Customer Reviews

Zojirushi EB-CC15 Indoor Electric Grill

5 star:		(77)
4 star:		(20)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Pros:
- non-stick surface makes it extremely easy to clean. Charred food debris just slides off the surface.
- base of the unit is made of plastic and acts as an insulator so there is no need to put anything under it to protect your tabletop.
- safety mechanism built in so that grill cannot be operated without drip pan.
- takes only 10 minutes to heat up fully.
- grill is a heavy cast iron so holds heat well. I have seen other similar grills by companies like Sanyo and only Zojurushi uses a heavy cast iron grill.
- heats very well. Grills meat very fast.
- no smoke generated- not sure why, but there just isn't any.

Cons:
- none so far.

Notes:
- if you want to grill vegetables, I'd recommend coating them with some oil before putting them on the grill, otherwise the veges tend to get dry.
- power cable is short, so make sure you have an extension cable handy.

Yes, it is....That is the problem with all the other electric grills on the market...they just don't get hot enough. This one does and I think it is just smashing !! I can control the temperature, it heats evenly and leaves nice grill marks on the food.....It is perfect for someone like me who does not have time to wait around for a charcoal fire to heat up and does not particularily like gas grills..... From onions to eggplant and shrimp to steak, this little cookery has lovingly seared my heart....It's just great !! It is certainly worth owning and I can highly recommend it to everyone !!

The Zojirushi EB-CC15 Indoor Electric Grill is a great indoor grill, and a large part of the reason my friend got me this one was due to the Amazon reviews. At first I was somewhat skeptical, since most similar products are significantly marked down from list price. But after spending a month really using this guy, I have become a believer. Zojirushi's reputation is well deserved!

Pros:
+ Great performance from the grill with a variety of meats and veggies
+ Detachable power cord provides safety and easier storage
+ Non-stick surface really works!
+ The lower reservoir catches excess fat and makes clean up easy
+ The size is perfect for grilling large quantities at once
+ The surface seems better designed for even grilling with wider bars than other units
+ The surface definitely is more durable than others like the Forman Grill
+ There is still some smoking, but it is very little and does lessen with more frequent use

Cons:
- Must be cleaned carefully because it cannot be fully submerged
- Limited temperature settings (low, medium, high), though not a big deal
- Still costs a premium relative to other indoor grills

Other Considerations
- You should be careful not to use metal utensils that could scratch or erode the surface
- While cleaning is easy because of the good surface, it does take a little time
- Because of the large grilling area, this will take up some countertop room
- If you don't want any smoking, use a lower heat setting

Setting this thing up the first time is very easy. The bottom try is stainless steel and cleans easily. When you place the grill on top, you have to line it up properly with the base and the connectors for the power element which plugs into the heating element.

I did notice that the meats I cooked smoked a little the first few weeks I used it. Obviously, if you set it to high, foods will cook quicker but also smoke slightly more. Interestingly, it seems to smoke less now. Perhaps the non-stick surface just needed to be *seasoned* or burned in a little more. It will still smoke a little, but definitely not too much.

Cleaning it is easy, but it does take a little time. Read and follow the instructions! You can remove the catch tray and clean it normally, but you can't submerge the grill portion because it has the heating element inside of it. Once you get used to it you should have no problems cleaning up.

Comparing To The Alternatives

I have used grill pans like the Lodge Logic Pre-Seasoned Square Grill Pan on the stove, but they seem to not work as well or cook as evenly as this. Also, this is just more convenient for grilling a larger quantity at once.

I have also used the George Foreman GRP4 Next Grilleration 4-Burger Grill with Removable Plates, White in the past, which are not bad but they tend to be messier and the non-stick surface definitely seemed to not work as well and chip away with normal use. In addition, the Sanyo HPS-SG3 200-Square-Inch Electric Indoor Barbeque Grill, Black is a little less money but has thinner grill bars and not as good of a reputation. The Delonghi BG24 Perfecto Indoor Grill was also an option, but I am glad I got the Zojirushi.

After using this for a while, I think this is a great price for a very well made and solid unit.

This is a great product. Give it a try.

Enjoy!

We continue to be pleased with this grill and we have noticed one additional benefit over the built in grill we had used previously: there is almost no smoke at all when we grill on the Zoji.
No matter how well we cleaned our previous grill, cooking 4 steaks would leave a lingering odor in the kitchen for a day. We had even looked into a roof-mounted extractor fan to assist the hood-mounted unit. Happily, we have no smoke problem anymore!

I just moved from a suburban house to a high-rise condo, and the one thing I thought I'd miss was grilled food. OK, so this isn't quite the same as Webber-ing in the backyard, but it's surprisingly close. I have grilled steaks, hamburger, shishkabobs, and hotdogs on this thing, all with excellent results: quick, thorough cooking time, nice "grill lines" on the meat, and most importantly for me, no smoke (there was some steam from partially-thawed hamburger patties, but that's it). As for cleaning, I've found it easy and convenient: the grill, tray and base separate and the nonstick surface of the grill unit is actually nonstick. I highly recommend this grill!

I have finally found an indoor grill that gets hot enough to make a good steak with! :)

FOLLOW-UP:
I've now had this for about 6 months and still LOVE IT! What a fantastic grill, and I have tried many before only to give them to someone else or leave them sitting in the cabinet because they suck!

I have been making tri-tip roasts on this one and they come out fantastic! They are crunchy outside, with beautiful grilling marks, and red and juicy inside. I could not be happier!

By the way, I read the review from someone complaining about smoke. Ok, completely smoke-free is impossible, unless you have a system to suck the air out. Otherwise, anything that grills will cause some smoke. Duh! I actually put mine on the window and the smoke flies right out.

FOLLOW-UP AGAIN:

Yeah, this is so good I have to keep talking about it. I actually just bought a second one to give to my mother because I talk about it so much she wants to try it. This grill brought back long forgotten emotions to my life. It's like falling in love again! But without someone actually here to bug me. I love it! :)

FOLLOW-UP AGAIN AND AGAIN:

So I took the second one I bought to my mother, who can always complain about things like no one else I know... While I was visiting, we made a tri-tip roast on it. It came out perfect! But I was too excited and just kept repeating "Isn't this thing just amazing?" Mom never said anything, or if she did I was too excited to pay much attention. The meat was incredible!

I come home, and a week later I was talking with my mom on the phone when she said "Oh, by the way, that grill thing is really fantastic!" My jaw dropped! That was all she said, without the usual "but..." You know what I mean, the mother thing of saying "that thing is really fantastic, but it this or that." No, she just wanted to say it is fantastic, she had nothing to complain about! Wow...

So, to finish with a nice touch, last weekend my boyfriend was visiting and we made some fish steaks on the grill. I hadn't made fish on it and didn't really know how well it would work. It was perfect! I turned it on MAX and let it pre-heat for about 10 minutes. Then I added the fish and turned it down a bit. I let each side cook for about 3 - 5 minutes, flipped the fish, another 3 minutes, then flipped the pieces again twice more so they would get the pretty crossed marks. The fish was perfect!

Enjoy!

___________________

UPDATE:

Since someone asked me for the recipe for making the tri-tip roast, I thought I'd add it here for anyone who wants to give it a try! :)

- Purchase a tri-tip roast and trim some or all the fat on the top side of it.

- Leave it outside the fridge so it's in room temperature right before cooking it.

- Once the roast is at room temperature, start the grill, turn it all the way to the highest heat setting, and let it get really hot (about 10 to 20 minutes).

- Rub salt and ground black pepper to taste all over the roast.

- Rub olive oil all over the meat. Any olive oil will do, but I usually use Star Garlic Olive Oil and it gives the meat a delicious additional flavor. Although regular olive oil doesn't have the same garlicy taste, it is still good.

- Let the meat sit on a plate or board with the seasonings and olive oil for about 10 to 15 minutes while the grill finishes getting hot.

- Once the grill is really hot, put the roast on it and let it sit for about 5 minutes, then turn it.

- Turn it again, making sure you rotate the meat so the grill marks cross, then turn again.

It will take about 10 minutes total on each side (5 each time you turn), or longer. I like mine medium-rare, so if you like yours more done, you can add more time. But the outside gets to be nice and crunchy, while the inside is nice and red if you use the directions above.

Once you remove the meat from the grill, let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes so the juices settle inside the roast, then slice it as thin as you can. The trip-tip, as the name suggests, has three tips. When slicing, I usually start from the thinnest tip.

Good luck, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! :)

We bought the Zoji a couple of years ago. When we first received, it we liked it, but not that much - somewhat uneven and slow cooking. We then decided to find something to use as a grill cover. We have found that the deep disposable aluminum rectangular pans work perfectly. We grill everything under the cover using a temperature half way between medium and high. Everything we have tried cooks perfectly, rivaling our outside gas grill. Try the cover if you have been frustrated at slow, sometimes uneven cooking. We think it works wonders!

After doing a lot of research, I settled on purchasing this indoor grill for use in my apartment. I've used it thus far to make chicken, burgers, and pork chops. Here's my rundown:

Pros
======
- Gets HOT--the manual says the temperature range goes up to 410°F, but my infrared thermometer shows my grill surface reaching 550°F and above. This is good, of course, since it gets closer to imitating the high temperatures a real grill.
- Grill surface is really nonsticky--nothing I've cooked so far has been able to stick to it. Of course, you can't use any metal utensils/spatulas/tongs on it (it will scratch the nonstick coating) so make sure you have nonstick-safe cooking tools before grilling.
- Grill surface is heavy and dense--this means it's going to hold its heat better which is important when grilling.

Cons
======
- No lid--to me, this is one of the main reasons I knocked it down a star. No included lid means your only method of heat transfer into the food is going to be conduction, which is fine for thin foods, but for thick foods the outside is going to burn before you can cook the inside fully. On a real grill, you can put the lid on so that it acts as an oven in addition to a grill. Since there's no included lid, you'll have to stick to thinner foods (or I suppose you could sear the outside on the grill and finish the thick meat in an oven, but that kind of defeats the point of having a grill).

- Tedious to clean--despite the nonstick cooking surface being extremely nonsticky, it's still a pain to clean because of all the small slats and the burnt fat that can buildup in between the slats. The manufacturer should have included a shaped cleanup tool like the George Foreman grills have, but I find using one of those handheld dishwands (with the scrubber that's safe for nonstick pans) is the easiest tool to cleanup the grill.

- Still not "smokeless"--despite what the manufacturer or anyone says, this grill is definitely not smokeless. This isn't so much a fault of this grill in particular, but rather a consequence of extremely high heats plus oil/fat. It's just going to happen. The drip tray does help some, but if you have a rub or a lot of seasoning on your meat, that's also going to add to the smoke as some of the spices blacken. It's still not too bad though, and nothing an open window and a box fan can't alleviate.

Overall
======
This grill is an acceptable substitution for a real grill for those who are unable or unwilling to own a real grill. No, you're not going to get that charcoal taste (but you can get a smoked taste by marinating/brining your meat with a liquid smoke product), but your meat is still going to get nice grill marks and taste pretty good. I do recommend this grill!

Extra tip: If you're like me and prone to under/overcook your meat, take a tip from Alton Brown and brine your poultry/pork! I brined my boneless/skinless chicken breasts and after grilling them on this grill, they were so unbelievably juice and tender I had to double check their temperature to make sure they were fully cooked. The texture and juiciness can't be beaten, even if you overcook!

My bf loves my mother's Korean bbq and she likes to use indoor grill to cook right at the table. When he decided he needed his own electric grill we decided to get Zojirushi EB-CC15 because compared to others it looked better, had more cooking space (same size unit), and non-stick coating. Since the purchase, we've used it many times and it cooks wonderfully and cleans with incredible ease. We definitely recommend this item!

With such rave reviews on Amazon, decided it's time for my old electric grill to retire and get a new Zojirushi.

Not going to rewrite all the good parts, plenty of other reviews. Here's the problems I encountered:

1. The electric cord that connects to the grill pan does not stay fixed. Just by lightly bumping or having a fan blowing on it loosed it and the grill had no power. This was the main reason why I was getting a new grill, my old 10yr old grill had that problem. Should not happen on a new $65 grill. Maybe it's just a defect.

2. Slightly on the small side. Max 2 people, anymore than 2 = lot of waiting around.

3. Smoke free - Not sure how everyone else got it to be smoke free, the smoke was clearly visible when I used it indoors. Yes, it's slightly better than my old one, but definitely cannot qualify as smoke free.

I'm a big fan of Zojirushi products, got the 10cup induction rice cooker, hot water pot, hot pot cooker, this grill was going to complete the Zojirushi set, unfortunately have to return it and try another brand.