When cooking meat of any type, it's important to make sure it reaches the minimum suggested internal temperature for safety. That doesn't mean cook till it's burnt, though. It's a balancing act to cook something to safety standards without overcooking, especially when it comes to making turkey.
Meater is a wireless meat thermometer that syncs with your phone to give you constant feedback on how your meat is doing, how soon it'll be done, and it's internal temperature through the entire process, before and after cooking.
Price: $99Bottom line: Get perfectly-cooked meat without having to fret about overcooking it with Meater.
The Good
- Precision reading
- Internal and ambient sensor
- Beautifully designed
- Easy to use
The Bad
- Ambient sensor isn't precise
- Limited range
Simple and effective
Meater: The features
Meater is a thin stainless steel probe with a sharp point at the tip. It doesn't have any wires attached to it or a big digital contraption that needs to sit next to your oven or grill. On the outside, it looks like a tool — or at least a weird metal stylus you definitely don't want to use on your screen.
You connect the Meater to your phone via the free companion app and use it as your digital display to give you all the information and feedback you need to cook your meat (or, frankly, any other food you feel the need to monitor the internal temperature of).
The standard Meater thermometer has a range of up to 33 feet, while the newest edition, the Meater+ has a range of up to 165 feet.
The companion app lets you set your preferred temperature, check the current temperature, and track the cooking process. It estimates the amount of time it takes to cook your meat based on the ambient temperature and the temperature of the meat, so you can get a better idea of how long it'll take to cook dinner.
If you're not sure of the perfect temperature to cook your meat, the Meater app also provides suggested internal temperatures for rare through well-done meats and notes the USDA's recommended minimum internal temperature.
Meater also offers a cloud storage service that allows you to keep an eye on dishes, even when you're out of the house. Through Meater Cloud, you can connect to an Alexa device and have your virtual assistant tell you when your meat will be done. You can also share information with others with Meater Cloud access so your cooking activities can be a collaborative one.
Perfectly cooked
Meater: What I like
This just works. I was impressed over and over again at Meater's accuracy in terms of properly reading the internal temperature of my meats. Whether I was cooking a whole chicken or a breast, a tri-tip, a fish filet, or even the Thanksgiving turkey, the Meater kept track of the temperature and gave me a nudge when it was close to being done.
It could easily handle varying heat, including a flaming grill, a smoker, and hours in the oven.
Not only does the Meater read the temperature of the meat, it keeps track of the temperature in the oven or grill where your meats are cooking, including noting when there's a sudden drop in temperature (when you're basting a turkey, for example).
Set up is easier than reading a recipe. When you first launch the Meater app, you'll be directed to connecting the thermometer to your phone. When it's time to cook your meat, just insert the probe (if you don't know where, the app will offer suggestions), tap "Start Cook" in the Meater app, and let it go. It's that simple.
I was surprised at the attractive and sleek design of the Meater thermometer. Most thermometers I've seen, both digital and analog, are functional but don't really have any design aesthetic. Meater is a nicely formed stainless steel probe that you could keep in your portfolio notebook and it wouldn't stand out. The wood charging and storage block it comes in is nicely crafted and has magnets on the back so you can keep it on your fridge. I'd never considered a meat thermometer's design, but now that I have the Meater, all others look like garbage.
Dropped connection
Meater: What I don't like
From my experience, it didn't seem that the ambient sensor was exact. When cooking a 22-pound turkey for Thanksgiving, the oven was set to 350 degrees, but the sensor never read above 340. Considering the turkey reached its internal temperature about an hour early, it's difficult for me to believe that the oven was running on the cool side (if anything, it might have been running high). I should point out that the internal temperature sensor was perfect. I checked it against a standard digital thermometer and an analog one and all three hit the same temperature within a few degrees.
I used the standard Meater (not the Meater+) whose range is supposed to be about 33 feet. If I walked about 20 feet from the oven, the connection would drop and I'd have to walk back into range. If I had the full 30 feet, it wouldn't have been a problem, but that loss of 10 feet made the difference between whether I could sit on the couch or not. It is for this reason that I'm recommending the Meater+ instead of the Meater for you to purchase. It's $30 more, but you get a significantly larger range, which you'll soon find is worth the premium.
The bottom line
Meater wireless meat thermometer
I was pleasantly surprised all around with my Meater experience. From the moment I took it out of the box and appreciated its design to the moment I took a 22-pound turkey out of the oven and it was perfectly cooked, I'm never going to use another meat thermometer again, and I'm going to buy one of these for everyone in my family.
