Dream Dinner Party: How to steam cook your way to a delicious meal

Once you’ve tipsily waved home the last giggling guests from your front door, you can always tell if you’ve hosted a successful dinner party. The clues are in how many empty wine bottles are lining the kitchen windowsill, or whether the once pristine-white, but now food-stained, tablecloth looks as colourful as a Jackson Pollock painting. But the best indication of culinary success is whether the dinner plates have been cleaned of every last bit of supper by your delighted guests. And the best kept secret to creating a stunning meal that wouldn’t look out of place in a Michelin-star restaurant is to use steam.

Many top chefs now use steam to create nutrient-rich and mouthwatering dishes with ingredients such as fish and meat, vegetables and desserts. From scallops for starters, to lamb for main and steamed puddings for dessert, the possibilities of steam cooking are endless. Top chef Jun Tanaka, who is best known for his appearances on BBC One’s Saturday Kitchen and for the delicious food at his world-renowned restaurant The Ninth London, is quick to praise the benefits of steam cooking in many of his dishes.

The great news for home cooks is that it’s now easier than ever before to achieve professional-style steam cooking using the latest appliances. Panasonic’s NN-CS894 Steam Combi microwave, for example, is one of the most flexible cooking companions available as it gives you the power to steam, grill, bake and microwave your food at the touch of a button.

As well as a Steam Combi cooking function, which effortlessly retains the vitamins and moisture in your food for delicious results, the sleek and stylish 32-litre design has a two-level convection cooking mode, which makes it a truly versatile model.

Here you can follow chef Jun Tanaka as he cooks a three-course meal using the Panasonic NN-CS894 Steam Combi microwave. Enjoy Steamed Muscles with Coconut milk, Lemongrass and Chilli for starters, Steamed Salmon with Beetroot Salsa and Horseradish and Pilaf Rice with Peas and Spices for main, and Raspberry Clafoutis for dessert. Try them out and go down as a dinner party legend...

Jun Tanaka’s Steamed Muscles with Lemongrass

Jun Tanaka’s Steamed Salmon with Beetroot Salsa and Horseradish

Jun Tanaka’s Pilaf Rice with Peas and Spices

Jun Tanaka’s Raspberry Clafoutis