Unox Italy
UNOX Commercial Ovens
In a kitchen, pastry lab, bakery or deli corner, having a commercial oven plays a decisive role both in the success of the dishes and in the adoption of a more profitable working method that increases both quality and profit. Convection ovens, convection ovens with humidity, combi ovens or speed ovens: which should I choose?
Commercial convection ovens are equipped with one or more fans (this is why they are also called ventilated) and use the internal circulation of hot air to cook food. Thanks to the convection motion, heat is distributed evenly in the chamber, which makes it possible to cook food uniformly. A convection oven is suitable for baking frozen bakery items, or for baking simple goods such as shortcrust pastry, which does not require special climate conditions during the baking process.
Commercial convection ovens with humidity possess the same characteristics as a convection oven but with the addition of steam. In this case, the elements we control are time, temperature, air flow and humidity.
The difference between a convection oven with humidity and a combi oven (or combination oven) is that the former is designed to perform very simple cooking procedures such as the ones described above but with the advantage that it can add percentages of steam to speed up the cooking process or to extend the range of products that can be cooked and baked.
An example? If I have to bake a fresh croissant that needs precise percentages of humidity during the first part of the baking process, surely the first choice falls on a convection oven with humidity. However, these ovens are not designed to handle baking processes with maximum humidity percentages like steam cooking. A commercial convection oven with humidity is suitable for fresh bakery and pastry goods as well, however it may have some limitations when baking certain types of bread or bakery products, for which it is necessary to use a combi oven that can saturate the cooking chamber with steam in a few seconds.
Commercial combi ovens (or combination ovens) are the ultimate expression of a commercial oven. A combi oven not only distributes heat through air flow, it also adds another fundamental element to cooking: steam. It was created to cover all the conditions necessary to complete a cooking process: from steaming to grilling. A commercial combi oven can cook everything and it is designed to withstand all conditions. In fact, with a commercial combi oven you can choose the percentage of humidity you want inside the cooking chamber. Thanks to their cutting-edge technology, UNOX intelligent combi ovens are able to automatically recognise the amount of food being cooked, the characteristics and the climate conditions in which to operate, and hence adjusting the settings to guarantee the perfect result in all conditions.
Commercial speed ovens are ovens which use a combination of microwaves and hot air to cook or regenerate food. Microwaves act directly on the water in the food, creating heat from within. Hot air, on the other hand, heats the outside of the food. The sum of the two ensures incredibly fast cooking times and even more incredible regeneration times. Due to the lack of humidity management and self-washing, these ovens have always been used for very simple cooking procedures which don't get the oven too dirty or for regenerating cooked food, sandwiches and snacks.
Commercial combi speed ovens are commercial ovens that represent for an evolution of simple speed ovens. These ovens combine all the aspects of a combi oven (such as the possibility of performing countless cooking techniques) with those of a speed oven.
Commercial ovens can be electric or gas, and manual or digital. Manual ovens are the ones with the classic knobs. They are very intuitive and meant for simple cooking processes. Digital ovens, on the other hand, are ideal for more advanced uses since they allow to create programmes, save recipes and are customisable.