Fast heating, wipe clean, works off clean electricity, roasts me less in the summer, doesn’t care about the air coming from a window, starts the first time every time, what more could I ask for? I got this cheap plug in one and it dropkicks my installed gas stove in basically every metric.
Yeah fast and easy to clean. What more can you want?
Physical knobs to turn instead of the tests of the limits of my patience that are capacitive buttons on a cooking device.
Please and thank you.
I hate capacitive buttons so much
Some induction stoves do have real knobs. Smeg makes one that I have not used so I can’t say anything about the quality, but I’m just happy that they exist.
That’s an unfortunate company name. Especially for one that makes kitchen appliances.
It’s an acronym for Smalterie Metallurgiche Emiliane Guastalla (“Emilian Guastalla Metallurgical Enamelling Works” in Italian). They’re actually a pretty high end brand, but yes, the name is amusing
Smeghead
That’s me. I appreciate the hell out of some enamel
For some reasom i was reading this as French even though i am Italian myself and I don’t know much French beside the almost forgotten middle school knowledge
Aaand actual temperature control. Not just on/off 100% power.
Mine has 10 different power settings
Ah yes, the duty cycling is annoying, too!
Temperature control seems to have so much delay that it seesaws wildly and isn’t actually useful in practice. I couldn’t get mine to boil eggs without it stopping the boil constantly, unless I set it to 160°+ IIRC.
Maybe not temp control, struggling to find a word, but a constant power flow instead of the on off duty cycle
I’ve never noticed a duty cycle with my induction, only conventional cooktops. Is that a problem with particularl makes, models, or price points?
My induction just sets the power output to the level I choose and holds it there. It doesn’t hold a temperature, just a power output, so I do have to watch it because setting it to medium will be very different on a hot pan vs a cold pan.
We have one at work that does this. Super annoying. If you put it at 5/10 it’s full blast 3 seconds and then off 3 seconds. It’s probably prevalent on cheap models.
I’ve had trouble finding the right setting (particularly with rice in my case) because it does adjust the power output very rapidly and you don’t have the temperature interia of a big ceramic pad in addition to your pan. Using cast iron on induction eliminates this problem. But I have a better way for eggs.
Steam your eggs in a steamer basket. Then you don’t have to worry about the water coming back to a boil after adding the eggs and the eggs don’t bounce around inside the pot.
- Fill a pot to just under the level of the basket.
- Bring to a boil.
- Add as many eggs as you want or will fit. One egg? Six eggs? Doesn’t matter steps are the same.
- Steam for about 7-10minutes depending on how you like your yolk. 7 minutes = gooey ramen soft boiled. 10 = fully cooked hard boiled.
- Remove eggs and shock in an ice bath to stop the eggs from continuing to cook from holdover heat. This also helps the peeling.
- If you want them peeled right away, give them some time to chill fully. Crack the shells throughly, lots of tiny cracks all over, no big in cracked sections. It helps to roll them around on a hard flat surface gently after getting some cracks going. Peel under cold running water, using the force of the water to get under the skin between the egg white and the hard shell.
i guess to be able to cook my food and keep me warm when the power goes out.
In my life I don’t think I’ve seen a power outage longer than a couple hours, and that was maybe once? I don’t even remember the last time I’ve seen one. Maybe experienced 10-15 in my whole life, with most lasting minutes.
Am I just really lucky in my area? Or is this the experience most people have?
Texans need not answer, I already know.
it happens to me about once a year, where i lose power for like 2 days due to a snow storm
2 days with no power? Damn! I can see the allure of gas much more in this situation
Where do you live? US?
yes on the east coast. not anywhere partially remote
I live in Seattle, and this has been my experience. Techno-city powered by dams = reliable
Where in the hell do you live to see a power outage? I live in the EU and the longest power outage was for three hours when I was a child. That was the only one in my life.
In the US, objectively the greatest country in the world (/s), you can expect a major power outage every other year, and it will be blamed on the very people who fucking called it.
Last big one in my life was just a couple years ago, no power for two weeks. Greatest country in the world my ass.
As a backup for the induction cooktop I have a propane camping stove and a full gas cylinder. Last power outage when I actually needed it was in 2021.
Benefits of induction greatly outweigh the minute possibility of the power going out.
yes. i can agree, why plan for the 1% when the 99% would be more impactful. just really responding to the “what more could you want” to mention some benefits that other options have.
The main downside is that your pots and pans need to be compatible. In particular we have a few nice small pans, like actually small, and they work exclusively on the front left burner, and need to be a bit off center. I imagine there’s something wrong with the stove or the pans, but it’s a class of issues you don’t have with resistive or gas stoves.
There are flat induction adapters for this very purpose, look 'em up, they’re cheap. They heat from induction and then transfer the heat to anything that doesn’t support induction itself, or is too small to work on a given burner.
While it obviously defeats the efficiency gains of induction, it’s otherwise workable and can help you with everything that can’t be put straight on the stove.
Basically anything you can buy now is compatible…of course that means your grandma’s pots downt work any more but all my stuff is now nearly 30 years old and works with induction.
I know it’s not everything, because recently a relative bought a pan without checking and only realized when it was on the stove and refused to work :P
It’s not a big deal, but not something I’d ignore, since it’s a real downside specific to induction.
if i could afford an induction cooker with a bowl shaped coil to fit a wok, i’d be fully satisfied.
what more could I ask for?
Longevity. My first induction lasted 10 years. My second 3 years, my 3rd six months, my fourth weeks. I use a conventional glasstop electric now.
Interesting. Is everything alright with your wiring/electric source? Because them dying in progressively shorter time tells this way.
Still, conventional electric is not bad.
Electrical is fine. Planned obsalescence is shit.
If there was a problem with the wiring, wouldn’t conventional electric also have issues?
Yes. But the issue was declining then shit quality of GE induction.
My conventional is rocking it. I miss my original induction, but they just don’t make em like they used to. When (if) I find the money, I’ll take one more gamble on induction and try a miele.
Dang, that sucks. I’m still daily using an electric stove from the 1950’s lol. I would love it if modern “environmentally friendly” appliances could last this long
I got this cheap plug in one and it dropkicks my installed gas stove in basically every metric.
like a hot plate?
which one my hot plate is too shitty to use my moka pot on but i have zero problems using the moka pot over gas
Probably because your moka pot is aluminum (or otherwise non-magnetic) so induction can’t heat it.
On this topic, there are adapter plates you can get for moka pots (basically just a piece of steel on a handle) so you can use them on induction.
oh, my shitty hot plate is one of those coils. it’s really shitty.
its problem is that it only has two settings, on and off, and it reaches the desired temperature by cycling between those. and full blast hot boils the water too fast.
Oh yea, that’s a different problem. One of the big drawbacks of all radiant electric unfortunately.
Aluminum is more conductive than steel so eddy currents flow more easily in aluminum. Some pans have an aluminum disc inside, for induction stovetops. Maybe it’s too much aluminum vs just a disc? His hot plate might be too low power or not induction just a glass top
This is wrong. Induction requires magnetism, not conductivity. A pure aluminum pan will not get hot on an induction hob. Some aluminum pans have an iron or steel plate inserted in their base to allow them to work on induction.
OK you’re saying the higher resistance of the steel is needed for adequate heat. Got it
No, I am saying the pan has to be magnetic, which is what I have said 3 times now. You are completely wrong about how induction cooking works.
Heat from eddy currents is a small fraction of what magnetic hysteresis can produce. You can technically heat any good conductor with eddy currents alone if it is non-magnetic, but the equipment needed is significantly more complex and power hungry than induction cooking hobs.
You’re wrong too, what on Earth does hysteresis have to do with heating??
Because we’re working with AC, we need a small skin effect, which is given by the inverse square root of [pifrequencypermeability*conductivity]. It’s permeability that’s going to be the deciding factor here, because all metals have reasonably similar conductivity but ferromagnetic materials have four orders of magnitude higher permeability.
This also means that steel which is not ferromagnetic will not work on an induction stovetop. The stove will detect it and the chip will reject the pan to prevent damage to the coils.
Induction has just gone from “cool, but for the rich folks” to simply an undisputed king of stovetops.
Much like solar and other green technologies.
Induction rules but the touch controls that almost always come with them can fuck right off.
“We should put touch controls on things that are permanently greasy” -Kitchen appliance and gadget designers hired by Satan’s evil twin.
I mean you really should wipe your stovetop off any time it gets greasy, that way it doesn’t build up so you don’t have a mess to deal with later. Even on an old one with knobs I’d advise that.
Absolutely. Luckily, there are induction hobs with knobs (I personally own one), and I hope we’ll see more of them going forward.
I had to buy a used induction stove because they no longer sell new ones with physical knobs at a reasonable price.
Same. Somehow not having complex system of sensors and having a simple knob instead is a premium feature. I begin to see a pattern right there…
Cool! Can I ask which one you have?
Some of the Gorenje Infinity series, don’t remember the model as I bought it second-hand. Here’s a very similar-looking one, Gorenje Infinity EC6INB, except mine has knobs facing front, not right:
Looks sick, works flawless, got in good condition for $50. Can’t complain.
Yeah, that looks awesome! I love the colors.
By front-facing, are the knobs still facing up from the face of the stovetop or do they point out like on a classic stove?
Yep, still up. The unit is separate and doesn’t have the oven included, so it doesn’t have space for knobs that would point out.
But generally, they don’t interfere with anything, if only sometimes when I use a large skillet on front left burner with low settings, but I can just move the skillet a little and it works anyways, so, no big deal.
Here, this is how it looks IRL:
Thanks for the picture, appreciate it.
You can usually attach real knobs if you have the space (and permission)
Also all my pots and pans are…aluminum
Are they anodised?
Ok, I’ll bite, what difference does anodizing make, and do you know what anodizing actually is.
Oxidises and creates a hard layer so the aluminium doesn’t leach or react with acids.
Yes, they are modern aluminum, so no dangers. They just don’t work on induction.
Wouldn’t oxygen in the air oxidize aluminum and create that layer regardless?
No
We couldn’t possibly use these button things. They are secret arcane technology.
It’s like EVs. A great paradigm shift in the underlying base technology, accompanied by puzzling interface and control designs that really detract from the enjoyability of the transition.
Been for some time now.
Was still too expensive for many parts of the world until a few years ago.
Maybe. But these pots will life longer then myself. I am sure my grandkids will still be able to use them… and they aren’t even born yet
Electric coils suck. They never make even contact with the pan, creating hot and cold spots.
Electric radiant is better. But it’s limited by lower burner output.
Gas solves both problems, but creates an additional problem that it measurably reduces indoor air quality with combustion byproducts.
The simple easy solution to that SHOULD be require a vent hood, and wire it so the fan automatically turns on low when the burners are lit. But that seems to require more brain power than the construction industry (or regulators) possess.Induction solves all problems. No combustion byproducts, even heat distribution, high output.
There’s also a company called Impulse that makes an induction cooktop with a 3 kWh battery inside- crank that guy up to 11 and it’ll dump 10 kilowatts into one burner so you can boil a pot of water in under a minute. Put in contrast, most gas and electric burners put out 2-4 kW. Obviously with only 3kWh it can’t sustain that output continually and once the battery is dead you’re left with whatever your electric circuit is good for, but that’s still plenty to get a pot boiling.
I have gas now. If I ever redo my kitchen I’m getting induction.
Within two weeks my gas stove and oven are getting chucked out the door. Replaced with an induction stove top and a convection/steam oven/air fryer.
Deyre goin to take muh gas stowve
Imagine having less asthma in kids and the elderly! Imagine having your inside air be less ubhealthy
Call me a dumbass, but until a couple of years ago I had no clue anything was unhealthy about gas.
CH4 + O2 + fire -> CO2 + H2O
I suspect most of Gen X and earlier still believe gas stoves to be harmless.
They better. It’s already affecting your spelling part of the brain
That was just parody.
Sometimes I have to go back to cooking on a ceramic or gas at someone else’s house and it always annoys me how long boiling water takes.
Induction is the best cooktop tech for daily use, and that’s a hill I’m willing to die on. I live in a rented place and cannot simply get rid of our gas range. However, it has a piece of kitchen counter placed on top of it and is only in use for its oven, which thankfully is electric. On top of the counter though? An induction hob.
Maybe, but its also the only cooktop tech that can interfere with implanted electronic medical devices like pacemakers.
and since I have people with pacemakers in my family, I hard avoid induction.
Which bits on, who can say. Perhaps none of it is on, perhaps resistive touch screen controls are a bad idea on the surface that might get wet. Who can say.
God I would kill for an induction stove with the classic interface for sure
They exist!
Ait then who’s the target?
Induction is fast, but actually cooking is a PITA because mine at least adjusts power output via PWMing the whole output with a very slow square wave: i.e. it alternates between full on and completely off. Yes that’s also what thermostats do on electric stoves with resistive elements, but those have extra thermal mass and thermal lag that smoothes out the overall heat output.
I do love the induction stove at my gf’s house, but the issue with induction is you basically have to throw out 75% of your cookware and go get the special heavy-bottomed pans and pots for the heating to be effective and even. Most everything I have that’s decades old and salvaged from yard sales and the like does NOT work on induction like, at all.
Pretty much all of my cookware already was compatible when I switched
Same
Well if you have really old cookware that does not work on induction it’s probably already time to replace it. Cast iron and quality stuff you would want to keep should work on induction.
My first cookware i bought nearly 30 years ago is induction ready.
All of mine worked with induction. Cast iron supremacy!
Cheap cast irons work well induction
It’s funny because while I didn’t comment on the previous post about the superior burner location, I do happen to have an induction range that has the big coil in the front right. So I get to have a side in both conflicts!
Seriously though, induction is the undisputed winner. We’ve had this thing for years, and whatever price premium I paid to move up to a lower priced induction model was totally worth it.
That big “burner” plus my big nitrided carbon steel pan is my go-to now to start like 80% of things I cook on the stove. Not counting heating up water in the kettle daily, though. That uses the small burner behind the big one. Then there are two mediums on the left. Or maybe it’s small, two large, and one XL.
I have a hybrid cooktop. one burner is radiant, the other is induction. this solves all my problems.
I also regularly buy bar keepers friend to clean the pots as stuff stuck outside those pots tend to get fiercely stuck when not using LPG.
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I stopped using an induction burner after having some issues with it, but I think that may have just been user error. I only ever use burners for boiling water for tea these days, so maybe I should give it another try.
are there any induction stoves with gas ovens?
Why would you wnat such an odd combo?
Options and versatility, probably.
Faster pre heat? Gas puts out more BTUs but Induction stoves are great because they heat the pans directly, where gas heats the air under the pan as well as the pan. Baking however, requires you to heat the air in the oven, so gas is faster and more efficient for baking than it is for heating a pan.
cheaper fuel, much cheaper fuel
Just having a gas connection cost me £100/year until I had it disconnected. Absolutely not worth it. Also how much of that fuel is wasted in heat going around the pan?
none because that would just have been gas spent to beat the house anyways
Just what I need by an open window because I am cooking…
over stone vents are common here precisely because you don’t want to waste that much heat with an open window
They definitely make induction stoves that are just the countertop part. I have one on my boat. Theoretically you could put one of those over a “regular” gas oven, but the gas ovens almost always have a stove built in.
