviews or spot anything that has changed in price or availability, please get in touch at goodfoodwebsite@immediate.co.uk.

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