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by kstenerud 1479 days ago
Gas stoves are an anachronism anyway; good riddance to them.

There has been no better time for electric-only cooking. Air fryers are FAR more energy efficient than ovens, and also cook faster. Sous-vide cookers are cheap and can cook certain dishes to perfection every time. Instant pot style pressure cookers cover most of the rest. And everyone already knows the convenience of microwave ovens.

Unless you're cooking a big roast or bird or cake, most stovetop and oven cooking can be done better with modern tools.

2 comments

Would you use a microwave, a sous vide apparatus, or an air fryer to make a Chinese-style stir fry? How about an omelet?
I don't think you'll find a single cook who would prefer electric. Literally no one.
The cooks and gas stoves feels a lot like the programmer / gamer with mechanical keyboards debate. There is really _no_ advantage to mechanical keyboards but almost everyone picks them and insists membrane keyboards are unusable.

It doesn't matter what the facts are, its just a personal preference thing at that point.

That's pretty much it. There are properties that make certain technologies slightly better than others for specific things, but at the end of the day it's mostly people wanting confirmation of their preferences.

People love to show off their kitchens for some weird reason (regardless of how much of it they actually need or use), so of course it turns into an audiophile-style argument (cast iron seasoning comes to mind, or those ostentatious "wall of oven-like devices" that some MPs are getting called elitist over). Conspicuous consumption makes people do funny things.

Once the gas is finally gone, you'll see people claiming they knew that electric was better all along. And I suppose I'll be saying that "I liked electric before it was cool, man!"

There's a massive advantage to steady heat though. Electric turns on and off and induction is a little weird because the pan is the heating element, easy to get too hot.

Seriously, find me a chef who prefers electric and I'll eat my shoe.

Easily disproven by comments in this and other related threads.