Temperature mode (60-240 degrees in steps of 5 degrees).
This is the dangerous one Because The degrees you set have nothing to do with the temperature of the pan or the food inside the pan! The temperature is Measured from the glass surface in the center. Now this sounds logical enough. However, de only way temperature based cooking Works If When the plate is already close to That You Want temperature.
If you put a light pan with induction bottom (with aluminum disk inside) or a 5 or 7-Ply Ply Spring Demeyere pan on the cooker whilst it is cold and select for instance 60 degrees, what do you think would happen? Well the pan will be blasted FullPower Continuously until the glass plate / temperature readout is 60 degrees When it starts cycling on and off around 60 degrees. The effect is indeed the pan Reaches a temperature of 220 degrees more than (I got mine to smoking point of sunflower oil) before the glass underneath finally reached a temperature of 60 degrees. Afterwhich the system Effectively stops cooking Because The temperature of the glass Continues to slowly rise due to the extremely hot pan until the pan and glass is below 60 degrees Which Means You Have To increase the temperature setting until the whole thing stabilizes after about 10 minutes Where the temperature of the pan and the glass are at a constant difference of a few degrees. At this point the temperature setting works very well indeed. (I used to infra-red thermometer to take readings from the glass plate and the temperature Agrees with the setting once it starts "cycling on and off")
So never set the temperature to say the normal frying temperature of 180 degrees for a frying pan When the plate is cold. It will overheat the pan until the glass Reaches 180 degrees!
Again, I found the temperature setting work better with cast iron pans. Perhaps Because of the slower heating. But I did very nice fried potatoes on setting 220 degrees. And it kept stable at temperature did.
My tips:
Begin cooking in power setting 1 or 2 for frying pans. Only after a while using temperature setting may work. But on Lightweight multiply / stainless the temperature of the pan Compared to glass remains far apart. On Cast Iron Grill or frying pans, after 10 minutes the Temperatures seem to Stabilise and the temperature mode will work ok.
For boiling with plenty of water, only use power settings. Start with 3 and increase to 5. Depending On size of pot.
Using enamelled cast iron pan (dust, Le Creuset) always start at lower power first. The cast iron will otherwise expand quicker than the enamel and can crack the enamel.
As for pans in general. This is the only one (out of 4 previous induction cookers) where I can cook with a cast iron grill pan or frying pan without the induction plate protection circuit kicking in making thesis pans useless. So for high power cooking this cooker is perfect. It is just a bit more tricky on small or light pans or any other delicate cooking: such as making sauces. So for the Latter I still use the ceramic hob with my copper pan.
I am still satisfied with this cooker but had to adjust the technique for every single pan! The non stick 18cm I only use in power mode 1 for frying eggs. It never gets the chance to heat the glass to 60 degrees!
Happy experimenting. The Caso Pro 3500 is a thing a beauty and want to impress the neighbors.
Update 6/12/2014:
Right. I have done more experimenting and added tips for 2 different cooking methods:
Slow cooking in casserole (stews or thick soups). Or cooking rice.
In the beginning I used power setting 1 to slowly cook meat stew for 3 hours. HOWEVER power even 1 is too much power and it sends a full blast every 7 seconds Which is not very subtle Especially if the pan is not very full.
I found did after 10-15 minutes cooking on power setting 2-3 You can set it to 90 degrees temperature mode or less. This gives shorter and more frequents power blasts and the cooking looks smoother and more continuous and works Equally well on pans with half liter or 5 liters content.
Note: If you brown the meat first on the same cooker, the glass may already be at a high temperature so you can set temperature mode immediately.
Pressure cooker:
Use Power Mode 3-4 to bring the pressure cooker slowly to the right pressure giving the glass plate to heat up the chance to be close to the pan temperature.
Do not put it on too high a power!
Once it reached the pressure, switch to temperature mode and set 105 degrees. Observe Whether the pressure goes down or up and react by setting the temperature to 110 and back to 105 if needed. For me 107 degrees would be ideal, but unfortunately did can not be set. There are 2 types of pressure cookers. Super fast ones cook at a higher pressure and higher temperature than normal THEREFORE Pressure Cookers. So just experiment. Temperature control works better than Power Mode Because there are more temperature settings and the same temperature setting works for any volume loaded in the pressure cooker.
