I had a chance to go into a showroom, to see a new appliance range from Omega, a local Australian brand, which is called Neil Perry Kitchen, see www.neilperrykitchen.com.au.

Neil Perry is a famous and successful celebrity chef who runs Rockpool restaurant groups. His flagship, Rockpool, has been receiving three hats awards from Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Guide since 2013. His Spice Temple restaurant also focuses on Asian cuisines and uses induction wok in the kitchen.

Let's put the preamble aside, and see what this Heavy weight chef brings to domestic market with his name badged on the appliances. There are two products that interest me, wok burner and oven, among a few things within the brand.

Wok burner is the second most powerful for current Australian domestic market at 23.5 Mj (6.5kw). The beefiest is Wolf ICBIM15/S at 24 Mj. For some reason, it is also advertised as an 8kw burner which translates to 28 Mj. I think this Wolf is an older model since it is not US subzero-wolf site, but still on UK one. In a land where powerful open burners like Capital and BlueStar are not available, anything out of ordinary is interesting. My beloved volcano burner is at a mere 9.7 Mj, but it does work.

Neil Perry burner has a ring that is quite compact, at 4" diameter. Flame looks quite contained to the middle area of round bottom wok. This design probably works better than beefing up 5" ring to higher power. With 4" ring, flame is a bit more compact, more focused. The actual unit also looks solid, and well built.

Oven range has an interesting design. They are electric wall oven, without self cleaning feature. The range has 24", 30" and 36" width models, all at 24" height. What is interesting is their power control. 24" model comes with a whopping 5.7kw power rating, 30" and 36" inch at even higher 6.4kw. Top element, bottom element, and fan ring element have separate power control, apart from temperature setting. For certain types of cook, this will give them a full control of heat source. Manual temperature gauge also works all the time. Interior also comes with 9 level racks where other brands usually have about 5 for oven at this height.

So do you think these have interesting design? Gimmicky? or would it work in real domestic kitchen?