It's like cooking with a regular oven, except faster. The outside of your food will brown faster. The inside will cook faster.

You can use slightly lower temps. The oven temperature is more even within the oven.

If you understand what convection does, then you can see a little more how to use it. Ovens vary quite a bit in my experience so you have to learn what each does by experience.

Convection does the following:

It is drying because of the moving air. This is great for roasting. The drying promotes browning and crispiness. This is not as good for baking things that require a rise until after the rise is complete. It can set the exterior prematurely and inhibit the rise and yet there are people who report that they bake cakes in convection with good results. I just try to think about what would be optimal. Some fans are strong enough that they can blow a cake and cause it to be mishapen.

It increases heat transfer. This is why things cook quicker. Some people lower the temperature of the oven while others decrease the cooking time. Your oven automatically lowers the temperature when you put the convection feature on. I usually don't lower the temperature but you just have to see what works in your oven. One thing I noticed was that the top element is used some in the convection bake which is kind of like the "convection roast" in some ovens.

It will even the temperature to some extent but this again depend on the speed of the fan and the build of the oven.

I love convection if for nothing else than the way it browns food. I also use it for drying food.

Here is a link that might be useful: user manual

There is fan-assisted "convection" which simply circulates the heat better than conventional ovens, and true convection, which includes an additional heating element around the fan for increased performance.

Cooking with either type of convection depends on what you are cooking. If you are cooking in a dutch oven or muffin tins, convection isn't going to buy you much. For cookies, you should get more even browning but you'll need to experiment with your favorite cookie recipe to see how it impacts your end result - I bake my recipe 25 degrees lower on convection and prefer the results. I don't use convection for cakes. Turkey, and anywhere you are looking to "sear" in moisture in meat, is far superior using convection as are roasted veggies. I even do our nachos using convection broil (better heat circulation through the chips and cheese). Pizza (scratch), however, stays at 525 but no convection.

I'd say I use convection 50% of the time and on average lower the recipe temp by 25 degrees and check for doneness on the earlier side go the time range.

Good luck.

I have also been told that instead of lowering the cooking temp by 25F you can keep the same cooking temp and decrease the cooking time aby about 10% of the total.

So, if you would normally cook something at 350F for 30 minutes, on a convection oven you would keep it at 350F, but reduce the cooking time down to 27 minutes (10% of the 30 minutes).

Some times I find that reducing the cooking time rather than the temp produces better results, but it is trial and error.

Phil