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Hello Insiders!
Today I have one of my household’s favorite dinners to share with you. We started making it about a year ago, and it’s in regular rotation as an infinitely customizable and build-your-own type of meal; exactly the kind most of us need up our sleeves for nights where it’s ‘adapt or order takeout’. Steamed chicken poke bowls welcome different toppings, different types of rice or grains and you can even swap out the chicken itself depending on your tastes or what’s in the fridge. I think you’ll love it; the recipe link is below.
In our last journal issue, I said I’d be doing some forward-planning for Insiders so I could serve you more of the content you need and love this year. Some of you sent emails with topic requests (thank you, I’ve read them even if I’m yet to reply!). I also cross-checked my running list of ‘things people want to learn and cook’ that I keep as a catch-all for Steam Oven Insiders planning.
There are a few themes that come up again and again, and although I like to have flexibility in what we talk about here, a loose plan of recipes and topics is helpful to guide things along. So, in no particular order, here are some things we’ll be focusing on through the rest of 2025:
Recipes, recipes, recipes. It sounds obvious, but the major reason most of you are here is for additional steam oven recipes – you want ongoing, new inspiration direct to your inboxes, and I’m very happy to oblige.
The recipes you want are wide-ranging, from baking and bread to fish to vegan meals. I’ll accommodate as much as I can (and give you as much variety as possible), but there are three standout requests I continually see, and will focus on:
One-pan and/or simple healthy dinners. You cannot get enough of these, which is handy because I love creating them! Chicken and vegetarian dinners are most requested, followed closely by fish.
Meals for two people. I write almost all my recipes for four or six portions, but I have heard you and I’ll work on some two-portion recipes.
Baking. This is broad, but essentially you can’t get enough bread, cakes and pastries. Is it the flip side to the healthy meals requests?! Who knows, but I’ll certainly be baking and sharing.
Something else that’s come up a number of times is oven-specific cheat sheets or guides, written by me instead of your oven manufacturers! You want to know what the various settings do on specific brands of ovens, so you can make use of more than one or two settings. I’ll do what I can in this area: I know manufacturer manuals can be hard to wade through so I’ll see if I’m able to simplify some of the more prominent brands’ offerings when it comes to settings and cooking directions. I’ve started with this by making a screenshare video walkthrough of Fisher + Paykel’s steam oven settings, in today’s Ask Me Anything section.
Finally, steam oven sous vide. Again and again, I get questions about sous vide. It’s a deep and wide-ranging subject that I’m happy to dig into further on your behalf, so you can expect more recipes and info about it this year.
Have you got other steam oven cooking topics you think I’ve missed above? Send ‘em in! Insiders is your membership, and I come up with some of the most helpful content by request.
Right, on with the show! Happy steam oven cooking, see you in a couple of weeks.
Emily x
New to Cook
My steamed chicken poke bowls are a fresh, healthy, and vibrant meal option for dinner or lunch. They’re packed with color, texture, and flavor, plus they’re easy to customize to suit your taste.
This recipe combines steamed chicken and rice with a variety of toppings for a meal that’s as fun to eat as it is delicious to make.
When I make this meal, we put all the components in the middle of the table for everyone to build their own bowl. It’s interactive and fun, and everyone can add more or less of each topping as they like.
The Season Flip
More rice bowl ideas from around the internet, to inspire and feed you.
Southern Hemisphere
A vegan and gluten free bowl that, like today’s poke bowl recipe, can be customized with all sorts of different ingredients. The turmeric tahini sauce that goes with this bowl is so, so tasty. To make the recipe steam-oven-friendly:
Roast the sweet potato using combi steam instead of conventional oven heat. Combi Steam, 350°F/180°C, 30% (low/med) humidity is perfect; depending on size the sweet potato cubes will take 15-20 minutes to cook through.
Steam your rice or quinoa. Quinoa can be steamed at 212°F/100°C (100% humidity), using a ratio of 1 part rinsed quinoa to 1½ parts water. Steam for 20 minutes then fluff with a fork and let it sit for 5-10 minutes before using.
Continue on with the rest of the recipe as written.
Northern Hemisphere
A brilliant cooler weather bowl, with deeply flavored chicken, black beans and lime to zing things up at the end. It’s not in the recipe but I think this dish would be great with some spinach or Swiss chard leaves thrown in, to wilt with the chicken just before serving. To make this recipe steam-oven-friendly:
Steam or sous vide your chicken to cook, instead of poaching in water.
Cook the rice in your steam oven.
Continue on with the rest of the recipe as written.
A Thing I'm Loving
I love, love, love my friend Lauren’s Instagram account (and website), where she shares easy, absolutely delicious recipes and ideas for meal prep – a lot of which is easy to adapt to steam oven cooking!
Don’t let the ‘athlete’ part of Lauren’s blog title put you off – she is a very dedicated athlete but you do not have to be the least bit athletic to love her food (case in point right here).
I met Lauren at a food blogger conference last year, and she is a natural when it comes to compiling flavors and textures, and making meal prep seem, well, less boring. If you like the idea of meal prep lunches or dinners but need ideas beyond a steamed chicken breast with broccoli, Lauren’s your girl.
Ask Me Anything (AMA)
Here’s your opportunity to ask me anything you like related to combi steam cooking!
I really encourage you to submit questions, and do my best to answer as many as possible. I am not able to get to every single question, but I carefully curate ones which are relevant and represent a variety of topics. We all learn from each other, and I often learn new things based on questions from all of you!
If you have an AMA question, please email it to [email protected]. Make sure you include the phrase INSIDERS AMA in the subject line so I can collate and read all your submissions.
From Teresa
Q: I have a question about baking sponge fingers and other Italian biscuits in my wolf CSO. I still do most of my baking in the convection mode using my M series Wolf oven but am wondering should I now be trying out these recipes in the steam oven in convection humid, as I believe this is the best mode for baking in the world of CSO?
I usually bake the sponge fingers (savoiardi) in convection mode at about 160 degrees C. I also make almond biscuits, (amaretti) which is an almond flour, castor sugar and egg white mix, on a lower temperature in the convection oven.
Would these work in the convection humid mode?
A: In general, I don’t bother baking biscuits and cookies using combi steam, as they’re an item you want to dry out somewhat in the oven. The exceptions to the rule are cookies you want to be a little chewy or soft. Based on the above, I’d definitely recommend trying the savoiardi on a convection humid setting. Amaretti might need some experimenting; if you like them to be quite firm, a straight convection oven will be the way to go. But if you like a little softness in the centers, you could try some using the convection humid setting. I’d love to know which way you end up preferring for those!
From Denise
Q: When I got my Fisher Paykel oven I signed up for cooking lessons but they didn’t happen due to Covid. I can’t seem to navigate the oven instructions manual for recipes. Is there any way you can breakdown what the different settings can be used for on the FP combi steam oven. Then I can relate more to your selected ovens and better navigate through your recipes.
A: I haven’t used one of FP’s ovens for a number of years, but I have downloaded their current user manual to take a look for you. I think most of the settings will be the same or similar even if your model is now a few years old – see this screenshare video where I walk you through the Fisher and Paykel settings and what each one means. I hope it helps, let me know if you still have any questions.
