Microwaves are lifesavers, if you are a family, and especially if you’re living alone. Gone are the days when you’d only use your microwave to reheat – a good microwave today should help you cook as well, and this is where the Haier HIL2080EGC microwave shines.
The Haier HIL2080EGC is a convection microwave that is good enough for a family of four, and excellent if you are living alone or with a flat mate. The 20-litre model comes with 5 power modes, a very efficient convection performance and Auto-cook menus that are geared towards the Indian kitchen. This is a counter-top microwave, so if you are using it in a modular kitchen, please know that this will not go inside a cabinet. That should not be an issue though, because in terms of looks, it fits beautifully in any kitchen.
Usability is also great for this one – the menus are easy to use and the buttons are placed conveniently on the side of the door. Whirlpool Microwave Oven Service
Read on to find out more about the Haier HIL2080EGC and check if this is right for you.
Design
It is difficult to innovate with the design of a microwave. Customers are used to a rectangular, boxy design, and that is what you get. Yet, the design on this Haier has been emphasised to sport a clean, uncluttered appearance.
The Haier comes in two looks – one with a silver mirror look, which we love, and another with a black door, which is also visually appealing. The control panel subtly fits in with the design, adding to the clean overall look of the microwave. The handle is conveniently placed on the side of the door, and unlike a button-press door, works better to open and close.
The bulb on the interior is bright enough to let you check the doneness of food if you are cooking. The turntable is easy to remove when you clean the interiors.
Two distance limiters at the back tell you how far from the wall your microwave needs to be, and this is a wonderful feature for those who can never judge if the distance from wall is correct and end up with a super hot microwave after every use.
The stainless steel interior is easy to clean, and the microwave has a quartz grill element for even browning. The auto cook menus are printed on the inside panel so it is easy to choose your menu before cooking.
Performance
We tested the Haier HIL2080EGC across multiple modes to see how it performs and it did very well on all our tests.
Reheating
Reheating of food was easy with the Instant Start button. The default time for reheating is 1 minute, but you can increase this if you press the Instant Start Button a few more times. Every press of the button increases reheating time by 15 seconds.
We heated food straight out of the fridge, and the 1 minute time was adequate. If you want your food hotter, or if the centre of the container still has cold food, increase heating time to about 1:30 and that would be enough.
Defrost
We tried the Defrost function next. There are 3 Defrost modes – meat (Ad-1), poultry (Ad-2) and seafood (Ad-3). We tried the poultry mode with about 500 gm of frozen chicken. Halfway during the time, 3 beeps sounded to remind us that we had to turn the food over for even defrosting. This was a very handy feature for people who tend to get busy elsewhere once the food is in for defrosting. Unless you turn the food over, the top gets slightly cooked and the bottom still remains hard while the time counts down to 0.
As with any good microwave with defrosting function, the Haier defrosted the chicken from inside and recommended a standing time of 15-30 minutes for evenness. However, the defrosting was not as good as we had expected at the default time, and we had to manually defrost the chicken again.
Grill/Combi
There are three power modes for the Conv. Combi/Grill.Combi function – G for only grilling if you are using thin slices of meat, G1 for alternating grill and cooking modes for thicker food with even browning and G2 for higher heat in the G1 mode.
We grilled a chicken breast for about 4 minutes in the G1 mode. At the end of the cooking time, the chicken breast was nicely grilled with even browning at the edges.
Convection
Convection required preheating and it was set to a default 15 minutes. The cake we baked was moist and completely cooked through. We inserted a knife at multiple points on the cake and it came out clean. The top seemed a little too browned, but it did not alter the taste.
C2 is for combining convection and microwave cooking. We cooked a chicken breast at this setting and it was still juicy at the end of the cooking time.
C3 is for getting results similar to C2 but there is more heat circulated in the oven for crisping the food as well as cooking it. We used it to bake a 15-mm pizza for about 35 minutes, and the result was very satisfying.
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