Active Cooking Evening

Recipe for one of the dishes

One of the highlights of my trip to the Miele headquarters in Germany was the active cooking evening. Miele love to get their customers, reps and dealers involved in understanding every aspect of the appliances, including active demonstrations. For kitchen appliances, they have a number of impressive 'active cooking showrooms' where you can really test out the kitchens and latest equipment.

We arrived to see that the kitchen was already laid out with the ingredients and recipes, which were in German, but the chefs and assistants spoke excellent English.

Dining table laid out

If you prefer, you can sit and watch the cooking

Nice large work top - it even has built-in weighing scales


Fresh spinach


Stir-fry waiting to be prepared - spot the chillies

The professional pressure and steam oven used to steam the fish

We were all given a different course to make and I assigned myself to
dessert (!!!) along with Jack from Dustfluffgrit. We made an admirable pair - me wafting around with camera in hand, and Jack doing all the hard work (sorry Jack!) We (he) made a fabulous quark-mascarpone-soufflé (with cherries) and it was cooked in the combi-steam oven for 25 minutes. It was really easy to make, all the ingredients except the egg whites and the cherries were whisked together. Then the egg whites were whisked to the stiff peak stage and folded in with the cherries before cooking.
In the other areas of the kitchen, fish was steaming, steak marinating, chicken grilling and plenty of vegetables were baking and stir-frying. We were even treated to little appetizers while we whipped up our dinner!

Fishy appetizer on rye bread

Carrot and ginger soup

Baked goats cheese on toasted bread, with tangy apple and beetroot salad

Mixing the ingredients for the soufflé

Plenty of sugar in the ramekins to prevent the soufflés from sticking

Cooking them in the combi steam oven

Plating up the fish course

Stir-frying the vegetables using the wonderful induction wok hob

Cooking the chicken on a tepan hob

And here's the results - the dinner that everyone helped to cook:

Steamed fish, spinach, rice and baked tomato starter


Grilled chicken on a bed of stir-fried vegetables with duchess potatoes

Our quark-mascarpone-soufflé dessert

The whole evening was most enjoyable and lots of fun, with all the food turning out beautifully, thanks to the Miele chefs and their lovely assistants.

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One of the last things we did before leaving Miele, was to have a presentation of the brand new combi steamer DGC XL, available from April 2010. This baby can steam, roast, bake and brown, cooks fabulous bread, meat, pastry, cakes, biscuits, pizzas and also convenience foods. It has a large cavity, 39L, and can cater for 10-12 people using full size oven racks/trays, or if you prefer, 2 smaller steaming trays. You can defrost, reheat, grill... plus it has non-stick 'PerfectClean' finish and a 'rinse care' programme, which makes cleaning a doddle.

This appliance actually has a brain! The timer tells you when to put the dishes in the oven, eg. potatoes first, then fish, followed by the vegetables. It uses controlled use of steam during the cooking process, no matter what amount/size of food you are cooking. It comes with a wireless probe to check the core temperature of the food, and has gourmet settings for professional chefs and hobbyists, as well as standard automatic settings.

Ahhh, beautiful! The new Miele Combi Steamer DGC XL

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Disclosure - this trip was courtesy of Miele.

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