Which Is The Best Wet Beville Smart Oven Pro

The Breville BGR820XL Smart Grill uses Element IQ technology and an embedded element heating system to sear meat on your countertop that tastes just as good as meat seared on the barbecue (closeup on right).

Why the Breville Smart Grill?

Every Breville product begins with a simple moment of brilliance. The Breville Smart Grill began with the simple fact that searing meat requires continuous high heat. What kind of machine cooks as well as a barbecue, but cleans fast like a frypan? The answer is the Breville Smart Grill, which allows you to sear meat indoors at a high consistent temperature without making a mess. It uses Element IQ technology and an 1800W heating system to electronically detect heat loss and provide rapid heat recovery.

Maintaining High Heat for Better Cooking

Countertop grills experience a drop in temperature when the cold meat or ingredients are introduced to the pre-heated surface. Even if they start off at the right temperature, most countertop grills can’t recover from this heat loss, heating up again slowly. This means less efficient cooking and tougher meat. The BGR820XL uses a smart technology called Element IQ to detect the drop in temperature and inject more heat for a rapid recovery back to the desired cooking temperatures.

Also, embedded elements in its grill plates help the grill maintain intense heat and recover from heat loss. The elements are cast into the plates themselves, which means that most of the heat generated by the elements is transferred to the plates instead of being lost (see below). That means less time to pre-heat and also rapid temperature recovery.

Other Features: Easy cleaning and Versatility

In addition to Element IQ and embedded plates, the Breville BGR820XL Smart Grill has numerous features: the top plate has six different adjustable heights that can be used for large sandwiches, small sliders, open-faced melts, or anything inbetween; the plates are removable for easier cleaning and can be interchanged depending on your needs (so the ribbed plate is either on the bottom or the top). The plates are nonstick plates made from cast aluminum coated with titanium infused Quantanium, for oil-free cooking and easy clean up. The housing is stainless steel, with die-cast arms.

The base can be tilted at an angle to drain, or lay perfectly flat for eggs, pancakes, and paninis. You can use it closed and use it to grill like a Panini press, or open it 180 degrees into barbecue mode, in which fat is drained from both plates into the drip tray. There are three different temperature settings (low, Panini, and sear, ranging from 320F to 450F), temperature and time control dials, and a countdown timer and sound alert.

Exposed Heating Elements vs. the BGR820XL’s Embedded Heating Elements

Exposed Heating Elements, typical of many grills

Embedded Heating Elements, like on the BGR820XL Smart Grill

Exposed Heating Elements: Heat loss

Many plates have exposed heating elements, where the grill plate sits directly on top of the heating element. Exposed elements lose much of the heat that they generate, instead of transferring the heat to the plate. This means the grill requires more time to heat up and more time to recover from heat loss, which extends cooking time and yields tougher meats.

Embedded Heating Elements: Heat transfer

The BGR820XL has grill plates with integrated heating elements, where the elements are embedded in the plates themselves. Rather than losing much of the heat that they generate, the heat is transferred directly to the plate. This means the grill requires less time to heat up and less time to recover from heat loss, which decreases cooking time, increases searing temperatures, and yields tenderer meats.

Two modes for two different cooking styles

Panini Mode

Barbecue Mode

Panini Mode

In Panini mode, use the top and bottom plates to press Paninis or grill ingredients on two sides at once. The height of the top plate from the bottom is adjustable, allowing you to press both large sandwiches and small sliders. There is a ribbed plate and a flat plate, and both plates are removable and interchangeable so you can choose the plate that suits your cooking style and clean the plates more easily.

Barbecue Mode

In barbecue mode, open the grill plates 180 degrees so the Smart Grill lies flat, and use it to grill and sear meats and vegetables. This doubles your cooking area, and also presents the option of grilling on both the flat plate and the ribbed plate. Additional ribbed plates and flat plates are available for purchase on Amazon if you’d prefer to have a uniform cooking surface in barbecue mode.

Temperature Control and Timing

The backlit LCD screen is blue when the grill is not hot

The backlit LCD screen is orange when the grill is pre-heating or cooking

Timer Control Dial

(Located on the left side of the Smart Grill front) You can set the timer for your preferred cooking time, and the Smart Grill will alert you when time is up.

Temperature Control Dial

(Located on the right side of the Smart Grill front) You can set the Breville Smart Grill in three different temperature settings: low, Panini, and sear, which range from temperatures of 320F to 450F. If you’d prefer to view the temperature in Celsius, flip the temperature conversion button.

Element IQ auto-adjustment

Element IQ detects the drop in temperature when you introduce cold ingredients to the pre-heated surface and automatically injects more heat to bring the Smart Grill back up to temperature and compensate for heat-loss.

Compare Breville’s Smart Ovens

Attribute	BOV450XL: Mini Smart Oven	BOV650XL: Compact Smart Oven	BOV800XL: Smart Oven
Dimensions	16x13x9 inches	16.5×15.5×10.25 inches	18.5×16.25×11.25 inches
Capacity	11 inch pizza, 4 toast slices	12 inch pizza, 4 toast slices	13 inch pizza, 6 toast slices
Element IQ?	Yes	Yes	Yes
Wattage	1800	1800	1800
Heating Elements	4 (quartz)	4 (quartz)	5 (quartz)
Convection	No	No	Yes
Pre-set functions	8	8	9
Accessories	Baking pan	Baking pan, broil rack	Baking pan, broil rack, pizza pan

Why the Breville Smart Oven?

Every Breville product begins with a simple moment of brilliance. The Breville Smart Oven began with the simple fact that different foods require different methods of heating: some, like baked goods, need to be cooked evenly; others, like meats, need to be seared on top. Most toaster ovens fail to distribute heat in a consistent way throughout their interiors, let alone change heat distribution to suit the different foods being prepared. This is how the Breville Smart Oven stands apart: whatever the food, it adjusts its heat distribution for perfect results.

For toast, high heat from top and bottom evenly crisps the outside of toast but doesn’t dry out the inside (left diagram), while for baking 1500W are distributed among four elements for gentle heat and even cooking (right diagram)

An oven that does the thinking for you

The Smart Oven is equipped with Element IQ cooking technology, which adjusts the power of the five individual quartz heating elements to cook food more evenly and quickly. This sophisticated heating system distributes heat throughout the oven when and where it is needed, to guarantee more efficient cooking. Nine different menu options allow users to choose the best setting for the food they are cooking. In addition to dynamically distributing heat to different areas, the Smart Oven can adjust the wattage of its heating elements for even more cooking flexibility. Most ovens have elements with fixed wattage that can only switch between ON and OFF, but Element IQ functions much like a dimmer on a light switch, increasing or decreasing element power with a simple turn of the knob.

The Breville Smart Oven comes with 3 acccessories: a pizza pan, baking pan, and broil rack.

For example, broiling requires high heat from above in order to melt and brown, so the Smart Oven activates 1500W of high heat from the top elements of the oven. On the other hand, toast needs to be cooked evenly on both sides without drying out the inside, so the Smart Oven uses high radiated heat from above and below (1800W distributed between four elements) to crisp the outside quickly.

Baking utilizes another feature of the Smart Oven that contributes to even heating: convection heating. Convection cooking uses a fan to circulate hot air so all sides of the food cook at the same rate. This is particularly important for baked goods, such as cookies and cakes, which need to be cooked evenly all the way through.

Each of these nine functions is preset with recommended settings, taking the guesswork out of cooking. However, each can be customized according to recipe, volume of food, or personal taste. Customized settings will remain in the memory of the oven until changed or until the oven is unplugged from the wall outlet, streamlining your cooking process.

Designed with the consumer in mind

The Smart Oven is carefully constructed from the most durable materials. It is attractively housed in reinforced stainless steel, a striking addition to any kitchen. The elements themselves are composed of quartz, rather than the metal elements found in other toaster ovens. Quartz responds more quickly to heat change, which results in more even heating throughout the oven. The roomy interior is coated with a non-stick material that can safely withstand high temperatures, making cleanup easier. A crumb/drip tray that is accessible from the front of the oven (rather than the back, like many other toaster ovens) also makes it easier to clean between cooking sessions. In addition, the oven includes a patented magnetic auto-eject rack: small magnets embedded on the sides of the oven door pull the wire rack halfway from the oven when the door is opened, making food easier to remove and preventing burns.

Goldilocks proportions

At 18.5 x16.25 x11.25 inches, the Breville Smart Oven is not too small but not too large. It is larger than most toaster ovens, with space to comfortably fit six slices of toast, a 13-inch pizza, or a whole chicken. However, as a countertop convection oven, it is more space-efficient than a conventional wall oven. A smaller oven means less time to heat up and less time to cook, perfect for preparing a meal in a hurry (or for cooks who like to create in the heat of the moment). This also translates into a cooler kitchen (particularly convenient in the hot summer months) and less energy consumed.

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Product Features

1. Easy-clean, stainless steel housing with ribbed plate warming tray
2. Non-Stick Interior with 3 rack positions
3. 13” pizza, 6-slice toast capacity
4. Tempered glass door
5. Magnetic auto-eject rack
6. 5 quartz elements with Element IQ for smart cooking
7. Back-lit easy-read LCD that calculates the correct the time and temperature, illuminating orange during preheating and cooking and blue once the cycle is complete
8. Function dial with 9 pre-set cooking functions: bake, broil, roast, cookies, reheat, pizza, bagel, toast, warm
9. Temperature and time dial with auto shut-off and sound alert
10. Easily removable pull-out crumb tray