Hobs come in three distinct categories, each of which has its own benefits. When you’re choosing a hob you will face the decision of whether to use:
Gas hobs
Gas hobs offer incredibly reactive cooking because the flame and heat can be easily and quickly increased or decreased depending on your requirements. Gas cookers tend to have differently sized hobs which cater for varying sizes of pan. Some even include a dedicated wok burner.
Gas hobs work by igniting a flow of gas which transfers heat to a pan.
Electric hobs
Electric hobs tend to be easier to clean than gas burners. This is particularly true of the ceramic hob variety which provides a flat, wipe clean surface with no nooks and crannies for food or dirt to get into. There are three sorts of electric hob commonly in use today:
- Halogen hob - heat comes from halogen lamps under the glass. These transmit heat and light upwards.
- Radiant spiral - electrical coils wound into a spiral element provide heat.
- Solid plate – solid hotplates are usually made from cast iron with a sealed electric element inside.
Induction hobs
Induction hobs deliver the speed of gas with the cleanliness of a ceramic hob and come with a range of other benefits too. Induction is the safest type of hob because it only heats the area the pan is touching. It does not involve generating heat which is then transferred to the cooking vessel, but instead works through powerful, high frequency electromagnet, which makes the cooking vessel itself the original generator of the cooking heat.
When a piece of magnetic material such as a pan is placed in the magnetic field that the element is generating, the field transfers energy into that metal. This transference of energy makes the pan heat up. However, anywhere that the pan is not in contact with will remain cool to the touch. Additionally, as soon as the pan is removed from the element, heating stops.
Because there is no naked flame induction hobs are safer than gas hobs. In fact, in demonstration it has been repeatedly proven that a £10 note placed underneath the pan on an induction hob, will not burn. Yet due thin material of the note, water in the pan will continue to boil.
Like a ceramic hob, an induction hob is easy to wipe clean.
Induction technology is by no means a new invention, it has been available since the1970s. However, induction hobs have never been as affordable as they are today.
For an induction cooker to work you much have pans which readily sustain a magnetic field. Whilst this sounds complicated, it isn’t. It simply means your pans must be made from iron – and most good cooking implements are. But for reference, you can’t use aluminium, copper, or pyrex cooking vessels.
