https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2021/06/how-the-fossil-fuel-industry-convinced-americans-to-love-gas-stoves/
Surveys showed that most people had no preference for gas water heaters and furnaces over electric ones. So the gas companies found a different appliance to focus on. For decades, sleek industry campaigns have portrayed gas stoves [...] as a coveted symbol of class and sophistication
[...]
The sales pitches worked. The prevalence of gas stoves in new single-family American homes climbed from less than 30 percent during the 1970s to about 50 percent in 2019.
[...]
Beginning in the 1990s, the industry faced a new challenge: mounting evidence that burning gas indoors can contribute to serious health problems. [...]
Cooking is the No. 1 way you’re polluting your home.
https://archive.ph/Aiyd2
You have more control over temperature on an induction cooktop than you have with a gas cooktop, but there is a learning curve. Samsung induction cooktops show a blue "virtual flame", which can help a new user visualize the amount of heat going to the pan.
Induction ranges are as good as gas, but they're also new and expensive. Coil element ranges are not as good as gas, because they are slow to respond to changes.
You absolutely can get used to a coil range and do good cooking on them, but it's disingenuous to say they're as good as gas, and it hurts our argument for phasing out gas ranges to say that they are.
Absolutely true. I have used gas, induction, electric coil, ceramic. In terms of utility for cooking, gas and induction are the top two, with induction being slightly better in my experience.
Electric coil is bad and the ceramic version isn’t much of an improvement. It’s possible to cook well, but the pulsed nature of the heat is not great for fine temp control with a reactive pan (e.g. steel and aluminium ply) but it’s still fine for something like cast iron which is non responsive anyway, it smooths the heat out just fine.
I'll give you induction is just as good but they're fucking expensive and it limits what cookware you can use if I understand correctly from when we were last looking.
We were stuck with a shitty old electric stove in our house and upgrading to a gas stove is a massive improvement. Idk what trying to say that electric is as good as gas does other than get anyone who cooks daily to disregard your opinion.
It's pretty nice ro be able to actually bring a full stock pot to a boil in less than 40 minutes.
I prefer a coil to induction if we're talking capabilities. You can work around slow responses on coil by using 2 burners or simply pulling the pan and allowing inertia to cook while a single burner cools.
You can't workaround an induction's inability to convect when convection is called for.
Water boils more slowly, sure, but it will boil eventually
I don't buy it that gas ranges are universally better than electric. I think they're just different and good at different things. Sure you can change the temperature faster on gas, but is that the end all and be all of cooking? Have you ever tried to cook something on a gas stove that requires low heat for a long time, like rice or a slow cooked sauce? It's extremely fucking annoying, gas can't maintain consistent low temperature like electric can. Call it a skill issue if you want but my mother who has been cooking her whole life still struggles with making rice on the gas stove since moving to her new house 4 years ago.
Phasing out gas cooking should always be a health and safety issue, I see people talk about the effects on children, but never about cooks who work in kitchens with a dozen burners running all day
One thing that really bugs me is we use gas to create steam to generate electricity to boil an electric kettle to boil water, really a minor pet peve here
another thing on cooking. so many home cooking appliances are dogshit, unsafe, too loud, and emit fumes with poor ventilation, and my new conspiracy is the modern nuclear family thing takes away power from unionised workplaces
anytime somebody claims it is impossible to cook without natural gas I just say "skill issue" and it is a hard counter, they cannot possibly respond to it without sound like they are very mad
Def a skill issue. But I must say, I hate electric glass top, way too much heat retention in the glass. I love the quick control I get with my gas burners, but if I had the money it'd be induction all day for me. There's literally no downside.
Absolutely. For cooking gas is ok but induction is purely better if you can swing it. I'm thinking of upgrading my electric stove because like the only thing bidens climate bill has done is like give $800 rebate for em.
I mean if my state ever bothers to implement it .
100% skill issue though. I cook better shit on my electric stove than anyone with a gas stove I know
I suppose purely better is hyperbole as I can't account for taste. But some objective metrics... induction releases far less pollution than burning gas does. It also removes various risks with gas stoves in a home. Additionally it is more energy efficient when measuring the required energy to say boil water.
As far as personal preference goes I can barely speak to it. Unfortunately my houses have had shitty electric for the last decade or so. Had gas before that at home and admittedly enjoyed cooking on it generally. Also used gas when I worked in a kitchen long ago. I've loved Everytime I've had a chance to use an induction stove though. The response and speed is incredible with the right pan. As is the cleanliness.
I do fucking hate that they often have touch screens style controls
Looks like my state hasn't implemented it either... When it comes to electric though, I would prefer to cook on those cheap coil ranges, but prefer to clean up the glass top.
Weirdly ya I think the direct coils can potentially cook a little better than glass electric. Induction smokes em both. And gas is also better for cooking if worse in other ways than the electric
I kinda assumed most people here rented and thus it was their landlords choice if they used gas or not
Yeah, I rent and way prefer gas stoves to any electric ones I've ever had available to me. I don't have any real experience with induction stoves, but I know if I moved into a place with one, I'd have to buy all new pans.
One of the most frustrating things about induction for me is that if a pan develops any sort of curve, it's as good as a paperweight. It will heat only on that tiny point of contact.
Great for the electricity bill tho
When I bought my home, I chose a gas stove because that’s what the builder installed, and I continue to use it because I don’t want to spend $2-5000 for a stove replacement and remodel to power it
If you are thinking on the ecological impact, keeping burning methane gas is better that scrapping a functional stove for a new induction one.
Where I'm from people rent empty apartments - there's no furniture, rarely a kitchen, and sometimes not even flooring. Most buildings are older than 100 years and have options for both gas and electric stoves. People can rent and still decide how they want to live.
Here, you get a stove or oven, but getting one installed would be seen as risky. Also a dishwasher. If your place does not come with these things, you are not using them.
Argued with somebody about this and they were like "what it the power goes out?" idk maybe nationalize your electricity grid if that's such a common problem for you, damn.
I mean for emergencies we have a camping stove that outside of that is just for camping. Like wow, it's not hard to have a little backup.
Coleman dual fuel stoves can just use gasoline in a pinch, and they're cheap too!
The more practical answer is to get a small camping stove or something like it. That way you can use gas in an emergency without having to hook up your home to a gas grid
you can buy butane canisters at REI for like the three days a year this is a real concern
3 days? Like damn, where I'm at it's two days in 5 years. Can literally just order takeout
Ah yes, instead of getting a gas stove for when the power goes out in an ice storm or blizzard for 24 hours several times a year I should instead simply nationalize my power grid and also make it immune from the effects of trees falling on power lines.
That's a way easier and more reasonable suggestion than turning on my vent fan when I cook.
Also lol at the people saying "if thenpower goes out just order takeout"
Oh yea why don't I just order takeout from the restaurant 10 miles away that's unreachable because of a blizzard and also doesn't have power.
I get ice storms, blizzards, or several feet of snow in a single night. Idk, sounds like your local utility has a skill issue bud.
I've literally never owned a gas stove lmao
Love how everytime something is discussed (specially bike lanes) all Alaskans came to argue that it's actually a bad idea because of the 365 days of ice storm they had to live with.
And I love how if somebody says "actually we lose power into winter storms so a gas stove is handy so i can cook food for my family when we lose power" the reaction form all my friendly comrades is to call it a skill issue and make outlandish assumptions like I live in Alaska lol.
The best part is that a gasoline generator would be a better solution all around. Powers your refrigerator, charges your devices, and can power an electric stove (yes, at 240 volts). And then when you don't need it, you can put it away and not worry about carbon monoxide and carbon particulate in your living space.
If you live in an apartment and can't use a generator, then you live somewhere dense enough that you can get takeout.
We literally have a gas generator. A large one for an individual house. It powers our water heater furnace and the outlets and lights in the kitchen (not our fridge since if thenpower goes out in thenwinter we can moce stuff outnto the porch. If it also had to power the stove we we'd have to eliminate one of those other things or spend 20k on a permanently installed generac.
Good for you. Idk what to tell you we lose power occasionally. I'm not aware of any municipality that can keep the power on when a tree snaps a power line but congrats on living somewhere thats managed to defy nature.
Either that or the storms you get aren't actually nearly as bad as the ones I, or the millions of other people that have power outages from winter storms every year, get. Sorry I can't personally maintain an entire power grid in a rural mountainous area, if that's my skill issue my bad I guess.
Again you saying "well I never lose power" isn't really a counter argument to me saying it's useful when we lose power.
Where do you live that you never lose power despite regularly experiencing major winter storms?
I love all the nerd ass comments telling me UMM ACTUALLY YOU ONLY LOVE GAS STOVE BECAUSE PROPAGANDA YOU'RE A MORON
Im a professional cook and I've cooked more in the last year alone than most of y'all will in your lives, I know what I'm about, thx
literal gaslighting btw "don't believe your lying eyes and years of experience cooking, you've just been lied to bro"
I mean two things can be true... The gas industry wants more homes to have gas stoves while in fact they are useless and wasteful for most people. And gas can be a preference for certain people in certain circumstances.
it's not all propaganda, though a lot of it is. they have spent billions over the years to convince people that the existing way of doing things is far superior to an alternative technology they have limited experience with.
but yes, your affection for the gas range is not entirely propaganda. some of it is years and years of gas fumes.
Have you actually ruled out that gas is better or is it just your totally unscientific preference
The nerdiest debate broiest response i could imagine
What the fuck is "better" here? Literally what does that mean? Because unless you're making a direct comparison between like energy efficiency or whatever it literally is down to preference. Is induction more energy efficient and "faster" heat? Sure, but like other people have said, it requires the pan to make direct contact. It stops heating as soon as it's lifted. It is less responsive and I have greater fine control over how I am applying heat with gas. To me that's "better," ahh but woops, that's NoT sCiEnTiFiC. I also prefer a stove that works when the power is out (ffucking nerds in the comments acting like that neeeever happens, or "just buy a portable stove" (you gonna fucking buy one for me? no? huh)) because I like to eat and not starve
Have you been in a professional kitchen where all of the appliances used electric
Yknow it's weird but every professional kitchen I've ever been in is all gas everything, huh
The nerdiest debate broiest response i could imagine
tbf your opener kinda provoked such a response lol walked in like
oi fight me!It's partially because I'm pretty sure this entire thread is a callout response to comments I made yesterday (i was complaining that every house I see has electric or induction, even if it has gas already)
Seriously on the one hand we have arguments like "skill issue", "just overthrow your government and make your electric grid immune to weather" and "white people can't cook so their opinion doesn't matter"
And then on the other we have every single commercial kitchen everywhere in the entire world.
Guess who I'm gonna side with between "every professional cook on earth" and "edgy internet contrarians"
The main difference between gas and induction for me were that you can't stir over heat (doing the shaking thing over flames, I don't know what the word is) because the pan needs to have direct contact with the induction stove and all the induction stoves I've used have been way worse when it comes to adjusting heat. Also pans develop curves with use, or at least in my experience they do. As soon as they curve they suck on induction
10000% but these nerds want to cooksplain to me like I don't know what I'm doing
Thank you, the other comment replying to me explains how heat works and that I can just stir with a wooden spoon 🙄
I made pasta last night and mixed some pesto gravy into some pasta sauce and tossed it together and I literally counted like 15-20 times where, if it were induction, it would have stopped heating it due to me lifting and shaking the pan
"It doesn't cool down immediately" BUT IT DOES. IT STOPS HEATING. it starts cooling down at that moment! I don't want the temperature to start dropping every time i move a damn pan
Thank you for explaining to me how my stovetop works, I really hadn't considered leaving it on the top and stirring it with a spoon so this is really eyeopening for me. Likewise I appreciate you explaining how heat functions as I really did not consider the fact that pots stay hot, so once again thank you.
I'm willing to concede that for what most people cook in the US or parts of Europe, the way most people cook in those places, gas or induction have a negligible difference. That's because most people in the global North can't cook for shit, and at best do some glorified reheating or some basic-ass
techniques. Have them change their ranges to induction, whatever.But for professional kitchens or other kinds of cooking that billions of people use open flames for? Get outta here. You're going to tell the south American grandma who hasn't left her town and has cooked with gas her whole life that she's been brainwashed by the American oil and gas industry?
Nah, there are a lot of people in the global north who can cook their asses off. Sure, a lot can't, but cooking is a fundamental life skill and even colonists have culinary traditions.
No matter what, somebody must cook. More people in the global north are eating out, sure, but there are people cooking for them like AmericaDelendaEst, and those numbers add up. Increasingly, fewer can afford to eat out anyhow, and learning to cook at home has become an outright necessity for most.
Prepackaged ready-to-eat meals aren't as cheap as they used to be, and you can get tired of them very quickly too
But for professional kitchens or other kinds of cooking that billions of people use open flames for? Get outta here. You're going to tell the south American grandma who hasn't left her town and has cooked with gas her whole life that she's been brainwashed by the American oil and gas industry?
You know, a pretty decent cause of mortality in poor countries is women cooking over wood fires in confined spaces. Combustion is just not good for you, there's really no way around it.
Also the idea that most people in the north can't cook well enough for their tools to matter is laughable. That's just your vulgar reaction to fetishism of high-class French cooking. What evidence could possibly support it? We can joke about the Brits eating like the Blitz is still going on but you can't set up an objective ranking of cuisines.
My wife is a professional cook too and she love our induction and use almost exclusively the inductions on her job. The fact that they can be timed to be turned off automatically was a game changer for her.
My boomer parents always insisted on having gas stoves. They also never fucking cooked lmao
Yeah, there are so many people where the extent of their cooking is boxed mac & cheese, but they insist they NEED a gas stove. I grew up with gas until college, then had electric until recently (sellers left their appliances). The main difference is expectations, most people who only know gas, only know how their pots/pans react to a flame, but try cooking on it more than one time and its pretty easy to adjust.
The funniest part is that nobody even brought up the supposed better performance of gas (again, skill issue) as some kind of attack against gas.
The entire thing is about not fucking poisoning yourself and your entire family every time you cook a meal.
Lead and asbestos are great for performance too, yet you don’t see comrades obstinately defending adding those into everything.
It is simply not a logically, ethically, physically safe, or morally defensible position.
The induction stove top i had at my last apartment was one of my favorites because of its ease to clean. It functioned really well, but it was also like wiping down any other flat surface. With my current gas stove top i need to pull all the grates off, dismantle the burners, scrub in hard to reach places that seem to attract food.... It's honestly a miserable chore.
Can confirm, I'm so frustrated trying to boil water on a gad stove because I'm used to how fast it is with induction
I'd love one but would also be constantly terrified of breaking the top when cooking
My current place has a glass electric cooktop (please let me upgrade to induction) and I was worried about it to but I've had no issue. Just don't be slamming things around I guess. I think you'd have to be pretty crazily just like dropping cast iron pans on it or get unlucky.
Unlucky is my fear haha.
Big pro for them is also easier to clean if you don't have to remove parts when cleaning
I use huge pans, cast iron, and more on the stove and I'm not exactly a graceful creature and so far not broken. I really think it would be bad luck to like put a pan down and the top shatters haha. Definitely possible though.
Cleaning is nice though. Spray down and wipe. Maybe a little powder sprinkled on for extra power of something got cooked on. Easy
I've never had a problem, nor have I ever heard of this issue. Although to be fair I haven't looked into it.
I know one dude who broke it, but I imagine that had a lot more to do with him than the stove
Just the thought of accidentally bringing the pan too hard down on the glass.
Or past trauma from shattering iPad screens
Where I live electricity is rationed, gass is not. I can afford to cook with gas. If I were to use electricity I would exceed the allowed usage and they would charge insane fees.
My partner insisted on a gas stove despite my protests in our last two places because of the "control". The few times we used electric or induction cookers on vacation she would get really frustrated.
Cut to our current place that just came with an electric cooker with no option for gas. A few months in and she's got no complaints and even comments on how it's not that different once you get used to it.
The learning curve is real, and some people will push back at first, but if forced to, I'm pretty sure every single person can figure out cooking just as well with electric.
okay but how else am I supposed to light my ciggies or feel like a chef
Electric ranges start having those old car cigarette lighters lol
They better. Also a plug in for a footbath so I can care for my poor sore feet
They'll include that as an option to replace the under oven drawer.
That's supposed to be a drawer??? I just fill it with water and put mah feet in it I wanted them to add a plugin so I could use the footbath to store items in. Stuff like baking sheets and the like. Weird they haven't thought of that
My adoptive mother would turn the electric range on with the end of the cigarette on it if she didn't have a lighter.
It stinks up your entire fucking house but does work
I have a CO2 monitor (which is probably picking up NOx too, it's not expensive enough to be selective) and can literally watch the air quality get worse as I use the gas stove or range. I've never lived in an apartment with a functioning range hood. I'd like to try induction. I watched a Technology Connections video saying that raw power delivery, e.g. boiling water, is faster.
Also, a quirk of how gas works in Chicago is that you pay a flat hookup fee of ~$30 a month, and a fee per therm for consumption. Cooking uses so little gas that the consumption part of my bill is pennies. If I had an induction stove, and if I had an inefficient electric furnace instead of gas, I'd probably still save $25 a month.
I just gotta say, all the induction stoves I've tried have been completely useles on ranges 1-5, had a mild effect on 6 almost medium heat on 7, more than medium heat on 8 and then 9 is just more 8 and 10 is a way to boil water faster than my electric water boiler.
Also whoever it is that designs stovetops with touchscreen needs to go to the gulag I fucking hate them. And whoever decided to add a feature to the last induction stove I had where it would beep when it was turned on and nothing was on it... straight to jail.Induction is great for boiling water but when I have to be stirring something around and shaking the pan I dont want to have to worry about breaking the glass cooktop.
If you smash your pan down into some glass it can break. But like just don't drop a pan full of water half a foot onto your stove. just put it down like a normal person.
Yeah I know that, it just sounded like boiling water might do something that would break the glass
Ya no nothing besides water being heavy would increase breakage potential.
idk I gotta say I have no scientific basis for this but there's just something that feels different about cooking on an open flame.
Like for example I just could not imagine cooking with a wok or making kebabs on anything but actual fire.
Same. All of my "professional" experience has been on industrial gas tops. There's something about an open flame that get me going
Show
i've seen an induction wok, the fancy part is bowled up instead of flat so the wok can still do wok things
i dunno, here's the Technology Connections video. there's multiple models, i'm sure it varies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzJKxUCKOBg
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Fire is fun. But I think I'm convinced easily ultimately... Indoor should be induction unless you absolutely have no compatible cookware.
Outdoors??? Gimme the grill with charcoal. Fuck gas then to actually. Lemme burn some wood
