What do the symbols on my microwave mean?

With the microwave function, you can defrost food and reheat your leftovers from yesterday. In addition, this setting is very suitable for boiling broccoli, beans, or potatoes. With the microwave function, you need less water to boil vegetables than you would in a pan. This way, the food retains its vitamins and you don't pour them out along with the water.

With the defrost function, you defrost products without heating them up. You can quickly defrost a slice of bread for breakfast or the minced meat for your pasta sauce. The defrost setting works differently for ovens and combi microwaves. When you use the defrost setting on a microwave, you select the weight. The microwave will then use the right wattage and defrost time. After, the air circulates through the microwave at a low temperature.

You can only find a crisp function on combi microwaves. With this function, you can make crispy oven fries, give your pizza a crunchy crust, or prepare your chicken a crispy layer. The crisp function only works in combination with a crisp dish or crisp plate. This extra-hot dish heats the bottom, while the grill is focused on the top of your dish. You can use the crisp function to speed up the cooking process, so you'll be able to serve a crispy dish quickly.

A fan is the icon for the fan function. In this mode, the microwave uses a fan to distribute the heat evenly throughout the entire space. The advantage of this is that you can bake relatively quickly. This function is less suitable for baking cakes, but you can easily prepare an oven dish, for example.

With the steam function on a microwave, you can steam vegetables in a steam dish. You fill this dish with water and place it in the microwave. That way, your vegetables don't loose their flavor, vitamins, and structure while you prepare them.

With this setting, you use the entire grill of the oven. With the grill, you can gratinate a dish or give a piece of chicken or fish a crispy crust. You can also make tasty vegetables, like bell peppers, zucchini, or aubergine. Thanks to the grill setting, the food gets that typical, sweet grill flavor. The grill isn't suitable for preparing thick pieces of meat. If you grill a piece of meat that's too thick, it's difficult to fully cook the inside without burning the outside.

With some microwaves, you can easily use just part of the grill. Make sure to check which part of the grill you're using, so you can place your dish in the right spot. Usually, this is the center of the grill. You use the partial grill function the same way you'd use the full grill function, but for smaller amounts.

The pizza setting often uses a combination of the fan oven and the heating element at the bottom of the microwave. The extra heat from below gives your pizza a crispy crust. You can also use the pizza setting for other dishes that need to be properly cooked on the bottom, like a quiche.

With lower heat, all of the heat is generated by a heating element at the bottom of the oven. You can use this setting for au bain-marie or to finish cooking a dish. If you're making an oven dish, quiche, or pie, this setting will cook the bottom without burning the top. For this setting, you should preferably only use 1 baking sheet or oven rack. That's because the heat from the bottom heating element won't reach the second baking sheet or second oven rack.

With upper heat, your microwave only activates the upper heating element. You can use this function to bake cakes with a pre-baked bottom. That way, you keep the bottom of your apply pie from burning. You can also use upper heat if you want to gratinate your dish, like a lasagna or chicory with ham and cheese.

If you choose the fan grill setting, your microwave will alternate between the grill and the fan. That way, the microwave blows the hot air around your dish every now and then. You can compare it to preparing a piece of meat on a spit. As a result, large pieces of pork fillet, pork chops, or roast beef cook faster. If you only use the grill for larger pieces of meat and fish, you run the risk of burning the outsides while the inside is still raw.