Cooking is a constant learning process, but sometimes that’s more true than others. For Voraciously staff writer and recent Washington transplant Aaron Hutcherson, that has meant adapting to an electric cooktop for the first time. Fellow staffer Becky Krystal, though, has cooked on electric her whole life. They recently sat down to talk about Aaron’s frustrations and aha moments, along with Becky’s advice.
Here’s a quick rundown of the biggest questions Aaron encountered, and how he has had to adjust, for better and worse.
- How long does an electric cooktop take to heat, and why is the burner switching on and off?
- Do electric cooktops retain heat longer than gas? How much longer?
- Where is the broiler in an electric oven? And what other physical differences should you be paying attention to beyond the flat cooktop versus grates and different knobs?
- How does an electric cooktop change your approach in terms of testing and writing recipes?
The following has been edited for clarity and length.
Becky: If you could describe your experience so far with electric cooktops, in one word, what would it be?
Aaron: Frustrating.
Becky: Tell me about your frustrations.
Aaron: Primarily because I’m used to the more immediate responsiveness of gas stoves. And it turns out I’m not as patient as I thought I was.
Becky: Patience is a virtue here, for sure. What are some of the things that have gone wrong?
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Aaron: Well, the worst instance was when I was testing the recipe for my pantry-friendly mushroom, white bean and rice skillet. And I burned the crap out of it.
Becky: Can we say crap? We’ll find out.
Aaron: I’m sure we can. I was sauteing the mushrooms and onions, then added the liquid and the beans and the rice. I turned down the heat to low and covered it so that the rice could cook. And I came back to look at it, and it was time to go in the trash.
Becky: When you were looking at apartments, did this play into at all your decision? Did you seriously consider not going with the place because it had an electric cooktop or did you think, “Oh, I’ll just figure it out?”
Aaron: Gas cooktops are definitely my preference, but in the grand scheme, if I wanted an overall nicer apartment compared to just the gas cooktop — I figured, “Oh, I could figure it out. I can make this work.”
Becky: Did you expect to have this kind of learning curve or no?
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Aaron: I didn’t think it would be like this. I never realized how limited my experience with electric stoves was until it was my only option. I was like, “Oh, I know nothing about these.”
Becky: You and I are coming at this from totally opposite ends of the spectrum. I’ve only ever cooked on electric. And typically the old-fashioned, radiant style, whether that’s the actual coil sitting on top or the ceramic surface. And then before the pandemic, I was cooking on induction in the Food Lab. So that was a bit of an adjustment, but not as much of an adjustment, probably, as you going from gas to a radiant electric. Has it felt like a step backward to you or just different?
Aaron: Yeah, it definitely was a big shock to the system as someone who was like, “I know how to cook. This is my job.” Now it’s like, “Oh, I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.” So it’s a little weird, for sure.
Becky: What else have you had to sort of relearn?
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Aaron: It definitely takes a while if I put a skillet on and want to wait until the oil shimmers — that’s going to be a couple of minutes. And then the lesson I learned from my burned-rice debacle is that it stays hot for a while, so if you want to reduce the heat, do it much sooner than I would have thought to do it initially. Or even switch burners, maybe. So it’s like the whole “remove from heat” line in recipe instructions has a whole different meaning for me now.
Becky: You’re probably having to be a little more conscientious on how you handle your pans on the cooktop, right? Like you’re not sliding around your skillets as much and you have to be real careful with the heavy stuff.
Aaron: I have yet to use one of my cast-iron skillets on the glass cooktop.
Becky: Just coincidence or you’re scared?
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Aaron: Um, maybe a little bit of both. So, I feel like that will be interesting come time. But yeah, I’ve always been careful about not just dropping pans onto the cooktop in general, but now I think there’s definitely an extra sense of caution in my head.
Share this articleShareBecky: I remember you sending us a somewhat panicked Slack messages when you were confused by the cycling on and off — the red, the not red. Tell me about what went through your head there.
Aaron: I think I was trying to reheat the Cincinnati Chili, where it says reheat on the stovetop on low or medium-low heat. I had used the cooktop once or twice before, I mean, obviously, to make the chili. I was using a much smaller pan this time to reheat some of it so now I could see the activity of the burner, the glow underneath, and I just see it go on and off and on and off. I was so confused. I seriously thought it was broken or that it was defective or something.
Becky: Yeah, that glow. It’s kind of both menacing and comforting at the same time. Anything else that really sort of shocked you in the moment, but you had no idea was going to happen?
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Aaron: Oh, using the convection feature in the oven for the first time. Maybe this is a feature of all modern stoves where it automatically adjusts the temperature to compensate for the more efficient heating of convection. Out of habit, I always check my oven thermometer to make sure that it’s at the right place, especially when testing recipes, but also just cooking in general. And so I set it to 425 and turned on the convection because I was like: “Oh, convection’s a good thing. It’s more efficient cooking. Let’s give it a whirl.” And then the thermometer just stayed at 400, so I was like, “Where are my extra 25 degrees?”
Becky: Mine will show you on the display, like if you set it at 425 convection, it will show you 400 so you know. But it sounds like yours is doing that without telling you. I can see where that would be somewhat distressing. Anything else that you’ve been confused by or had to adjust?
Aaron: Well, I guess the broiler is the big difference. I’m used to having a broiler drawer underneath. And that’s where I would put things to get nice and brown on top. Whereas now it’s like the heating element is just at the top of the oven. So when it comes time to use that, it’ll be an adjustment. Is there a drawer? I just realized I have some sort of drawer at the bottom that I have not opened.
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Becky: I bet that’s a storage drawer. In my old-fashioned electric ovens, that’s just where you put pans and stuff. Usually the broiler comes from the top heating element. Yeah, don’t put raw food in that if that’s the storage drawer and think it’s going to broil.
Aaron: [Walks over to check the drawer.] I think it might just be for storage. What?!
Becky: Yeah, that’s what my oven in my old house was. I have a double oven now so the whole range is oven space, but my in-laws have a storage drawer in the bottom, so put your baking sheets down there.
Aaron: Huh. Learn something new every day. I had not opened that until right now.
Becky: You would have been in for a rude surprise if you had stuck like a steak in there and turned on the broiler setting and then pulled it out and been like, “Why is this raw?” So yes, I’m guessing the broiler is the top element. So adjust your rack accordingly, four to six inches from the heating element and broil away. So what are the things that you like more about this oven and cooktop?
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Aaron: The one thing that is a huge game-changer is a smooth top where I can just take one big swipe and it’s clean. As someone that generally doesn’t like cleaning, this has made my life a million times easier.
Becky: I don’t like flames. So for me, that’s a plus. I know people like the visceral element of the flames and it’s easy to see, but especially when you have kids and pets, no flames. And also knobs that are not on the front of the stove is a huge thing.
Aaron: There have definitely been times when I have leaned up against my gas stove and been like, “Oh, I’m just letting gas out into the air.”
Becky: Oh my gosh. This is like my worst nightmare.
Aaron: And once I woke up a little lightheaded and then I later found out that the gas was on. So I was like, “Oh, that was very dangerous.”
Becky: I love not having to worry about that kind of thing. Has this affected your thought process when developing recipes or testing recipes?
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Aaron: It sort of gives me a new insight into the way so many people cook. Now I’m curious, have people had issues with my recipes just because I had never tested them on a different stovetop? It’s definitely something to think about. I didn’t realize how much of a difference it made, but now I am that much wiser. I think it makes me a more conscientious recipe developer. It gives me a better perspective, for sure.
Becky: It almost makes you want to write the recipe two different ways, which is impossible. I’ve tested recipes from cookbooks where I’ve been sure that the recipes were tested on a gas cooktop because there’s no way that my cooktop could do what it says to do in the same amount of time. I think it also goes to show how important it is to give as much information about everything as possible. You don’t just give the heat level, you don’t just give the time. You have to give basically as many different landmarks, like the heat level, the time and then the cues, which are probably the most important.
Aaron’s takeaways: As weeks have passed and I’ve worked with my new stove more — even since Becky and I had this discussion — I’ve realized just how drastic the difference in responsiveness is. I noted it above, but now I have measurements to back it up: Toasting shredded coconut on the stovetop used to take me just 5 minutes with gas, but with my new electric stove, I stood there for 20 minutes from the time I turned on the burner. (I’ve opted to toast it in the oven instead for an upcoming recipe.)
And to expand on my last answer, this shows that the switch is affecting the way I develop recipes. Another example is that where before I might sear something at medium-high heat, remove it from the pan, and then lower the temperature to cook something else, I now try to just use one heat level throughout the cooking process, because though I turn the dial, it could take minutes before the heat reduction goes into effect for the burner. (My apologies to anyone who might have had issues with my recipes in the past because of this.) Though I still mourn the loss of my gas range every day, I am grateful for what the switch has taught me so that I can serve you better as a food writer and recipe developer.
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