OK, time for a short* thread** about gas stoves. At this point, I have been thoroughly disillusioned and don't know how I ever thought they were any good. I never want one again***
I hope
** Please read the whole thing (I'll mark the end) before replying, as I might be touching on your thought!
*** Wok-users and enjoyers, boy do I have some interesting news for you about plug-in induction woks and how they're getting fairly cheap
@TechConnectify We had noticed (a) air quality, particularly when using our oven, and (b) the fact we just avoided using our oven from May through September as it would heat the place up so much.
Switched to an induction/convection range in November, and realized how much the gas industry has hoodwinked us into thinking gas is superior.
Not to "well achtually" but I mainly use a gas stove because gas in my area is half the cost of electricity
It is just cheaper to use. and that is the only reason. If someone installed Solar panels at my home for free with a battery backup I would GLADLY switch to Elec Range.
but for cost savings of solar, i have no desire to pay for the electricity of the next owner of my home
@thesteelrat You should know that energy use for cooking is absolute peanuts compared to heating (both your home and water). In homes with all gas appliances, the stove accounts for single-digit percentages.
So what I'm saying here is - the stove ain't saving you much money at all. And given how poorly the heat from the gas actually transfers into the cookware, it's quite possible it's not saving anything at all.
@thesteelrat This is especially true if you cool your home - electric ranges don't add nearly as much heat to the space, which reduces load on your air conditioner.
Electric ovens can actually be insulated - you're just making the inside of a box hot. Gas ovens need a way to exhaust the gas, which is why the kitchen gets so bloody hot when you use it.
My point is - the logic is sound for actually-large heat sources which are used a lot. But the stove just... isn't that.
@TechConnectify I really hated our glass top electric stove, and thought for a long time that gas burners /electric oven would be better. Well, time came and I changed my mind and now I have an induction range. It's faster, more responsive, and easier to clean (bc my experience was that stuff burnt on to the old one rather badly). The new oven isn't as good, but the new stovetop IS better
The matching microwave, however... Sucks
For a wok, I'd be tempted to get a portable gas canister burner
@TechConnectify When we moved into this house 20 years ago, it had gas appliances. Now, we have an electric heat pump, electric stove, and electric dryer. The only thing left is the gas water heater. Wanna do an episode about electric tankless water heaters? That's probably our next purchase.
@mrkite Do you have central water heating? I would highly advise against a tankless electric in nearly all situations. They need a ridiculous amount of power to heat water on-demand, so unless you actually need limitless hot water, consider a heat pump water heater instead.
Those aren't always an option, but they'll save a lot of energy and won't need the 100A circuit tankless electric units sometimes need.
@mrkite And I'm not making that up. Tankless electric needs bonkers power, depending on how much flow rate you have AND your climate - it's all about temp rise and flow, so if your water is only a bit over freezing in the winter, you need something like 10kW just to provide enough for one shower of flow.
If you have the space, I'd even consider tanked conventional electric over tankless. They're very efficient, losing very little heat, and have reasonable power draw. The water is a battery.
For reasons which are personal and too complicated to get into anyway, I've been living out of two places for like five years. That's coming to an end in fairly short order but the upshot is that I've been regularly switching back and forth between a high-end KitchenAid gas stove and a Whirlpool radiant (not induction!) electric stove.
Now, aside from the energy source, they are essentially the same model. The Whirlpool is just the more budget-focused option.
I had the KitchenAid gas stove first - I was able to pick out my appliances in my new home, regrettably everything was gas but at that point in time I legitimately still thought I preferred cooking with gas so I just went with it.
Lived with that stove for about a year and, aside from the back burners being utterly useless for anything other than simmering, thought I liked it.
Then, about a year later, I installed a range circuit at Place 2 to ditch its gas stove for air quality concerns.
That's the Whirlpool, and it marked the first time I was using an electric stove day-to-day since my childhood.
And ever since then, I've hated the KitchenAid stove at home more and more. It takes the oven much longer to preheat. It makes the kitchen hot as hell in the summer, and smelly whenever I use it - unless I have the vent fan blasting, that is.
The front-right burner makes the microwave handle above too hot to touch in a matter of minutes, and even worse? It's SLOW.
My folks were over for Christmas and we had some potatoes O'Brien for breakfast - just a frozen mix you do up in a frying pan.
It was taking AGES. I could have sped it up moving over to the mega burner, but that would have made the searing heat coming around the sides of the pan even worse! It was damn-near painful to stir that stuff around with a wooden spoon, and it took like 20 minutes to fry up nicely.
They're not fast, folks! They just react quickly. That's it.
So, since I'll be spending less time at Place 2, I've made the decision - I'm ditching the stove at home.
I've made arrangements to have a range circuit installed, and I'll (eventually) be getting the electric version of the same KitchenAid stove (which is nearly functionally identical to the Whirlpool). I'm a sucker for those knurled handles with the red, what can I say?
And guess what? I'm not even going to go with induction. I like glass-top ceramic just fine.
@jernej__s The thing is I've got a portable burner which gives me these features (aside from a power boost since it's limited to 1800w) and I've found that in most cases (for me, anyway) it's a nice-to-have and not a must-have.
And, I mean, I have it anyway! I'm fine to keep the main stove conventional (still have a lotta cookware that isn't induction-compatible) and use the TILLREDA thing when I really want that control.
@TechConnectify I only had a few pots that weren't induction-compatible, so for me it was easy (and I just moved those pots to my weekend house, which at the time still had a gas stovetop – replaced that with induction last year, too).
@TechConnectify@jernej__s We have an induction hotplate next to the glass top electric range and use it almost exclusively. Maybe the cooktop could boil faster with a really big pot, but its extra power is just missing the pan when you're making pasta. vs a flat-bottom wok on the 30kBtu outdoor propane burner, the 1800W induction hotplate leaves something to be desired. It doesn't heat up the sides as well, plus it seems there was some steam removal done by the column of waste heat.
And to those Wok people - I bought an induction wok for $199 just the other day. Round-bottom wok and everything. I have virtually no cooking experience with a wok but would like to try it - and I'll probably be making a video about it, just as a PSA if nothing else.
Woks come up again and again as a sticking point in the gas stove discussion. There are multiple solutions out there.
Now, will I make a main channel video about the stove situation? Not sure. It will invite a lot of stupid comments, for sure.
But I can repeat the same experiments I did with the first stove rodeo, do it a little better, and it will (probably) be a swap to the SAME MODEL but electric rather than gas.
I'll definitely do more water-boiling timing, oven pre-heat time (I already know the electric will crush it) etc. at least for Connextras.
I used the word hoodwinked earlier - perhaps gaslit would have been better!
But that's really what it feels like. How did I ever think I like the smelly, fumy, hot-AF cooking experience more? Why did I think electric stoves were so slow? How did these thoughts get in my head, and stay so pervasive?
And that's the end of the thread. You do you, I'm sure some folks out there still want gas stoves. I won't judge you - but my mind has been changed, and HARD.
@TechConnectify the only complaint I’ve ever had about my ceramic cooktop is that it can at times be frustrating to clean. But BKF is a miracle worker for most set in stains it gets over time.
@sass The key is to keep on top of it. Lots of folks seem to be under the impression that they inevitably become permanently stained, but my folks have a glass-top from ~2007 that looks perfect to this day thanks to their regular cleaning with Cermabryte.
And I've seen demos where a drill with a buffing pad will clean up even the most horribly-neglected cooktops just fine! The surface is surprisingly resiliant.
My only real complaint is how stuff slides around easily, but that's minor.
I went from an apartment with a landlord special curly cue electric, to a house with a cheap, but name brand, gas stove. It is SOOOOO SLOOW especially with the bonus condition that is altitude. I had it on full blast and it barely got hot enough for caramel. Ugh. Also I don't have a hood exhaust, and the igniters aren't fully working. Totally replacing it at some point in the future.
Why didn't you go with induction? Price? Replacing all your pots?
@DasGanon I have several reasons for sticking with conventional - mainly, we're still in the same situation as before - I want a double-oven range and there are scant options with induction cooktops.
But my current cookware is a factor, as is repairability. A duty-cycle control for a big resistor is a lot simpler than whatever voodoo is going on with induction, and I'm still a little leery of the long-term reliability of the tech.
@DasGanon Bottom line, though, I have a portable induction burner which I've been using and while it's interesting and useful, it's not a game changer or anything for me (plus, I'm not a fan of the noise).
And even if I really liked it - well, I have it! I'm not even really making a choice, as it stays out all the time now with a kettle on-top. It's become my even-more-useful-than-a-kettle kettle-replacement.
I'm thinking induction personally, but that's because A. I'm already going to have to get a new circuit, and probably even a new panel due to the weirdness of the house (1930, and it's in the pantry right next to the ng water heater exhaust pipe) B. I don't need two ovens so that doesn't bother me too much, although I remember seeing a Samsung 2 oven range (although I don't think it actually had 2 door handles? Feels like an IRL look is needed)
@DasGanon My brother has one of those, and yeah - it's a single handle with a little release donger you hold if you only want the top oven to open. Otherwise it opens as one giant door.
And I'll confess, rarely do I ever actually need both ovens, but most of what I throw in an oven is skinny sheet-like stuff and I enjoy having the slim oven higher-up. It's more of an ergonomics thing for me than having two ovens, though it does come in handy fairly often.
@TechConnectify@DasGanon I get being cautious given they haven't been around in the US for that long.
But maybe as an anecdotal data point. I'm using an old induction stove and oven combo that I took over from my parents.
It's been used for 20+ years now and it still runs like on day one. Never had to repair or replace a single thing.
Another side-effect of the slow penetration, though, is that plenty of cookware (even high-end stuff) remains incompatible with induction. You still have to be on the lookout for it to some extent.
That's not a big deal, obviously, but given that I'm fine with standard electric, it's nice to not worry about.
@TechConnectify Understandable yea. Thats what it was like in the 2000s in Germany. You really had to check closely if something is induction compatible. More like a 60/40 thing.
These days thats a no brainer and its hard to catch something thats not compatible.
@TechConnectify my random guess is that seeing the fire and cooking with fire makes our ape brains go "This good. Fire food good. More fire better food. Must sacrifice lamb to spirit of fire."
@dek Oh for sure, and I won't lie - one reason (albeit a small one) I'm not going induction is my brain still finds "thing glows red hot" more satisfying than "thing makes buzzy noise and pan gets hot"
@TechConnectify very curious about the induction wok! I have a good friend who uses his wok only on a 26k BTU burner outside because his kitchen gets too hot when he cooks indoors
@SamTheGeek Since I've never cooked seriously with a wok ever (and only on a flat-bottomed wok, to boot) my opinion of it probably isn't worth much.
But it's fairly well-reviewed. Brand is nuwave, and while it's only got the ~5k BTU a normal outlet can provide, it's essentially ALL going into the wok - so I'd be willing to bet it's damn close to a 26k gas burner where so much heat is just flying around the outside.
@TechConnectify I’ve been a gas stove disciple for years — including doing a conversion from ⚡️ → 🔥 in our home — and now you have me doubting everything. 🫨
@siracusa@caseyliss Alec is definitely underselling induction. I think he has had a poor gas stove/installation and just about anything else is better.
I rarely use anything over 7/9 power setting on my induction cooktop (4 "burner" 7.4kw Electrolux). I briefly use 9 or boost to boil water but even then it's rare since it boils over before I remember to check it.
@caseyliss I mean if you really enjoy cooking, then yeah - radiant electric will probably feel somewhat limiting for some foods. For me, though, it's easy enough to manage - I just rely on anticipating the need to change the power level early. That little bit of work is SO worth it, though - at least to me. Plus the cooktop is so much easier to clean!
I'll bet you'd really like induction, though, no matter what. It's truly the best of both, and MUCH faster than gas.
@caseyliss But I'm a basic bitch. I'm good with regular electric.
Then again, it's becoming clear that a lot of people haven't experienced glass-top stoves and are basing their idea of electric stove performance on older designs. They're a big improvement over the curly-q elements, at least in some ways, and I've come to the conclusion that the "slow" thing is 95% psychological. It definitely feels like nothing's happening for the first, oh, minute? But after that - it's hotter than gas.
@TechConnectify@caseyliss I haven’t found the speed an issue really, though I was mostly familiar with cooking on the old coils. My biggest issues with the radiant glass tops is that you are discouraged from using cast iron and enamel cookware, which meant that we had to buy new stuff (though we kept our cast iron in storage)
@LordOphidian@TechConnectify@caseyliss Meh, I have some cast iron cookware (a frying pan and an enameled Dutch oven), and it's fine on the glass top. I wouldn't do anything like make a rolled omelette with the cast iron (because you need to shake the pan over the stove to roll the omelette --scary over a glass top!).
@TechConnectify@caseyliss I switched 20+ years ago, and my top tip is that you can get that “instant” heat control on (non-inductive) electric by physically moving a pan off the burner (e.g., onto another, unused burner or onto a heat-proof hot plate on a counter). Everything else is pure upside, especially the cleaning.
@siracusa@TechConnectify@caseyliss This has always confused me, when people complain they burn food because they can’t change the temperature fast enough. Like…you can move pots, you know?
And I have a gas stove! If I could run a higher amp circuit to it easily I’d’ve swapped it out by now.
@siracusa@TechConnectify@caseyliss I moved into a house with electric a few years ago and adjusted my habits. Then we got a deal on an IKEA induction cooktop, and I really think it’s a great blend of the two experiences of heating, with the added benefit that the handles of my pots and pans are still useable with bare hands under all but the longest and hottest cooking sessions! Even my cast iron wok!
@siracusa@TechConnectify@caseyliss anecdotally, the electric, 20ish year old ceramic top range in our old house was terrible to do any kind of fine cooking on. It was only possible to boil water or overcook eggs for example.
Until we moved, I was thinking that all modern electrics must be this bad, but I’m happy to be mistaken thanks to the newer electric range in our new place that actually has a functional thermostat or whatever. The oven is even convection!
@nbomb Usually conventional electric stoves are modulated with a duty-cycle controller. So, if set to 50%, it spends 10 seconds on than 10 seconds off.
It seems likely your old stove had something wrong with that function - as far as I know that's been common for decades. The only improvement that I can think of is that there seems to be some logic now which will keep the burner on for some extra time when you adjust the temp up (and keep it off when going down) to speed up the change.
I went from my parent’s home with a 1961 Gas oven/Range (which my dad uses as a kitchen heater) to a IH range here in Japan, and I really like the IH range. My wife scratched the hell out of it with a wire loop brillo scrubber, and I clean it with a scraper blade.
My only complaint is not the speed - it is fast! - it is the coarse steeping of the power: level 1-8 + 3KW boil, and all I want is something between 3 and 4 - “3.5”!
@TechConnectify@caseyliss we’ve got an electric stovetop and a portable induction burner from IKEA (so cheap). The induction burner blows away the stovetop. Faster to heat, faster to cool, easier to adjust, doesn’t heat the kitchen as much.
Best part? The glass stovetop is covered in scorched stuff that no amount of scrubbing can get rid of. The induction burner is just as pristine as the day we bought it.
You can totally get it clean again -and regularly cleaning with Ceramabryte will keep it perfect. My folks have a GE stovetop from 2007 and other than a scratch it looks brand-new.
@siracusa@TechConnectify@caseyliss I’ve used scrubbing sponges, razor blades, and soft-scrub cleaner and our stove still looks like the one in that video.
I think it’s time for me to try the buffer attachment.
@Kubi@TechConnectify@caseyliss Let me introduce you to glass stovetop cleaner. (It’s a mild abrasive with the consistency of liquid-y toothpaste.) This stovetop is over 20 years old and it looks brand new after a cleaning.
@pauld We chose it because it keeps the controls out of the reach of children. Also, in practice, reaching over the burners to reach the controls is not an issue. Zero incidents in 20+ years. What is an issue is that the controls reduce the space available on the stovetop for pots because tall pots bump into the dials.
@caseyliss@TechConnectify I have a gas cooktop but switched the oven to electric. Gas ovens are shit because burning natural gas (methane) produces water vapour and guess what prevents cakes and bakes getting nice and crispy.
I've not experienced any of the kitchen heating issues with a gas cooktop though. The microwave thing is just a location issue. Stuff above a cooktop gets hot. Who knew.
I tried induction once. The cooktop overheated while trying to boil a pot of water then refused to turn on for an hour and a half. I'm not sure how that's possible (one would think boiling a pot of water is a low bar that all cooktops should be able to achieve).
You know what doesn't turn off when it gets too hot? .... fire.
@bartreardon Saying you "haven't experienced" the kitchen heating thing just tells me you are used to it. You might be amazed by how little your kitchen heats up when you have an electric stove.
And the microwave is the range hood - no option to move it!
@christianselig@caseyliss@TechConnectify
IME, induction (unless you have some attachment to cookware that doesn't work with it) is hands down the best solution out there.
Heats faster, cleans easier, etc. over gas (which is what I have). I know this because a friend has a house we've stayed at for years and they have it, and I am very jealous. If I did it again, would go with it.
Did you pick basic electric over induction because it was cheaper or some other reason?
@Drwave Assuming your last question is to me, it's a combination of stuff:
Big factor is that a double-oven range is more important to me than having an induction cooktop. There are very few options with both and they're all stupid money.
I'm also not super convinced of the long-term reliability and repairability of those kinds of electronics, though I'm not sure how concerned I need to be there.
Bottom line, though, I don't find glass-ceramic limiting or difficult.
@Drwave I can handle the thermal inertia just fine (no disrespect to those who can't) and am not bothered by the hot surface.
Plus, only about half of my cookware is induction compatible. Replacing it wouldn't be a big deal, but outside of IKEA induction-compatibility is still not a given in the US. Even some pretty high-end stuff isn't.
Given all those factors (and, admittedly, "ooh thing glows red hot" still tickles my primate brain) I didn't make it a priority.
@TechConnectify@Drwave I’ve only used a few induction stovetops, so I don’t know if this is an issue with all of them, but I really disliked the vibration/buzz of the electronics that I could both hear and (seemingly?) feel through the pans.
@siracusa@Drwave Oh right, that, too. I've only used two induction units (both portable) and both make unpleasant sounds. Not particularly loud, but also not-too-far off nails-on-a-chalkboard.
I've been told that's less of an issue with full-on ranges and proper cooktops, but it was still pretty off-putting to me. And it's not always the cookware - my TILLREDA burner still makes that noise with a single-layer kettle so it's definitely some electronics sound and not vibrating cookware.
@siracusa@Drwave ...and the fact that I have that at my disposal, sitting right next to the stove (and soon! with a glass top, ON the stove) when I want it - another reason going with radiant didn't feel like much of a sacrifice at all.
@TechConnectify I purchased a hybrid radiant + induction glass top stove 5 years ago, a Samsung model. I hardly ever use any of the radiant stuff, induction is so much faster and better, no contest here. Keeps much cleaner too, much less heat to burn stuff on there. A few drops of dishwashing liquid soap, a wet microfibre cloth and done.
@Fleeecy I actually wish hybrids were more common, but at least for me - the difference isn't that night-and-day beyond a few impressive feats.
Like, sure, it'll boil water faster. And it will instantly shut off. Those are nice things, certainly, but not that important to me. If they were, I'd certainly be heading out to buy more cookware to use with it! But I'm not, which confirms to me that I just don't care all that much.
My Ikea burner is definitely worse with some pots, but it makes the same screechy sound even with the single-layer (non-laminated) kettles I have. Heh, and for the hell of it I tested to see if it would work with a baking sheet I have. Yes, it does and yes it made the same noise as always.
I have little doubt that it's worse than a proper stove, but still. Radiant just gives a little bit of a hum.
@ucblockhead@siracusa@TechConnectify@Drwave yeah, I love them. We treated ourselves to a bunch of le creuset a while ago. (I cook a lot because we can’t go out or order in because food allergies)
@thomasfuchs@siracusa@TechConnectify@Drwave specifically the tri-ply stuff like All-Clad - the steel and aluminum vibrate at slightly different frequencies, which results in the singing
@siracusa@TechConnectify@Drwave They vibrate a bit at very high loads (like my 3KW boil mode), but they sell silicone pads to put on the stove to stop this.
For most other uses, the vibration is only at the beginning.
But it is not quiet: the power supply fan ramping up drowns out most other noises. Our drop-in has two top vents (dark grey, top): intake for the power supply and exhaust for the tiny fish broiler.
I dismantled mine and cleaned it when it was 13 years old. (Pictured dirty)
@TechConnectify@Drwave I hadn’t even considered a /double/ oven was a thing I’d look for! Good note to have in my brain as an option.
I’ve only ever hard the black coils that sometimes warp, induction was enticing now that I know gas isn’t great. Hadn’t really looked at glass tops though.
Truthfully, it's not as if I need two ovens all that often - in fact I'd call that rare. But the arrangement of many - where there's a skinny oven at the top and the full-size oven is practically on the floor - is a lot more ergonomic for me.
I basically only ever need the skinny oven which is at a better height and heats up faster. That's been the real game changer for me, and the bigger one below it comes in handy around the holidays.
@christianselig@caseyliss@TechConnectify gas stoves work while the power is out, which was really handy when we had no power for almost two weeks after a crazy winter storm :)
@TechConnectify I was watching a BBC show from a while back called Wartime Farm where they recreated life on a British farm during WWII, and was surprised to hear that the government promoted electric stoves (radiant, obviously) hard as a way to save coal even back in the 30s and 40s as war loomed.
@TechConnectify
We're making the switch to induction out of air quality concerns. We're stuck with a conventional electric coil range now & it's awful.
@TechConnectify I hated my electric stoves. It was hard to select the right temperature, eg to get things to simmer without boiling over. I specifically looked for gas when I moved to my current place, and except for the fact that one of my knobs is now busted I've loved using it.
That said I'm probably going to take the opportunity to upgrade to induction, since it now needs fixing or replacing. As I understand it, they don't have the same problem of being slow to change temperature like conventional electric stoves.
@Hyperlynx Just want to throw in that based on the behavior of the Whirlpool stove, there's been some logic added to the burner control to make those adjustments easier.
Rather than being a pure duty-cycle, it's influenced by its previous setting. So, for instance, if you turn it down - it stays off for an extended period of time to cool before switching back on. Likewise when you turn it up, it does a long pulse to heat up before cycling again.
@Hyperlynx In the days of curly-Q stoves, you couldn't really observe how it was cycling the elements. Plus, they retain heat better.
So conventional electric probably has improved in some ways. I don't find it difficult at all to dial in a setting for simmering, for instance - I know it's going to be slow to react, but it doesn't seem to require much fiddling anymore.
@Hyperlynx I would say that if you've never used a glass ceramic top, you should give it a try.
It still does not change quickly, I don't want to suggest otherwise. Compared to both gas and induction, it feels very slow to respond. But at this point I would say usually within 60 seconds it's at a new equilibrium, or at least close enough.
They are effectively just a heat lamp pointing up at your cookware, so they start producing heat instantly. But the base still retains plenty
More than once have been in Ice storms that have knocked out electricity power lines for over a week in dangerously frigid temperatures in communities where there would have been many fatalities if not been for widespread use of natural gas, sometimes cuddling in a closed kitchen near an lit oven kept shut ins alive.
Silly, but I cannot disrespect gas so easily for that reason.
And if you have a video on how induction stove tops work, I’d love to see it.
@Chancerubbage The solution to this problem is to make the electrical grid more resilient. Or, if you're really committed, to have a generator. And ya know what? I wouldn't power it with natural gas.
Gas infrastructure will be in a death spiral before long - and it's already fairly fragile. Yes, it has come in handy as a backup on several occasions - and even saved lives. But it's just a second, different grid. And it can absolutely fail, too. See: Texas.
@TechConnectify We just renovated our kitchen and I lobbied hard to change our dual fuel Wolf to electric only but my wife still hangs on to those misconceptions about gas burners. I’m sure we could have sold on our Wolf this year, in a few years time I’m not so sure…
I wonder why the cooking industry, chef's and the like, all default to gas ranges. Certainly there are gas ranges that sell for prices that are meant to imply that gas is better, like I can buy a car for the price of a gas range in some cases. Yet electric is presented of as the budget option? Is it perception that is partly driving the market?
I have used electric coil tops, glass top ceramic, and natural gas (not propane) and of all of the options I still lean to natural gas for reasons, but they're all personal preference reasons and not based on efficiency, thermal transfer, thermal mass of the heating apparatuses etc.
@thinkcomputers A lot of professional chefs are starting to embrace induction, so it's definitely not going to remain the default in commercial spaces.
But I can see why it has been historically - it's easy to get a million BTUs out of gas. Just make the pipes bigger. Utilities probably would slap all-electric commercial kitchens with demand charges even if they could support it.
I suspect the economics will not stay as such for very long, though.
@TechConnectify I still do things where the fast reaction of gas is better than resistance coils (see also wok cooking which is included in that), but having had a single induction hot plate for a while - we're going to swap the gas stovetop out to induction as soon as we can afford it.
of course if we were still suffering major power outages 10-12 times a year that'd be a harder decision, but our town got Real Mad and they finally fixed it so that's over, thank fuck.
(also gas ovens have always been trash in every way, never saw any benefits to that shit)
@TechConnectify Yeah I feel gas stoves are promoted by chefs, but of course in a large kitchen there's an entirely different premise to cooking than at home.
Gas just makes no sense. So much heat and energy waste, so little actual heating of the food, nevermind the air quality.
@TechConnectify I'm a little sad about this thread, only because I was hoping you had a solution to the reaction time issue. That is my main problem with electric. I kinda knew everything else.
If necessary, pick the pan up. That will immediately remove it from heat.
Otherwise, it just takes a bit of planning. It's not that difficult for me to anticipate what I need to do with the heat setting early. I respect that it might be for other people, but I truly think you can learn your way through it
@TechConnectify I also cook with very large pans at high heat (14" saute pan). Gas / Electric can spread the heat out across that pan, apparently induction can have issues with it.
@fuzzybinary just, to be clear, I don't have an induction range and I don't plan to get one. I'm perfectly fine with regular glass-top radiant electric.
I have a portable induction burner which I sometimes use, but I haven't found it to be wildly superior except for a couple of impressive feats. And since I already have that, there's no need for me to prioritize induction.
@fuzzybinary oh, that shouldn't concern you. If you're getting an induction cooktop, it's going to be on its own breaker.
The portable ones will pull a full 15 amps, so if you have anything else on that circuit it's likely to trip. But you can also probably just keep it below the highest setting and not have an issue
@TechConnectify are the radiant ceramic top stoves different somehow from the open-air electric coil stoves? those are what im used to using, and theyre awful. the flat-top ones have always been new and fancy to me, far too expensive to own myself, and i thought thats what induction was!
@MostlyCoraGrace it's been so long since I've used a coil top stove that I can't compare them directly, but people seem to agree that they're a big improvement.
Mainly, they start producing their full heat output nearly immediately. They function more like heat lamps pointing up at your cookware. However, they still retain heat (induction doesn't).
And at this point it's pretty standard and all but the very cheapest ranges have glass tops
@TechConnectify
Intriguing. Firstly, go with what works for you. My comments here are about my own experiences and preferences.
Over the last 4 years I've lived in dozen or so houses (long story), regularly switching between gas and electric cooking. My preference is gas hobs with an electric oven. Gas ovens have no advantages unless the power is out.
Why do I like gas hobs? Mainly I like having more granular and responsive control over the heat. Also they heat woks and cast iron pans faster.
@strypey@TechConnectify Second that you should go with what works for you. All stoves exist because a lot of people like them. 🙂
That said.
I've got a half-induction, half-radiant glass top stove here. I'm pretty frustrated with it vs the cheap coil induction stove I had at my previous place. I've had stuff still boiling a full 10 minutes after I've killed the heat on the radiant side, which makes it frustratingly difficult to turn the thing down when I need to due to the thermal mass - or turn it up in a hurry.
I do like that an off burner is effectively more counter-space right where you need it, though. That was a problem with a friend's gas stove, although he really liked the heat profile. For me, I like the same instant heat from an induction stove - no worries about stray heat or fumes.
@ddr
> I've had stuff still boiling a full 10 minutes after I've killed the heat on the radiant side, which makes it frustratingly difficult to turn the thing down
This is my frustration with most electric cook tops.
> I like the same instant heat from an induction stove
Yes, important to specify what kind of electric one is comparing a gas hob to. There was an induction hob in the apartment I lived in while in China, and it was indeed better than most electric cooktops.
@TechConnectify I think the main issue lies with how many electric versions there are. The spiral heating element (mostly an NA thing?), the black circles, ceramic, induction… I’d wager induction is on par with gas, if not faster.
Is there a difference between EU and US induction due to power limits?
@teotwaki Shouldn't be - range circuits here are at least 8 kW, usually 9.6 and often 12. We don't have three-phase but there's plenty of power on-tap.
@TechConnectify Do you know if there’s an upper limit of how much power can be dumped into metal via induction? Surely the pots and pans are built to a specification? I guess there’s an upper limit of usefulness as well; there’s only so many litres of water one needs to heat up at once.
@teotwaki No I don't, I'm afraid - I'm also, to be honest, not sure how different sizes of pots affect how much power a coil can actually put out. There's a lot of what feels like voodoo in induction tech, but it obviously works very well!
It's just not common enough here in the US for me to be bother diving into it at this point - the range I'm looking at isn't even offered with an induction cooktop option, and KichenAid is a premium brand!
@TechConnectify I think electric stoves must have gotten a whole lot better. I grew up with gas. Then, when I got married, I moved to a house with an electric stove and hated it. It was slow. The burners were hard to clean. Just no fun. 1/3
Re induction stovetops: One thing to be aware of (no idea if fixed in recent years) is that they are apparently not strong enough to support typical home-canning stovetop equipment.
My friend who does home canning learned this the hard way. 😬 (Regular radiant or gas seems fine).
May not be relevant to you but could be relevant to others'.
PS: Always love your work, thank you for sharing! ❤️
@likelyjanlukas@TechConnectify There is no one "induction" power level. If your friend's induction stove was inadequate it was probably using a single 120V outlet or something. If you go induction, invest in a 240V circuit and at least one 3.7kW burner. This thing has power like a Wolf range.
@stevenbodzin@likelyjanlukas@TechConnectify I wish there were more affordable 240V 20A hobs (and the outlets to plug them into, whichever of those is supposed to come first... maybe that should be a kit to bolt a couple onto your existing range, with appropriate overcurrent protection etc, just sharing the main range circuit.)
@TechConnectify I have to admit, I wasn't expecting my induction hob to be able to do wok cooking, but on the P setting (which is basically "turn the induction driver to max and keep going until you hit the thermal limits of the electronics") it's actually slightly more capable than my old gas burner. but then my induction hob did cost more than six times as much as the gas hob, so I guess that's probably a major factor.
@TechConnectify I have a flat-bottomed wok for my electric stove, and it's merely OK. I was historically on team gas, but when I learned how much health impact it has, I decided I'd live with suboptimal wokkery. I've thought seriously about getting an outdoor gas jet burner just for wok cooking, but if an induction wok can get pretty close to that, it'd be far more convenient. I know I'm unlikely to regularly use an outdoor stove that I have to setup every time.
@TechConnectify
We cook almost exclusively on two induction burners (110v) and in two instant pots.
We have a Lodge cast iron wok with a flat bottom (on the outside... The inside is still wok shaped) that works great on the induction units. Way cheaper than $200 and uses what we already have and use for other things.
Since I've been monitoring CO2 in the apartment, the gassiness of our gas range has become super obvious. Like wow.
The only thing about gas vs electric is if you turn it off, it's off. With electric, it takes a while for the heat to fade and as I recall, you just learn how to account for that.
Rental unit, no choice in appliances. But gas vs electric may play into choice when we move to another place.
@TechConnectify I remember when I first moved out of my parents house which had a radiant glass-top stove to an apartment with gas and it felt like gas took an eternity to boil water and had much less temperature control compared to what I was used to which was very confusing because I had always considered gas to be the "premium" option, because that's what chefs used.
@KalenXI Yup. And every gas stove I've used has had a very stepped nature to the valve - so you had to judge its output by looking at it, and it took a lot of finesse to make adjustments around those step points.
Whereas the numbers on an electric stove actually mean something
@TechConnectify THANK YOU. I've been wondering about this for years, especially when friends with gas stoves have had me over for a meal. Because sometimes they'll even rave about how great the stove is, yet the meal takes about as long as is estimated for my electric (radiant).
@TechConnectify The sheer amount of heat that gets wasted going up the sides of pots and pans with a gas stove is INSANE.
I wonder if it would make sense to design pots specifically for gas stoves? Maybe have a "skirt" that goes around to reduce the amount of heat escaping around the sides, or have fins, like a heat sink (though in this case it would do the opposite of a heat sink) to sap up as much of that heat as possible.
No, of course it wouldn't work or someone would have done it already. :)
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