321–330 of 528 posts
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I always wanted some kind of "collar" that I could put around a burner to try to direct that excess heat back into the pan/pot.
The problem is you need airflow or you generate carbon monoxide instead of carbon dioxide. So simple solutions can get more heat but also kill you.
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Your gas stove will likely dramatically outperform an 1800W electric heater if you use a proper pot: https://turbopot.com/ I would still rather use a nice induction range, but it is possible to get decent efficiency out of gas.
What efficiency (in terms of energy transfer to the intended material vs to the environment) is observed with gas? IIRC, gas achieves maybe 35-50% efficiency (depending on the surface area and material of the pan) compared with ~80% for electric resistance heating and >90% for induction. Adam Ragusea did a water boiling comparison and the gas stove was dumping so much energy into the air around the pot that his therm…
You still of course do have the problem that home rangehoods usually aren't powerful enough to create enough air-flow to properly deal with the NOx and SOx produced by burning gas, which turns out to be a big health risk...
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You can also use a lot less water than is standard: just enough to cover the noodles. Kenji Lopez-Alt has written about this a bunch [1]. Noodles cooked that way were indistinguishable in his testing. He's also discussed it on his cooking youtube channel, which I recommend to anyone. For example, a 3-ingredient macaroni and cheese [2] in which he discusses the noodles at 0:40-ish. [1] https://www.seriouseats.com/how-…
Kenji's 3-ingredient mac and cheese is a masterpiece. It's become the go-to meal for my kids. It also has to be the peak in energy efficiency for pasta. The idea is that by minimizing the water you can maximize the starchiness of the water, which creates a great emulsifier for the cheese sauce, along with evaporated milk. The combo is truly creamy mac and cheese, with no grittiness or separation of oils. It tastes gr…
I do a 16oz box of pasta, 12 oz can of evaporated milk, and 16oz bag of shredded cheese. I put the milk and cheese in while there's a bit more water still in the pan, and have never missed the extra bit of evaporated milk.
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But that's partially because 1100W kettles are less _useful_. I'm mostly a coffee drinker, and use a bean to cup machine for that. But I still use my kettle a good bit, because it's quicker to boil the kettle and then pour into the pan and bring back to the boil than bringing cold water to the boil in the pan. I've got a 3kW kettle, though, if I had a 1100W one I wouldn't do that because it _wouldn't_ be quicker.
Unless you have some sort of thunder-wok burner the 110V kettle is still way faster than the stove. Source: have a 110V kettle and a gas cooktop with very large burners, still use the aforementioned trick.
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A better way to save energy is to use an electric kettle to get the water up to boiling. This is about three times as energy-efficient as a gas hob. Combined with passive cooking it could save real money… Technology Connections on YouTube has a good video about how electric kettles are the superior way to boil water: https://youtu.be/_yMMTVVJI4c
> This is about three times as energy-efficient as a gas hob. I sincerely doubt this figure in cases where electricity is generated from fossil fuels in the first place. For example, I lived in the Netherlands where 80% of electricity is still produced by fossil fuels, mostly in gas-fired power plants. As I understand it, generating electricity from gas has an efficiency of only about 50%. That means you lose a lot o…
Your assumption that "the cost of transportation is approximately equal for gas and electricity" is probably not accurate, given that while the infrastructure costs are probably similar, the cost of the energy used in the compressors to pipe the gas around is likely quite a bit higher than transmission losses (around me at least, the service fees on the bill if you have gas were at least 50% higher than electricity last I heard).
You really don't want to be getting much of your heating from a gas stove (or unflued gas heater) not just because of the possibility of carbon monoxide formation, but because NOx and SOx produced by burning gas is actually a health risk (primarily asthma for kids, cardiovascular for adults).
Backpackers have been using this technique to save fuel - I've got a cozy for my cookpot. I also remember seeing this on one of the Victorian Farm shows - it was something like a pot roast brought to a boil in the morning, then put in a well insulated container to sit for the day. Edit: Whoa, I just clicked through to "The Product" section, and it's an open source design using an Arduino. Super cool!
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A better way to save energy is to use an electric kettle to get the water up to boiling. This is about three times as energy-efficient as a gas hob. Combined with passive cooking it could save real money… Technology Connections on YouTube has a good video about how electric kettles are the superior way to boil water: https://youtu.be/_yMMTVVJI4c
Americans don't really do electric kettles, largely on account of using 110V mains, which limits power to around 1100W, making it a lot slower than ~2000W electric kettles in the 200+V world.
It does take longer to boil, but it's like 2 min compared to 1 min.
I survive.
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Your gas stove will likely dramatically outperform an 1800W electric heater if you use a proper pot: https://turbopot.com/ I would still rather use a nice induction range, but it is possible to get decent efficiency out of gas.
I have a gas stove in my studio apartment. I still use an electric kettle to get water boiling before dumping it into a preheated pan to cook noodles/whatever. Highly recommend this approach if you are stuck with gas.
My partner, who cooks more, bemoans that our new apartment has electric. Grew up using gas and claims that it’s better for cooking. I prefer not to intentionally dump gas into our house and welcome the minor benefit of energy efficiency.
Funny how different people see the world (and technology).
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Will it also make my bones stronger? Where does it come from? Was it in the water to begin with?
Don’t know about your bones but all tap water has some minerals in it.
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I'm American and learned about electric kettles during trips to Asia. They are definitely handy, even at 110V. We make our daily coffee in a French press, so the electric kettle is a no-brainer.
> We make our daily coffee in a French press Moka pots are much better. Your French press will start letting the coffee powder through at some point. I use these: https://www.rommelsbacher.de/en/coffee-tea-co/espresso-maker... .
I do recommend it though. Lots more options for coffee drinks.