Jenn-Air Culinary Center vs Miele MasterChef Wall Ovens (Ratings/Reviews)

Ovens have one essential function...cook our food, but some are better than others. Jenn-Air and Miele have the best user controls in the industry. They could not be different companies with Jenn-Air being part of the giant Whirlpool company. Miele on the other hand is family owned and privately held.

Updated March 2014

Convection Cooking

Standard ovens have a bake element (on the bottom) and a broil element (on the top). This is great for dry turkey and burnt cookie bottoms, because the heat is disbursed unevenly.

Walk with me into the new age of cooking... "Convection Is Key".

Convection is a fan forced heat which circulates the air and cooks food evenly, not to mention, it's 20% faster at a lower temperature!

So since we now have the basics down, let's compare Miele vs Jenn-Air. Two juggernauts in the appliance biz, let's break them down...

Jenn-Air is one of the last pure American appliance makers. The original Jenn-Air Products Company was founded by Louis J. Jenn in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1947, later becoming simply Jenn-Air. The company was focused on manufacturing and marketing of industrial fans for use in a variety of commercial and industrial applications. In 1961, Jenn-Air's integration of one of these fans to a cook-top range lead to the invention of the first self-ventilated downdraft range, which is still available today.

The company expanded its product line to include many other kitchen appliances including microwave ovens, refrigerators, dishwashers, and small appliances such as mixers and blenders. Backed by Whirlpool Corp., they recently poured $30,000,000 into the Jenn-Air brand invested into two categories; pro ranges and this wall oven technology, to be competitive with the marquee brands.

Miele is a German, family run appliance business that prides itself in the quality of their products. Their company has been in existence for more than 100 years starting with butter churners.  Miele's credo of being 'forever better' has remained to this day company policy and are widely renowned for their obsessive quality control. Their products are manufactured for a 20 year life.

Controls

Both ovens have the most intuitive interfaces on the market. This is accomplished by using easy menu settings that automatically cook your food by item and sets the best cooking mode for that item.

Sure, there a lot of recipes online, but they're all different temp/time, which one is actually the best? The great feature about these ovens is all you have to do is season the roast and place it in the oven. The meat probe (internal thermometer) will turn off the oven when the roast is cooked to your choice of doneness (rare, med rare, med, med well, well done).

There are also many other foods programmed into the ovens like fish, baked goods, turkeys, casseroles, vegetables and desserts.

Miele has their MasterChef. Jenn-Air has the Culinary Center. They ostensibly accomplish the same function of guessless cooking.

Now to the finale...

Here are my two videos of cooking a prime rib in each oven:

Jenn-Air Culinary Center

Which Do you Choose

I think Jenn-Air is perhaps the better value at the lower price plus they offer more aggressive rebates like free hoods and dishwashers for multiple purchases.

Although I love the Miele interface, Jenn-Air with the doneness guides is better. However, Miele is the most reliable appliance sold at 2.9% over all, 5 % in wall ovens. Jenn-Air is the industry average at 20%....so its not an easy decision.

Additional Resources

Download the Yale Wall Oven Buyers Guide with specs, features and inside tips to all the brands. Well over 55,000 people have read a Yale Guide.