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- Easy to programme
- Extractor minimises smoke
- Dishwasher-safe parts
- Doesn’t vent steam well
- Not as versatile as some multicookers
- Lacks guidance for different foods
While the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker is up against some of the best multi cookers you can buy, it’s obvious that it’s of a different breed. It can’t air fry, pressure cook or cook rice. But what it can do makes it rather special.
It offers six different plates for grilling, searing and sizzling food, as well as steaming, slow cooking and even making party snacks. This is where the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker shines, and it’s great if you’re in the mood for a barbecue when the weather isn’t, or if you’ve got a hankering for Japanese-style teppanyaki treats.
It’s compact enough to be portable, so you can cook at the table, and, unlike some tabletop grills, there’s a built-in extractor to whisk smoke away. In testing, the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker was simple to use and effortless to clean up afterwards – although I would have liked more guidance for cooking different foods, and that extractor isn’t so effective when it comes to steam. That said, the cooker’s versatility and low maintenance could easily help you to overlook the odd drawback.
Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker: What do you get for the money?
When considered alongside the best grills, the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker has a distinctly higher price tag at £250. However, it has many extras that those grills don’t. For example, there are six plates rather than the usual two. Two of these are devoted entirely to grilling (a flat plate and a ridged griddle) and two are recessed for making pancakes and canapés/snacks. You’ve also got a deep 2.5l pot for slow cooking as well as a stainless-steel steam plate that fits into this pot. All have a ceramic non-stick coating, apart from the steam plate, and a separate lid fits on top when required.
For grilling or steaming, there’s a good amount of space for food: the flat plate measures 29 x 19.5cm inside, while the steam area is 30 x 21cm. The pancake plate will accommodate six pancakes (it’s also handy for fried eggs), while the snack plate fits up to 24 snacks. These can all go into the dishwasher after use but, curiously, the lid has to be cleaned by hand: while this isn’t difficult, it feels as if this should be similarly dishwasher compatible.
The Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker has nine cooking settings. These are mostly tailored to the plates, with pancake, snack, steam, slow cook and BBQ settings. There are also programmes for steak and veggies, as well as convenient keep warm (up to 12 hours) and reheat settings. These are easy to select using a single dial that’s also used to start and stop cooking. The time and temperature can be toggled within the parameters of each programme, or you can cook manually with temperatures ranging from 40-250°C, and times from 5 minutes to 12 hours.
Finally, there’s an ‘anti-smoke’ button for turning the extractor on and off, though this is switched on as default for some programmes. Smoke is drawn in through the extractor and filtered through the water tank, which can be accessed via a drawer at the side.
As the cooker has been designed with portability in mind, it’s compact enough to carry – 41.6 x 39 x 25.4cm (WDH) – but it’s still quite weighty at 5.8kg (with the pot in place). However, a big plus is the 2.5m-long cable, which gives you plenty of versatility and reduces the likelihood of needing to use an extension lead.
What’s it like to use?
Calling this appliance a multi cooker is a little misleading. For example, I stocked up on rice when I saw there was a steam function, only to realise that the plate had holes that were far too large to cook it. It’s best thought of as a grill that slow cooks and steams larger pieces of food – and at that, it excels.
There could be more in the way of guidance to get going: its quick start guide doesn’t mention adding water into the tank to use the extractor, while the instructions list what each programme offers without much help when it comes to the time and temperature to use for certain foods. There are some recipes on offer, but otherwise it’s guesswork. An app can be downloaded via a QR code, again with recipes to try, but that’s not much use for someone who’s wondering how long a chicken breast would take to steam versus veggies.
Outside of the instructions, the multi cooker is intuitive to set, and I liked that the alerts were loud enough to hear over the extractor when it was running. Plus, the 1400W cooker heats up fairly quickly.
One feature I didn’t like was that once a programme stopped, or was stopped manually, the extractor also cut out. This means for fatty meats that produce lots of smoke, you might still be opening a window to clear your kitchen, or have to keep the cooker running. It would be helpful if you could leave the extractor to run independent of the cooker.
How well does it cook?
The only recipe for steaming in the instructions involved fish, giving me little idea of how long to steam chicken and broccoli. For both, I opted for 20 minutes (the timer is in 5-minute increments, so 16 or 18 minute cooking times weren’t possible). The countdown didn’t start until a sufficient amount of steam had built up – this took seven minutes – which further increased the overall cooking time.
As the chicken and broccoli cooked, I noted that the lid didn’t fit the cooker tightly, meaning some steam leaked out. I turned on the extractor to combat this but it wasn’t very effective, with condensation forming on vertical surfaces around the cooker. After the cooking time had elapsed, results were mixed: the broccoli was overdone and fell apart but the chicken was perfectly cooked through with no pink remaining. This could be remedied by cooking the vegetables separately, or adding them midway through cooking – but you’d lose steam by lifting the lid.
I had more success using the grill plates. With the flat plate in place, I loosely followed a recipe in the instructions to cook asparagus. First, I used the veggies setting for 10 mins at 100°C with the lid in place to cook the oiled asparagus vegetables, before switching to the BBQ function at 160°C without the lid on for four minutes. This browned the exterior of the asparagus well. Again, though, the countdown timer didn’t start until the set temperature had been reached, even though the food was still being cooked as it heated. This is worth keeping in mind when you’re working out cooking times.
Grilling steak produced the best results. The cooker has a dedicated steak programme, which preheats the ridged grill plate, coated with a little oil, in four minutes. Its anti-smoke function is automatic and pretty efficient – much more so than with steam – and I could see the smoke being sucked towards the back of the appliance. There was no lingering odour of grilled meat and grease once I had finished cooking, even though the steaks had a reasonable amount of fat and some marbling.
I chose to cook the meat for four minutes on either side, with a five-minute rest. The results were medium steaks, with slight pinkness in the middle.
Should you buy the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker?
Whether or not the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker is a good choice for you will come down to how you prefer to cook. Families who often sit at the table at mealtimes and like to get the kids involved in cooking will find a lot to love here, as will keen entertainers and those who enjoy barbecue flavours but are hampered by inclement weather. As Panasonic points out, it’s also good for those who are keen to expand their horizons with international cuisine, such as Teppanyaki stir frys and Takoyaki snacks.
The extractor is the headline feature in keeping smoky smells at bay, but if you’re on a tight budget, a tabletop grill without may be a better option. Cuisinart’s Grill and Griddle, for example, offers both a flat plate and a griddle and is a far cheaper buy. Similarly, there are comparably priced multicookers with greater capacity and versatility, such as Ninja’s Foodi 11-in-1 SmartLid Multi Cooker.
However, if the idea of an appliance that’s handy year-round appeals – being able to slow cook during cooler months or barbecue without having to check the weather – the Panasonic 6-in-1 Table-top Multi Cooker could prove to be a brilliantly multitalented buy.
