• admiralteal@kbin.social
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    4 months ago

    Get an electric kettle, too. Boiling water on either a gas range or a standalone 110V induction hob is pretty slow, but can be jumpstarted in an electric kettle to spare a lot of headache.

    As someone who cooks a lot, gas ranges just plain suck to use. Don’t believe the astroturf. They take 20x more work to keep clean (which is honestly the only reason I need to hate them). They also heat pans super slowly (even my previous cheapo ceramic resistive electric range, which had a 5000W hob, heated pans faster than any gas range I’ve ever used), they irritate your eyes and fuck with your air quality (and thus require much more powerful vent hoods – which are loud and also suck your climate controlled out), and they rapidly heat up the room you use them in.

    Buy commercial if the hob is going to be your workhorse, though. The commercial ones are just built to a way higher standard compared to the cheapo import brands. They cost more and are ugly, but they will last you way longer. They tend to have things like powerful cooling fans – which can be a bit noisy, but it protects their electronics.

    I can’t speak for your local energy prices, but I’d be surprised if the gas is so much cheaper than electric that it is worth using the gas range for things that are going to be powered for a long time.

    Though they aren’t readily-available yet, there’s a new product category starting to appear that’s more renter-friendly for this – electric ranges with built-in batteries that run off regular 110VAC power. The prices are high, since you are also paying for a relatively large backup battery (that can run things like your fridge during a blackout, for example), but for many they are cheaper than the cost to have a 14/3 40A line run to the kitchen by an electrician.

    • edric@lemm.ee
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      4 months ago

      Get an electric kettle, too

      Yup, we definitely will. We also used to have one.

      Buy commercial if the hob is going to be your workhorse

      I’ll definitely shop around.

      but I’d be surprised if the gas is so much cheaper than electric that it is worth using the gas range for things that are going to be powered for a long time

      I actually have to compare once we move in. The house has solar panels, so I need to test if it would be cheaper overall to use induction vs the gas stove, or use both depending on the type of cooking.