Induction Cooking Efficiency...

[ELGo]

AC, I now realize I missed one of your questions --

Our pressure cooker is pretty standard, although it is two-walled with a vacuum. I was just planning to pour hot water into it from the thermos.

--
It seems fair to view the electric plate heat-up as a fixed cost. If you are cooking a lot of stuff and/or for a long time, the fixed cost is not too bad. Heating up a cup of water would not give pretty efficiency results I imagine for similar reasons, a high wattage resistive plate has lower overall efficiency.

[ELGo]

Apologies if this is a bit off-tangent ..

Matching cookware and stove to the type of food being prepared makes a lot of sense. My home is vegan most of the time, and a lot of our food is cooked lentils and beans. Sometimes we cook the legumes or beans to a mush, and other times for soup. In each case a pressure cooker is great, and I doubt induction would improve the cooking or save much energy. I presume the latter because the cooker stays on the electric stovetop once the power is off and bleeds off the heat retained on the stovetop. This is what lets us cook with 10-15 minutes of power for 1.0 - 1.5 pounds of dry stock.

If soup stock is planned, the pressure cooker is still filled with a small amount of water. Later we put some food into a bowel, add water, and heat up in the microwave for eating. People may not want to dilute a stew this way, but for soup it works great.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by ELGo

...Re: your test protocol,
As was posted before me and you realized since you measured how much time the water continued to boil after the power was turned off, some of your resistive heat went to heating up the plate. I wonder if you could have turned off the resistive element say at 12" and then let the water come to a boil from
the latent heat in the plate.

Yeah, or something close to that.

I also thought about getting the hot plate hot and then putting the pot on top and timing it from that point... but I didn't try it, because nobody really cooks that way.

It did make me realize how much energy is lost in heating up the wrong thing, and that is what induction is good at, its energy goes into the bottom of the pot.

Originally Posted by ELGo

I completely agree with you -- go induction for the heat control and timer, not for efficiency. Not that efficiency is bad, just not superior enough to other methods to justify on that basis alone.

But, there is the control angle to it. If you are really into cooking... making sauces for instance, gas is really nice, because you can quickly and smoothly bring the heat up, and even more importantly, drop the heat before something scorches. Unlike resistance heat, induction does these things well too.

There was an interesting article I saw in New York Times recently about a restaurant that recently opened there. It was a high-end Asian restaurant. To put in a standard commercial range with say 6 or 8 burners would have been pretty expensive in itself. But then for the extraction system to remove all the excess heat (gas is only about 40% efficient) and the CO2 and CO, the cost would have been about $300,000 (NYC, remember?). They were able to do it with a battery of commercial hobs, and there was almost no excess heat to dump and no CO2 or CO to reckon with. So in this case, induction made the new restaurant possible, where it would not have been with gas.

But from what you've said, it sounds like you're living off grid, or are supremely dialed in to lowering your power use. Any way you slice it, I like your approach.

BTW, I used to date a Palestinian woman and she told me that in Arab culture, tea is enjoyed all day long, and they use a thermos, just like you do.

Best,

-AC

[AC_Hacker]

It's been nearly a year since I started this thread, and with several months of typical induction cooker use under my belt, I should report that I am using the smaller induction hob almost exclusively, even though I have a nice gas stove. I'm still not in love with the membrane buttons, but the quietness of operation, repeatability of and timer on the unit has been very useful to me.

I do like to do stir fry from time to time, and in that case abandon the induction cooker and go for gas. The induction unit is poorly suited for that application.

I have made every mistake in the book, including forgetting to set the timer and letting the pot boil dry... the temperature sensor cut the heat and sounding the beeper.

I also set a lid down on the still active hob... just not a good idea. The temperature sensor couldn't read the lid, even though it was getting hotter. So total idiots, such as myself, can still get in trouble.

All in all, it has been a very useful addition to my kitchen, and worth owning.

-AC

[oilburner]

Thanks for the review! I have been wanting to try one of these for several months now. I just found the Target model a month ago and am in the process of saving for one now. We try not to use the stove very much in the summertime, but this will help alleviate some of that excess heat worry.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by oilburner

I just found the Target model a month ago and am in the process of saving for one now. We try not to use the stove very much in the summertime, but this will help alleviate some of that excess heat worry.

Thanks, the Target model (Aroma) is still working out for me, reliably doing what it should every day since I wrote the review.

The excess heat aspect is absolutely a great benefit, and in the summertime it is especially advantageous and cost effective.

My initial reason for getting into induction cooking was reducing CO2 levels in my house, which is becoming more important the more I reduce infiltration losses. It has succeeded very well in that, too.

My summertime gas usage cost is now down to less than half of the fixed service charge (cost to read the meter).

Benefit for the buck... it is a winner. However, I'm sure that there are other units that are in the same price category (maybe even cheaper) that work just as well.

I hope you are as pleased with the unit you get as I am with mine.

* * *

My other unit works well too, but it's too noisy for daily use... it makes me grumpy. But I really do like the variable temperature control, as imperfect as it is.

I think a really good induction unit would have a calibrated temperature control that would actually give you the temperature you call for. Maybe the brutally expensive units ($1000+) are this good.

On my dream unit, I would also like to see full programmability and that would easily let you set up storable 'temperature profiles', because some cooking requires that you have various stages where temperatures are held at an exact level for an exact amount of time, and then changed to a different level for some other amount of time, etc.

But I don't think a unit such as this even exists yet (Arduino hackers are you reading this?).

Best,

-AC

[pinballlooking]

Ok I am going to put my hat into the ring.
I just bought Max Burton 6200 Deluxe 1800-Watt Induction Cooktop. It is not very high end but it should let us try this out and see if we like it. It got pretty good reviews.
Max Burton 6200 Deluxe 1800 Watt Induction Cooktop | eBay

We have an elect stove I am hoping this will use less power and still cook well.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by pinballlooking

Ok I am going to put my hat into the ring.
I just bought Max Burton 6200 Deluxe 1800-Watt Induction Cooktop...I am hoping this will use less power and still cook well.

That's a pretty good price, and free shipping too!

It will use less power, for sure.

I'm finding that the timer feature is really useful, and the ability to have good control of the temperature are more of a draw for me now, and the power savings are a bonus.

Enjoy...

-AC

[pinballlooking]

I am not sure how on board my wife is but she likes to put stuff on to boil for long periods of time.So I really think this will help.
I really don’t cook much so hopefully she will like it.
I will have to get some different pans. I think only a couple of pans we have will work.

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by pinballlooking

I am not sure how on board my wife is but she likes to put stuff on to boil for long periods of time.

Hope you read the manual. Some of the induction hobs have a built in 2 hour timer, after which they go on warm. RTFM.

Originally Posted by pinballlooking

I think only a couple of pans we have will work.

I got quite a few pans at first (check thrift stores), but for the things that I most prefer to use the induction on, there are really two pans I actually use. I really like induction for rice, etc. Boil water, add rice, drop heat, cover, set timer, done. And waiting for when you're ready.

Beans & soups work out well, too. So far, I have found that what I really like is that I can set the temperature to just below simmer, and I get the same simmer effect, only things don't tend to stick, so stirring isn't so important... also at sub-simmer, the aromatics that are lost from simmering and boiling stay in the soup or stew... yum.

Good luck.

-AC