STOP PRESS! November 2011: Well - would you believe it? Scholtes have pulled out of the UK market - just a year after entering it - and an amazing two months after the high profile launch of a £2 million London showroom on prestigious Wigmore Street. Nil points to parent company Indesit for forward planning!!

The Wigmore Street showroom will be taken over by sister brand Hotpoint Luce ... but Luce is not in the same leaugue as Miele, Kuppersbusch and Gaggenau. Showroom owners who had bought into the Scholtes brand and put them on display ... and who had persuaded customers to switch from other brands (like Concept Interiors and Kate - below) ... will not be at all happy!

Makes you wonder whether V-ZUG, the other recent, top end, re-entry into the UK appliance market, will benefit from the disappearance of a competitor ... or will be tarred with the same brush and find customers more wary. I hope it's the former ... because I was very impressed with their combi-steam ovens recently.

The news can only be good for tried and tested brands like Miele, though.

I'll leave the original news item:

You may have heard of Scholtes - they're an Italian appliance brand - bought by Merloni back in 1989 which subsequently disappeared from the UK market. They're planning a comeback, though, with some very upmarket appliances, aimed at the top end of the UK market, and available only from kitchen specialist showrooms. They'll be competing with the likes of Kuppersbusch and Gaggenau.

They're concentrating on two finishes for their new look appliances - high quality stainless steel - and black glass. They have some good looking gas hobs - with double crown burners - so you can use the tiny internal crown with or without the larger outer burner ... and they have some interesting "domino" hobs, including a single gas burner (with one of those double crowns), an indoor barbecue and a teppan yaki.

The picture above is the barbecue hob - whilst below is a good looking black glass steam oven

The most interesting appliance from the new Scholtes range, though, is the Multiplo (the top picture and below). It uses induction technology to provide a new version of worktop cooking. You can use water, oil or steam in the containers and Scholtes are promoting a low temperature version of deep fat cooking, as well as the cooking - in water - of vacuum packed meat (they also supply the vacuum packing machine). Verrry interrresting ....

I haven't seen any prices - but I wouldn't expect a huge amount of change from £2,000 for the MultiPlo. If I'm wrong, I'll come back and own up.