What Can You Cook in a Halogen Oven? Nifty Tips and Ideas

Last Updated on January 10, 2023

A halogen oven, also called a halogen cooker, is a convenient kitchen appliance that can be used for many purposes. They are not only more efficient and portable than a full-size conventional oven but are also a great way to conserve energy and reduce electricity costs. Cooking food with a halogen oven sounds excellent when considering the benefits, but you may be asking yourself, what can you cook in a halogen oven?

Fortunately, you can cook almost everything you can cook in a traditional oven, but not quite. We will help you learn about all of the potentials your halogen oven has for cooking leftovers, side dishes, and even full meals so you can get the most bang for your buck. Don’t worry; it is not nearly as complicated as it sounds. Keep reading to learn about all of the tasty foods you can prepare with your halogen oven and get some great ideas for halogen oven recipes.

Halogen Oven Basics Explained

What’s the Technology Behind Halogen Ovens?

Halogen ovens are small appliances that utilise a halogen bulb to create heat. In addition to the halogen bulb heating element, an air fan helps circulate the heat within the cooker and heat the dish inside, similar to a convection oven. This combination of heat and hot air circulation results in even cooking all kinds of foods in a highly efficient manner. Unlike a microwave oven, you can easily bake foods and cook directly in the serving dish too.

Typically, a halogen cooker features a glass bowl and a well-sealed lid that houses the halogen bulb on its underside. Depending on your specific halogen oven, it may also come with various accessories such as an extender ring or a high and low rack to help expand its capabilities overall and make even more types of cooking accessible.

What Cooking Methods Are Possible With a Halogen Cooker?

Halogen oven cooking methods encompass a wide variety of possibilities, just like a standard oven. In addition to being able to cook faster, a new halogen oven will also allow you to do almost all of the things you can do with conventional ovens and even some things you can accomplish with a hob as well.

Possible Halogen Oven Cooking Capabilities:

• Roasting
• Baking
• Steaming
• Grilling

With all of these options, it is no wonder people wonder what to cook in a halogen oven. Roasted chicken and oven chips might be some of the first things that come to people’s minds. However, you would be selling yourself short if you chose to limit your halogen oven cooking to these basic dishes.

What Can Halogen Ovens Cook?

If you are looking for a halogen oven recipe, you can either start from scratch or by reheating leftovers. Either way, you have nearly limitless possibilities.

Vegetables

Halogen ovens enable you to cook just about any vegetable you could want or think of, including tougher vegetables like parsnips, carrots, or Brussel sprouts. And if you like to steam vegetables, a handy steaming tray often comes with a halogen oven to help make the steaming process easier.

You can easily roast vegetables in your oven, too. Just remember to use a bit of cooking oil if you want to use the roasting method. Otherwise, your vegetables could dry out and become tough.

Potatoes

You can choose to boil potatoes first and then cook them in the halogen oven. Or you can stick them straight into the oven once they have been prepped. However, this may result in harder wedges and chips.

You can cook the following with your oven:

• Baked oven chips
• Potato wedges
• Roast potatoes
• Jacket potatoes

Meats

In addition to vegetables, you can also cook meat using your halogen oven easily. This includes small pieces of meat, large meat joints, or even a whole chicken as long as it fits inside. Many halogen ovens even come with cooking racks designed to help drain away extra fat while the meat cooks.

Another thing that makes halogen ovens a nice addition to your kitchen is that it allows for flexibility. You can mix different types of food to make an entire meal, or stick to one food item at a time, whichever you prefer. Hence, if you’re a meat lover, try cooking the following meat-based dishes:

• Roast beef
• Roasted beef sirloin
• Pork chops
• Roast chicken
• Chicken breasts
• Brisket
• Sausages
• Bacon
• Ham
• Steam or roast fish fillets
• Hard-boiled eggs

You can also make boiled eggs in a halogen oven, but it is not a great way to do it because it will take a bit of time, and they may not cook as expected.

Pizzas

Pizza is a fantastic food to prepare in a halogen oven as well. Grated cheese tends to melt exceptionally well, and you can add all kinds of additional toppings to it, as is probably evident by now. Halogen ovens are great for the following:

• Homemade pizza
• Frozen pizza
• Pizza leftovers

Different Types of Bread and Cakes

Similar to homemade pizza dough, you can also use halogen ovens for baking different kinds of bread, puddings, and other kinds of dessert. You will not be able to cook all types of desserts, but you might be surprised at what they can accomplish. We recommend experimenting with smaller dessert items to ensure the centre cooks thoroughly.

Make sure you monitor dessert items while they cook — this is good practice for anything you cook. However, in our opinion, it is more important with dessert dishes because many of your baking recipes will not directly convert to the halogen oven, especially when it comes to cooking times. You can use your oven to make:

• Toasted bread
• Demi loaves
• Buns
• Muffins
• Fruit cakes
• Cupcakes
• Carrot cake
• Coffee cake
• Scones
• Fruit tarts
• Fruit crumbles

Frozen Foods and Leftovers

Can you cook frozen food in a halogen oven? You bet you can. They are great for cooking frozen chips evenly and various other frozen food items, which makes preparing a meal even more straightforward than you may have thought. 

Below are some of the food items you can try cooking on your halogen oven:

• Frozen vegetables
• Frozen pizza
• Frozen burritos
• Frozen chips and other kinds of potatoes
• Premade frozen dishes and meals
• All kinds of leftovers

Additional Halogen Oven Considerations

Halogen Cooking Pro Tips

In addition to considering what can be cooked with a halogen oven, we recommend you observe the following preventative maintenance advice to ensure you get the best results possible from your halogen whenever you choose to cook with it.

• Make sure you place your halogen oven in a space with good air circulation.
• Evenly space food to ensure even cooking inside the oven. You don’t want to overcrowd your halogen oven as this can restrict proper air circulation within.
• Always cook food properly to avoid potentially getting sick — this is particularly important when cooking meats.
• Clean your halogen oven and all of its components regularly.
• When handling and removing food from your halogen oven, always use hot pads or oven mitts, as the interior and the food you cook will be burning hot.
• A halogen oven cooking times chart can be a useful tool. Consider using it to make your favourite dishes to simplify the cooking process in general.
• Monitor your food while it cooks so you can adjust both the cooking time and fan oven temperature when needed.

Today's simple money tip: Opt for a halogen oven when cooking small meals instead of your main oven pic.twitter.com/YsGrP1SaIP

— Cash Savvy Tips (@CashSavvyTips) March 9, 2016

What Tools Can Be Used When Cooking With Halogen Ovens?

Now that you know all about what can be cooked using a halogen cooker, it is only natural to be curious about what accessories and possible cooking utensils you can use with your device. Luckily, a halogen oven is again quite versatile in this regard, and you can use most of your regular equipment.

Accessories

Many halogen ovens come with a range of accessories that are designed especially to suit the shape and size of the device. An elevated cooking rack or bottom rack is probably the most common accessory included as it helps to catch drippings while keeping your food crisp throughout.

Some even come with a high and low rack to give you multiple cooking levels, just like a conventional oven. Air fryer attachments and extender rings that increase the internal capacity are also common accessories that come with a halogen oven.

Oil

Foil

Can you use aluminium or silver foil inside a halogen oven? Yes, good for catching excess fat and food drips during the cooking process. It can also help speed up the cooking process for recipes like jacket potatoes or other root vegetables.

Lastly, foil can also help to make for a quick clean up when the time comes. Toss the foil and rinse the bowl and lid, and there is a good chance you will be done, depending on your recipe, of course.

Casserole Dish

You may be surprised to learn that you can also place a casserole dish for soups and stews inside your halogen oven while it cooks. However, you can not cook actual casseroles because they are not designed for slow cooking. While it may be possible with a few recipes, it almost certainly won’t be the ideal cooking process.

What Will You Make?

Now that you know the answer to, ‘What can you cook in a halogen oven?’ do you think it is a versatile cooking appliance? Will you be adding a halogen oven to your home kitchen or stashing one in your camper?

Or, if you already have a halogen oven, what do you want to try and cook first? Will you start with a basic side dish like roasted vegetables, or will you cook an entire meal? Either way, thanks to the intuitive nature of halogen ovens, we are sure you will do a fantastic job and achieve great results in your recipes.

Let us know what you think in the comments below.