Questions about stove/oven

[leebee]

We are in the market for a new stove/oven. I've only ever cooked on an electric stove with burner elements, but these are getting harder and harder to find; ceramic/glass seems to be the only option for a slide-in stove (which is what we have to have). We have also just recently converted our house from oil heat to gas. I have a couple of questions:
>Do you prefer gas cooking to electric cooking? Why? Caveats?
>Regarding the cooktop: Is it easy to keep clean? Are you limited in what kind of pans you can use?
Any help would be appreciated. TIA!

 

[kanerf]

I like gas. All professional chefs and kitchens use gas. It gives you much more control over heat.

 

[SM1992]

I've only had glass top/electric. The thing I hate about it is the glass top retains heat, so it takes forever to adjust temp. of what's being cooked. I believe most professional chefs use gas- you can increase/decrease heat as much as you need. However....... I'd probably always worry about a leak or pilot light going out, but that's just me being me.

 

[firefly_ris]

I don't mind either one but I personally prefer cooking with gas. It is easier to quickly control heat. I also can still use the top when the power is out.

 

[Moliphino]

The only thing I don't like about gas is that the heat is less even. My parents have gas, I have an electric (glass cooktop, not induction) - it's easier to cook bacon at my house because you can have the low heat spread evenly over the large pan. With gas the outer bits of the pan don't get enough heat.
It's much easier to control temperature with gas because the adjustment is immediate. Electric takes time to adjust.

With a regular electric stove you can use any pan. It's only induction ones that need magnetic cookware to work.

 

[emily nicole]

I have never cooked with gas, so I can't chime in there. I have heard it is much better than electric.

I grew up cooking on a coil stove but when I bought my house it came with the ceramic cooktop. I hated it. It was so slow to come up to temperature and even just water boiling over made brown ugly stains. I've been slowly upgrading all of my appliances to stainless steel and did find a coil stove at Home Depot. It had to be special-ordered, but I got one. It is so much better imo than a ceramic top.

 

[luvnwdwgal]

I would only use gas. Love having a real flame. Instantly being able to adjust the heat. Ability to use it if the power is out. They are a bit to keep clean but if you stay on top of it it’s not that big of deal. It’s worth it in my opinion.

 

[RogueX]

When we remodeled our kitchen, we got a stove that has a glass cook top. It's not induction so we don't have to use any special pans. However, a painful lesson we've learned is when something fell out of the nearby cabinet and hit the edge, it actually cracked the glass. It was a can of Pam cooking spray and I kid you not when I say this happened twice. We've had to put a rubber bumper on the edges so that if anything else were to hit them, we wouldn't have to replace it again.

 

[barb969]

I love my induction stove. The surface doesn’t get hot, the heat comes quickly to the pot and the changes in heat are almost instant, like a gas stove. I hate cleaning the glass cook top. It tends to smear. However stuff doesn’t get cooked onto it, so noo scrubbing. The On induction you need pots which are magnetic like stainless steel or cast iron. You can buy a magnetic disk to put under non magnetic pots to make them usable. Have you considered a convection oven? It will reduce cooking times by abut 25%.

I was used to electric coil stoves, but I‘LL never go back.

 

[Christine]

I've done both--always prefer gas, but I don't "hate" electric (and my only experience is using cheaper electric models).

My gas cooktop is now about 13 years old. It's kind of bear to clean but better than the one I had before it. It's ceremic glass with the burners cut out. Spills just seem almost impossible to get up once they've heated on. My parents have the new model (about 5 years old) and it's better. I think they get better and better as time goes on.

 

[disneychrista]

If you’ve always had electric, stick with electric. I found that there was really a “learning curve” to figuring out how to cook with gas after only using electric. It was something I never really mastered. I was so glad when I moved again to a place with electric again.

 

[_19disnA]

Have only used electric stovetops/ovens so can't comment on using gas. Have had the older coil burner in the past and now have one of those glass/ceramic top types. The supposed advantage with the glass surface is you don't have to clean those recessed burners bowls like in the past. However, I find the flat top has to be cleaned much more often as anything the gets on the surface tend to stain and burn if not immediately cleaned off. The glass surface also looks unsightly if you don't clean it after every use. You also have to be VERY careful using any sort of heavy pans or cast iron as they can easily scratch the glass surface. You cannot slide the pan around on the glass surface or it will get scratched and that isn't any way to remove those scratches. One advantage is you can move the pan slightly off to the side of the burner if you need to make small temperature adjustments when cooking something that cooks quickly.

Induction surfaces are fairly new and require certain type of pots/pans. Never used it but seems like something to avoid, more of a gadget then a feature that makes cooking easier. Ovens with that convection feature (basically a fan that blows the hot air around) cook some things faster. However, if you do a lot of baking, you will need to figure out which recipes work with the convection feature and which do not. It is not good for everything and there isn't a single easy conversion for traditional recipes. I think for use at home the convection feature is just an added cost for something you really don't need.

I would be less interested in what some pro chef uses in a restaurant/commercial kitchen and focus more on the practical aspects of what matters to a home cook.

 

[lanejudy]

I grew up with electric but have only used gas since being on my own. I prefer the gas stovetop and oven. It's so easy to control temp. We've never had a problem keeping it clean. We don't lose power often but it was so nice a couple of years ago when we lost power for 3 days and could still fix food.

 

[Praying Colonel]

We are in the market for a new stove/oven. I've only ever cooked on an electric stove with burner elements, but these are getting harder and harder to find; ceramic/glass seems to be the only option for a slide-in stove (which is what we have to have). We have also just recently converted our house from oil heat to gas. I have a couple of questions:
>Do you prefer gas cooking to electric cooking? Why? Caveats?
>Regarding the cooktop: Is it easy to keep clean? Are you limited in what kind of pans you can use?
Any help would be appreciated. TIA!

I much prefer gas to electric. The heat source doesn't take a long time to heat up, so the pan/skillet heats up quicker. I also find it much easier to manipulate the amount of heat.

I don't find gas to be harder to clean than electric, especially the electric glasstop stoves. Have fun cleaning one of those after something lands on the element and sticks/burns.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

We had gas in our rental house and then decided we liked it a lot so when we were having our house built we paid a little extra to install gas lines for the kitchen. We have a gas oven and stove top. We like it.

 

[Jeannie]

I grew up with a gas stove, used gas for the first 20 years of marriage, and have had an electric glass cooktop for the past 20 years. I cook every day and don't prefer one over the other. I do, however; prefer the glass electric cooktop 1000% over gas for ease in cleaning! We have found Weiman Glass Cooktop Cleaner & Polish to work the best. My 20 year cooktop looks as good as new.

 

[Schneewittchen37]

I grew up using a gas range and had a gas range in my first home for about ten years.

For the last 10 years, our "new" house has had an electric range. Just like you, it was getting harder to find burner elements (the darn thing was built the same year I was born (I actually think the manufacturing date was a few months older than me). My housekeeper had a hard time putting everything back together properly every time she cleaned it. The clock was busted. The built-in timer was missing a knob and didn't work. (It was state of the art for the 70s!)

So we bit the bullet a few years ago and bought a new range. Yes, I love cooking with gas, the temperature control is great. But seriously, I'm a home cook. There isn't anything I can't do now that I would do on my gas range. Also we have natural gas in the house, so that's not the problem. At the time, we used gas for both hot water and the furnace (we switched to an electric heat pump two years ago - LOVE IT). So, gas wasn't an issue. I actually wanted to stay with electric for two things:

1. I wanted convection (I had a convection microwave in the RV, those things are magic)
2. I wanted the flat glass top for easy clean ups because I hate-hate-hate taking apart the top of a range to clean it properly after a spill.

Anyway, I got a convection Samsung with the glass top. I like it. DH tolerates it (he's a range snob I guess, but it's not like he ever does anything more complicated than boil water).

I use the same pans I used with the old electric and the previous gas range. I have a set of Revere Ware copper bottom pots and pans, a couple of non-stick pots, a few aluminum restaurant style pans and a few ceramic non-stick pans. Everything works fine.

It's been easy to keep clean. I tend to use Weiman or Bar Keeper's Friend glass cooktop cleaner. It's like Soft Scrub. It's actually a lot easier to clean than the old ranges. Nothing to take apart.

 

[mjkacmom]

I grew up with glass top electric, got a gas oven when we bought our house. I really prefer gas, and I cook all of the time.

 

[DisneyHardin]

We have a glass top stove because that was our only choice, but I much prefer a gas stove. The glass top ones are hard to keep clean. I am constantly scrubbing it and scraping it with the razor blade scraper to get stuff off of it.

 

[SandyinMonterey]

I prefer gas. Easier to control. I do, however, have double wall ovens that are electric. They are professional grade. When we moved across country and looking at houses, all wall ovens were electric. I don't mind it (much) accept cleaning it. More difficult to clean and keep clean. My Mom had an electric stove top. She used only glass pots/pans on it. It was a pain. When stirring a pot of spaghetti sauce, if you don't hold onto it, the whole thing spins.