Hi,

Recently my wife starting making cookies and cakes with our small Tanaka electric oven and we were shocked to see our electric bills shot through the roof. Through some monitoring, I gathered that the electric oven (more like a toaster as it only has 16L capacity) consumes about 15-20 KWh per hour of usage. My wife uses it for up to 2 hours each time.

Using simple calculations, I could buy her a newer, better oven with the electric bills chalked up in a month. Some of our friends said the small 16L electric oven that we have is not mean for making cookies or cakes as it is meant for simpler tasks like heating up sandwitches and all. True?

Our current Tanaka oven looks like this. It comes with 3 knobs just like the one in the url. http://www.beds.sg/home-appliance/kitchen-appliances/electric-ovens/mistral-20l-oven-toaster.html

I am considering to buy a proper oven that is made more for making cookies and cakes. Saw some Tefal ovens during a roadshow and my wife liked them very much. URLs for a 24L and a 30L below. Now the question is whether these ovens consume as much electricity (if not more) than our current one. Of course, the promoter told us to go ahead and make the purchase and said these oven don't consume much power.

http://www.courts.com.sg/Products/PID-IP042163%28Courts%29.aspx

http://www.courts.com.sg/Products/PID-IP044729%28Courts%29.aspx

I read up on some built in ovens that are 60L or bigger and they all stated power consumptions of 2-3KWh. So I am not sure why our existing puny oven consumes so much of power.

Your advice will be much appreciated.

Not sure why your current one consumes so much power - it could be that typically, these small ones do not have a seal around the door hence heat escapes. To maintain the 200+ deg C could take more energy...

The larger ones, if you look closely, have closer fitting doors or sometimes, a seal. Never compared the power consumption of the 2 cos I never use the small one to bake cookies and cakes, only to bake fish or warm up stuff (max 15min).

When you select your oven, take a look inside, keep in mind the following:

1. Oven is able to heat top and bottom, preferably with a switch to allow you to switch between top, bottom and both

2. Heating element position - that's the rod you will see at the top and sometimes, bottom of the oven. If it doesn't cover the whole length of the oven, u will get cold spots in the oven, so ur cookies placed at that position won't bake at the same rate as the rest. That's the problem I have with my current Tefal oven.

3. Preferably with a turbo fan capability as well - this will circulate the hot air around the entire oven, contributing to more even temperatures.

The more features, the more you gotta pay. Depends on your budget and utilisation. Fyi, this is the oven I plan to buy, you should be able to get these kind of stuff cheaper at those neighbourhood stores like at alexandra village etc.

rowenta oven

A small tip, regardless of the oven you buy, get a good oven thermometer (buy at phoon huat, sin lip kee etc) - that's the only truly reliable way to make sure you are baking at the temperature the recipe demands. Maybe $20+ ?

Happy baking !

wow! That's very good information. Thanks dragonnite

That Rowenta oven looks cool, but I think it is too "pro" for my wife. She just started doing baking and since I am not sure how long her new-found interest will last, I am planning to get her an oven that is in the range of $200-300.

So do you see an electric bill shock if you use your oven? My electric bill increased by about $100 when my wife uses the small oven.

Hmmm, not really frankly. At least, I've never noticed a significant increase...