Efficient cooking suggestions.

[EbS-P]

Hi all,

With my new real-time electric meter monitor I can see that cooking is consuming a considerable amount of electricity. We have a glass top electric range and oven. We are a big hungry family that likes good food. I’m looking for tips, meals, recipes ect. that will reduce the energy I use cooking. I switched to cold brew iced coffee after I broke my carafe.

Cooking gadgets that I own that I use some but not regularly are and instapot, wonderbag. ( you should get one and gift one. I don’t use it nearly enough https://www.wonderbagworld.com/) , propane grill, cowboy grill/fire pit, bread machine.

Like tonight, for example we will have baked potato bar. I am going to cook the potatoes for dinner in the woodstove while it’s still hot.

What would you cook and how?
Evan

 

[peakbagger]

#1 thing to do is find a magnet and check your cookware for items that are ferrous (magnet sticks) then pick up a single burner induction stove. I pulled the knobs off two of my electric elements and plopped it on top of them. The pans heat almost instantly. It dropped my usage a lot as the unit only heat the pot or pan not the surroundings. I paid $60 for a 1800 watt single burner on Amazon.

It can control to temp, it has a 170 F simmer which is good for making stocks. The only odd thing is getting used to the on of nature of the unit. If you are doing a light simmer you can see and hear the coil pulsing. I dont have big stock pot yet but will probably buy one after christmas.and try it for canning

 

[Fletcher22202]

Look up camping recipes, as they are often intended for things like what you've done with those potatoes. No electricity just coals and yummy food. One of our favorites is a "hobo dinner" chop up raw chicken and your favorite assortment of vegetables ( I like carrots, celery, onions, asparagus), add a little butter, season as you like and wrap in tin foil. Set that in the coals and check on it every once in a while. Everything cooks together and ends up really flavorful and super easy.

Also look into more in the instant pot, I'm sure you've found its super easy and quick and consumes little electricity, but still makes good food.

https://bookoutlet.com/products/9781507211137B/the-i-love-my-instant-pot-affordable-meals-recipe-book?source=ppc&ppc_campaign=PLA-US&keyword=&gclid=Cj0KCQiAnuGNBhCPARIsACbnLzoICN9J8l73lFNiZX8uSLJII2SD4abKh7apfbpDlZXLMGBWu0msi2oaAmL2EALw_wcB

Check out this book and others in the series for a ton of great instant pot recipes.

Maybe consider an air fryer, they use relatively low electricity but make amazing food. Great for cooking and so much better for reheating than an oven or a microwave.

 

[peakbagger]

Insta Pot would be my #2. A lot of items just need to be brought up to pressure and then left to sit. Also good for stews.

 

[EbS-P]

#1 thing to do is find a magnet and check your cookware for items that are ferrous (magnet sticks) then pick up a single burner induction stove. I pulled the knobs off two of my electric elements and plopped it on top of them. The pans heat almost instantly. It dropped my usage a lot as the unit only heat the pot or pan not the surroundings. I paid $60 for a 1800 watt single burner on Amazon.

It can control to temp, it has a 170 F simmer which is good for making stocks. The only odd thing is getting used to the on of nature of the unit. If you are doing a light simmer you can see and hear the coil pulsing. I dont have big stock pot yet but will probably buy one after christmas.and try it for canning

I forgot to include I have a really nice single induction one that the nice church ladies plugged in and it didn’t get hot so they sold to me for 20$. I should use it more. last time it was out was to brew beer.

 

[woodgeek]

I got an induction range, bc my old junker range was starting fail. And it is awesome.

Haven't put a meter on it. Yet.

 

[Highbeam]

Cooking uses a decent amount of power but it's only for a short while. Doing laundry is what kills my daily power consumption. I monitor my instant and daily power usage and have for many years. The electric tank water heater is surprisingly miserly. Refrigeration is surprisingly miserly. The giant 20 year old hot tub on the patio, not miserly but we love it.

I too use a conventional flat top electric range/oven. I would only change from it to go to gas for use in power outages. At least it's a convection oven which supposedly hurries cooking along.

 

[EbS-P]

Cooking uses a decent amount of power but it's only for a short while. Doing laundry is what kills my daily power consumption. I monitor my instant and daily power usage and have for many years. The electric tank water heater is surprisingly miserly. Refrigeration is surprisingly miserly. The giant 20 year old hot tub on the patio, not miserly but we love it.

I too use a conventional flat top electric range/oven. I would only change from it to go to gas for use in power outages. At least it's a convection oven which supposedly hurries cooking along.

I’m still hanging 6 loads a week on the line. Feeding 6 keeps the oven going a lot. Love the convection on mine. Use it 90% of the time. We don’t have any natural gas or propane. We could get by cooking without electricity for a few days. Let’s say we want sweet potato fries. 3-4 pounds of potatoes 15 minutes to heat up and another 30 to bake. 2-3kWh? We do a lot of roasted veggies. we now cook 2# of pasta at a time. That’s a big pot of hot boiling water.

Duke estimates cooking is 25% of my bill when not heating so that’s roughly 150 KWh. That’s significant. More than lights.

 

[NoGoodAtScreenNames]

We switched from a conventional electric glass top range to an induction glass top last year. Couldn’t be happier with it. Like others have said it’s great for getting up to temp quickly and to precisely control the temp. But more than that since the glass doesn’t get hot you don’t get baked on crud that is nearly impossible to get off even with the Cerama Bryte mix and a razor blade.

To reduce electricity also try and use the convection setting on your oven, if you have it, to reduce baking / roasting times.

 

[bigealta]

Hey Evan, how long do those baked potatoes take in that coal bed in the jotul?

 

[gthomas785]

In recent years the power consumed for lighting has gone down a lot, thanks to LED bulbs. Cooking and laundry are for sure the lion's share of my electric bill because we have gas hot water but electric stove and dryer. In the summer we definitely do less cooking because it heats up the house, so it's usually cold food or at least doesn't need to be baked, or we grill outside. In winter I don't mind cooking with electricty because at least the heat from cooking is offsetting a bit of wood use and I pay $250 a cord for my wood. I do cook on the wood stove when I can.

 

[EbS-P]

Hey Evan, how long do those baked potatoes take in that coal bed in the jotul?

2-2.5 hours. It was a too long or it was too hot when they went on. Big potatoes in foil on a less hot bed than pictured coals was about an hour. 7 in a lidded Dutch oven with coals on top should have been about 1-1.5 hours. I think sweet potatoes in the Dutch will be great. Just don’t burn those like I did the bottoms of the potato’s. Stew would be great in there too. I’m going to try an oval Dutch oven to up the capacity. Hobo dinner is next On my list to do.

 

[Poconojoe]

We switched from a conventional electric glass top range to an induction glass top last year. Couldn’t be happier with it. Like others have said it’s great for getting up to temp quickly and to precisely control the temp. But more than that since the glass doesn’t get hot you don’t get baked on crud that is nearly impossible to get off even with the Cerama Bryte mix and a razor blade.

To reduce electricity also try and use the convection setting on your oven, if you have it, to reduce baking / roasting times.

Do you need special pots and pans to use an induction type stovetop?

 

[bigealta]

2-2.5 hours. It was a too long or it was too hot when they went on. Big potatoes in foil on a less hot bed than pictured coals was about an hour. 7 in a lidded Dutch oven with coals on top should have been about 1-1.5 hours. I think sweet potatoes in the Dutch will be great. Just don’t burn those like I did the bottoms of the potato’s. Stew would be great in there too. I’m going to try an oval Dutch oven to up the capacity. Hobo dinner is next On my list to do.

Ok thanks, please keep us posted and the pics are great. Still waiting to get the pizza going in the stove but also been getting the Bread in dutch oven method down in the oven and would like to try it in the jotul. Just need another dutch oven as i don't think my wife would be happy with me throwing her "la cruiset" in there.

 

[EbS-P]

I use the lid on this one for pizza. To keeps my screens off the coals. I wouldn’t get and expensive one. I had my lid north of 900 F and I’ve read that’s bad and will ruin cast iron. I tried a new pizza cooking stand. That I could keep feeding wood into. I need a flame shield the same size as my pizza screen.

 

[bigealta]

I use the lid on this one for pizza. To keeps my screens off the coals. I wouldn’t get and expensive one. I had my lid north of 900 F and I’ve read that’s bad and will ruin cast iron. I tried a new pizza cooking stand. That I could keep feeding wood into. I need a flame shield the same size as my pizza screen.

View attachment 287773 View attachment 287774

Any reason you don't just put the pizza straight onto that piece of steel? That's the preferred method in the home oven.

 

[peakbagger]

Do you need special pots and pans to use an induction type stovetop?

Yes, they need to be ferrous construction although they can be clad with non ferrous. If a magnet sticks to it, it will work if it doesnt, nothing happens. Cast iron works great. I use my cast iron a lot more often these days.

 

[EbS-P]

I did this time. Is my new set attempt flames burn the the edges that hang over.

 

[Poconojoe]

2-2.5 hours. It was a too long or it was too hot when they went on. Big potatoes in foil on a less hot bed than pictured coals was about an hour. 7 in a lidded Dutch oven with coals on top should have been about 1-1.5 hours. I think sweet potatoes in the Dutch will be great. Just don’t burn those like I did the bottoms of the potato’s. Stew would be great in there too. I’m going to try an oval Dutch oven to up the capacity. Hobo dinner is next On my list to do.

When we used to go camping we would wrap potatoes in foil and bury them in the coals of the campfire. We called them "mikies". They would be charred on the outside and creamy on the inside. Absolutely delicious! I'm thinking we kept them in the coals for a couple hours.

 

[NoGoodAtScreenNames]

Do you need special pots and pans to use an induction type stovetop?

As peakbagger said they need to be magnetic but they don’t need to be special. All my existing pots and pans worked except one ceramic pan we use for omelettes. We bought a new induction one that is ceramic for the cook surface but has a small metal plate attached at the bottom to generate heat.

 

[woodgeek]

As peakbagger said they need to be magnetic but they don’t need to be special. All my existing pots and pans worked except one ceramic pan we use for omelettes. We bought a new induction one that is ceramic for the cook surface but has a small metal plate attached at the bottom to generate heat.

I would add that I had some OLD stainless steel pots that DON'T work, bc they are non-magnetic stainless.

Bottom line: if a magnet sticks to it, it will get hot.

The bottom needs to be flat...if it was like a steel wok...you'd get a hot spot.

Cheaper and warped pans can vibrate and 'buzz' at higher heating power.

 

[DuaeGuttae]

I thought of this thread today when I was setting up to cook my Christmas ham. The forecast was for unseasonably hot weather today, and I wanted to avoid using the oven more than necessary, so I decided to give the ham a try in the crock pot. I’ve done chicken that way (even getting it a bit crispy at the end) and a turkey breast. I’ve never done a ham before, but it was quite a hit with the family. Because I thought of this thread, I put our Kill-a-watt meter on the crock pot at the outset, and saw that the almost four hours of cooking (mostly low, a little at high, and a bit on keep warm) took exactly .99 kWh .

I did use the oven for a scalloped potato dish and an apple pie, but putting the ham in the crock pot allowed me to have those dishes share some time in the oven, and just to run it a lot less. I find crock pots to be a good way to cook for energy efficiency as well as for keeping heat out of the kitchen (and therefore using less air conditioning) during hot summer months. For the same reason, I use a bread maker that I keep in the pantry. Doing one loaf at a time requires more batches for our family of six, but I prefer it over my old method of using the oven for batches of bread.

 

[peakbagger]

I must admit my cheap bread machine doesnt get the use it once did. Its a combination of the limitations of the design (lots of way to bake bread) and the fundamental problem that if I cook fresh bread I want to eat it and bread is not a low calorie food

I have not tried one but several folks have raved about the bread maker that King Arthur in Vt sells. It makes a lot of specialty bread and loaves.

Zojirushi Home Bakery Virtuoso Plus Bread Machine

Put your ingredients into the bucket, press "start," and come back 90 minutes later to thoroughly kneaded, beautifully risen dough. Simple as that.

shop.kingarthurbaking.com

BTW if you are ever in VT, the King Aurthur Complex in Norwich is worth the trip for anyone who cooks

 

[begreen]

I must admit my cheap bread machine doesnt get the use it once did. Its a combination of the limitations of the design (lots of way to bake bread) and the fundamental problem that if I cook fresh bread I want to eat it and bread is not a low calorie food

I have not tried one but several folks have raved about the bread maker that King Arthur in Vt sells. It makes a lot of specialty bread and loaves.

Zojirushi Home Bakery Virtuoso Plus Bread Machine

Put your ingredients into the bucket, press "start," and come back 90 minutes later to thoroughly kneaded, beautifully risen dough. Simple as that.

shop.kingarthurbaking.com

BTW if you are ever in VT, the King Aurthur Complex in Norwich is worth the trip for anyone who cooks

We've tried several bread machines before settling on the Zojirushi Ultimate. It does a good job, is flexible, has many options for the stages of rise and baking, and stands up well.

 

[MagdalenaP]

What about good ol hobbo packets? Potatoes, sausages, broccoli, and any seasonings or sauces.

We do that while camping, in tin foil over coals. Other ideas are potatoes, mushrooms, carrots, cream of mushroom soup, dill, salt and pepper. One of my faves