We Used the Suvie Kitchen Robot, and It Has Features We Love and Some We Loathe
It sous vides a mean steak, but at what cost?
When you shop through retailer links on our site, we may earn affiliate commissions. 100% of the fees we collect are used to support our nonprofit mission. Learn more.
We’ve used many kitchen appliances in our day, both in our personal lives and for Consumer Reports. Last year, we tried out the Tovala Smart Oven and were pleasantly surprised with how well it performed at reheating, cooking lunch meals, and roasting vegetable side dishes.
The Suvie claims to do all that and more, including sous vide, slow cook, and cool to cook (a scheduled setting that refrigerates your food until it’s time to switch to cooking). The large countertop appliance has a top oven and bottom oven, a water chamber, and a smart control system that can scan a Suvie meal card to load preset cook settings or let you schedule a cook from the mobile app. It also has a starch cooker sidekick for grains, pasta, and potatoes.
Photo: Paul Hope/Consumer Reports Photo: Paul Hope/Consumer Reports
How We Evaluated the Suvie Kitchen Robot
The system comes with the Suvie Kitchen Robot plus a starch cooker. We ended up evaluating both the Suvie 2.0 (originally purchased in February 2022 and received in late June) and the Suvie 3.0 because of a malfunction that occurred with the first unit just before the 3.0 was launched in August. (Suvie replaced it under warranty.)
We signed up for the weekly meal kit delivery during the 2.0 evaluation. Suvie says the price for meals starts at $10 per serving (some premium meals have an upcharge, and the price increases the fewer you order per week). It came out closer to $15 per serving for us (four meals a week), plus a $10 shipping fee every week. We ordered a mix of proteins, including salmon, chicken breasts, steak, and shrimp, and prepared each meal per the instructions. We also cooked foods using our own ingredients and following Suvie’s recipes.
We tried out each of the Suvie’s cook functions: cool to cook, sous vide, slow cook, roast, bake, broil, steam, pasta (starch cooker), rice (starch cooker), and potatoes (starch cooker).
Setting Up the Suvie System
The appliances shipped separately in large, sturdy boxes that were difficult to move around because the main 2.0 cooker weighs 58 pounds and the 3.0 weighs 56 pounds (the instructions say two people are required to unpack the appliance and lift it onto the counter), and the starch cooker weighs 25 pounds.
The main 2.0 cooker is 17 inches tall x 13 inches wide x 19 inches deep. It also required 6 inches of open space in the back, 4 inches on each side, and 1 inch above. The 3.0 is 13 inches tall x 14 inches wide x 20 inches deep. Per instructions, we let the main cooker sit for 24 hours to allow the refrigeration fluids to settle before using it.
The initial setup, which included connecting it to WiFi and syncing with the app, was straightforward for the main cooker. I was never able to connect the starch cooker to WiFi, and customer support was not able to help, either, so we used it initially without syncing it to the app. Then, after realizing it needed a software update to work properly (which needed WiFi), Suvie replaced it with a new one under warranty.
