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No way. I cook everyday and induction is vastly superior than gas. The only time fire is vastly superior is when I use a wok which I have a stove I use outdoors

No way. I cook everyday and induction is vastly superior than gas. The only time fire is vastly superior is when I use a wok which I have a stove I use outdoors. Most induction stoves have temperature maintained too. So it can keep your oil at a specific temperature let it be frying or confit or roasting spices.

Forgeties79 2mo ago
Yeah I was going to say, induction is the shit. Normal electric stove tops are a far cry from them and people should not assume they’re anything alike other than a non-flame process.
jedberg 2mo ago
They have wok adaptors for induction now, FYI.
- kibwen 2mo ago
  They've had wok-compatible induction burners since the very beginning. Induction is huge in China.
chomp 2mo ago
Can’t (properly) cook a tortilla on an electric burner, though you can get subpar results in a pan Can’t char a pepper on an electric burner Can’t heat a nabe on an electric burner Also during hurricane season, my gas burner still works when the power goes out. The list goes on of things that electric simply cannot do. To claim one is superior over the other ignores a lot of the ways people cook. They are just simply different cooking tools.
- shimman 2mo ago
  Can literally do all these (except nabe, don't understand what's happening there) with a basic cast iron pan + induction stove top. They may be different cooking tools but if one is ruining the quality of your life + possibly children, wouldn't you rather do it the safe way? Or are your habits more important than your health?
  - chomp 2mo ago
    You absolutely cannot do the same thing with a cast iron, I promise.
    - shimman 2mo ago
      Char food? I do that several times a week. You realize things get hot and you can cook right? Gas stove tops aren't the only thing capable of generating heat. Induction is simply better. Way safer too.
- pkulak 2mo ago
  Does the list _really_ go on though? I think we basically exhausted it (and one on that list is solved with a $10 torch, one with a cast iron pan, the other with an induction-friendly nabe). You can make lists for induction too: - Can't temper chocolate, cook a hollandaise, or do anything that requires low heat without using a double boiler. - Can't boil a large pot of water in under 20 minutes (unless you have a high-power/commercial burner that will absolutely murder indoor air quality/conditioning). - Can't set the temperature of the pan (or even the contents), rather than just the power level. Think, maintaining an oil temp for deep frying, or a surface temp for browning. That last one is a really big deal. Imagine if ovens still just had power levels (low/med/high) instead of thermostats.
  - chomp 2mo ago
    I mean really, all of my examples involve on-demand flame at a BTU higher than a torch, so I suppose the list doesn’t go on if you exclude things like charring eggplant for baba ganoush. Induction is super awesome for maintaining temp. But one isn’t superior over the other in all cases. My point was purely, people need high BTU fire sometimes based off how they cook. I mean, you won’t see me cooking tagine, but surely someone in the world cooks tagine?
    - pkulak 2mo ago
      Fair enough. I do actually have a camping stove that I've used a couple times when I needed a flame.
  - hellisothers 2mo ago
    Let’s assume we both have nice ranges. - I can temper on my 7k BTU burner - I can boil water quick AF on my 18k BTU burner - setting pan temp isn’t a thing, there are no recipes that call for a pan temp. Oil temp? Sure and that is why you have a thermometer, very solved problem. For browning etc you do it by time and feel, even if you could set a pan temp you wouldn’t just leave your meat on it for some temp x time amount.
    - pkulak 2mo ago
- Hikikomori 2mo ago
  I get good tortillas on induction. Can char pepper in the oven. Can also get a portable gas stove.
- LargoLasskhyfv 2mo ago
  Depends on your electricity. Induction will stay shitty at 120V AC. It needs at least 2500 Watts sustained per pot/pan, to be good. > Also during hurricane season, my gas burner still works when the power goes out. 'Powerwall' or similar?
hellisothers 2mo ago
Maybe it’s because my wife is literally a chef but you’ll have to pull her gas range/oven out of her dead hands. She’s worked with induction before for years, it is not the same league. For instance, you can’t tilt the pan.
- cmclaughlin 2mo ago
  I have a Bosch induction range and it doesn't immediately turn off the "burner" or beep when the pan is lifted up, so yeah I can tilt the pan.
  - LargoLasskhyfv 2mo ago
    Me too. I'm not following it that much, but I heard more and more chefs using and recommending it. It's only here on HN, where I stumble upon the stubborn naysayers :-)
PhotonHunter 2mo ago
Except that on all but the most expensive hobs, "simmer" is on-off and scorches the sauce. And on all but the most expensive hobs, the coil is much smaller than the pan you'd want to use (and many times much smaller than advertised). And the sides don't heat up like gas. And you can't use copper or clay pots like gas. And like many electronic things but unlike gas or the old resistive coil tops, induction seems to have longevity problems (perhaps that gets better as the technology matures, or perhaps it runs into the same electronic parts availability issues that plague modern appliances, I tend to think the latter). Induction is fantastic for boiling water, and good for many things, but there's too many shortcomings to declare "superior than gas".
- acdha 2mo ago
  Those are either artifacts of a bad stove or using extremely thin pans. We have a fairly low-mid range model and the low mode doesn’t burn anything and the coils match the sizes of the pans we use. I agree it’s not great to get rid of a pure copper pot but those (and even many of the Korean dolsot pots) seem to be easily available with induction bases now. The flip side was that our cheap $5 IKEA cast iron works even better so we use it more, and this was also true of some Costco ceramic skillets which weren’t trying to be so light that they didn’t have a hefty iron slug. Between air quality and child safety, my general decision tree is simple: “are you a chef doing things like wok cooking?” Induction is probably better if you don’t have a specific technique requiring unusually high BTU output. I have had to learn to stop saying “come on” when we visit relatives with gas stoves, though.
  - PhotonHunter 2mo ago
    > Those are either artifacts of a bad stove or using extremely thin pans. We have a fairly low-mid range model and the low mode doesn’t burn anything and the coils match the sizes of the pans we use. It’s a smaller than advertised coil, 6”, causing the problem, which is endemic but not limited to portable hobs. Warped a Lodge carbon steel pan the first time I used induction (2mm thick). Then I dove deeper and saw the issues others had. Since then I moved to a larger coil (first a Max Burton, now a Nuwave PIC Titanium). On reddit, you can find any number of examples of shattered cast iron pans and warped pans and ruined seasoning, and it’s not just portable hobs causing the issues. The issue with simmer is well-known and rears its head if you’re working with delicate sauces. Most people don’t. Induction bases don’t fix that gas heats the sides too and if you’re able to use that feature it’s not something you want to give up. And actually, wok cooking on induction is pretty darn good if you have one of the specialty wok hobs, better than a wok ring on gas (but not better than a specialty wok burner). Again, my point isn’t that induction sucks, it’s that it isn’t superior to gas across the board. My dream setup? One proper induction burner, one induction wok burner, a French top in the center, and two proper gas burners on the other side, all with a giant vent fan.
KellyCriterion 2mo ago
- only time fire is vastly superior - ....and on a grill/smoker! :-D

Forgeties79 2mo ago

Yeah I was going to say, induction is the shit. Normal electric stove tops are a far cry from them and people should not assume they’re anything alike other than a non-flame process.

jedberg 2mo ago

They have wok adaptors for induction now, FYI.

kibwen 2mo ago
They've had wok-compatible induction burners since the very beginning. Induction is huge in China.

chomp 2mo ago

Can’t (properly) cook a tortilla on an electric burner, though you can get subpar results in a pan Can’t char a pepper on an electric burner Can’t heat a nabe on an electric burner Also during hurricane season, my gas burner still works when the power goes out. The list goes on of things that electric simply cannot do. To claim one is superior over the other ignores a lot of the ways people cook. They are just simply different cooking tools.

shimman 2mo ago
Can literally do all these (except nabe, don't understand what's happening there) with a basic cast iron pan + induction stove top. They may be different cooking tools but if one is ruining the quality of your life + possibly children, wouldn't you rather do it the safe way? Or are your habits more important than your health?
- chomp 2mo ago
  You absolutely cannot do the same thing with a cast iron, I promise.
  - shimman 2mo ago
    Char food? I do that several times a week. You realize things get hot and you can cook right? Gas stove tops aren't the only thing capable of generating heat. Induction is simply better. Way safer too.
pkulak 2mo ago
Does the list _really_ go on though? I think we basically exhausted it (and one on that list is solved with a $10 torch, one with a cast iron pan, the other with an induction-friendly nabe). You can make lists for induction too: - Can't temper chocolate, cook a hollandaise, or do anything that requires low heat without using a double boiler. - Can't boil a large pot of water in under 20 minutes (unless you have a high-power/commercial burner that will absolutely murder indoor air quality/conditioning). - Can't set the temperature of the pan (or even the contents), rather than just the power level. Think, maintaining an oil temp for deep frying, or a surface temp for browning. That last one is a really big deal. Imagine if ovens still just had power levels (low/med/high) instead of thermostats.
- chomp 2mo ago
  I mean really, all of my examples involve on-demand flame at a BTU higher than a torch, so I suppose the list doesn’t go on if you exclude things like charring eggplant for baba ganoush. Induction is super awesome for maintaining temp. But one isn’t superior over the other in all cases. My point was purely, people need high BTU fire sometimes based off how they cook. I mean, you won’t see me cooking tagine, but surely someone in the world cooks tagine?
  - pkulak 2mo ago
    Fair enough. I do actually have a camping stove that I've used a couple times when I needed a flame.
- hellisothers 2mo ago
  Let’s assume we both have nice ranges. - I can temper on my 7k BTU burner - I can boil water quick AF on my 18k BTU burner - setting pan temp isn’t a thing, there are no recipes that call for a pan temp. Oil temp? Sure and that is why you have a thermometer, very solved problem. For browning etc you do it by time and feel, even if you could set a pan temp you wouldn’t just leave your meat on it for some temp x time amount.
  - pkulak 2mo ago
Hikikomori 2mo ago
I get good tortillas on induction. Can char pepper in the oven. Can also get a portable gas stove.
LargoLasskhyfv 2mo ago
Depends on your electricity. Induction will stay shitty at 120V AC. It needs at least 2500 Watts sustained per pot/pan, to be good. > Also during hurricane season, my gas burner still works when the power goes out. 'Powerwall' or similar?

hellisothers 2mo ago

Maybe it’s because my wife is literally a chef but you’ll have to pull her gas range/oven out of her dead hands. She’s worked with induction before for years, it is not the same league. For instance, you can’t tilt the pan.

cmclaughlin 2mo ago
I have a Bosch induction range and it doesn't immediately turn off the "burner" or beep when the pan is lifted up, so yeah I can tilt the pan.
- LargoLasskhyfv 2mo ago
  Me too. I'm not following it that much, but I heard more and more chefs using and recommending it. It's only here on HN, where I stumble upon the stubborn naysayers :-)

PhotonHunter 2mo ago

Except that on all but the most expensive hobs, "simmer" is on-off and scorches the sauce. And on all but the most expensive hobs, the coil is much smaller than the pan you'd want to use (and many times much smaller than advertised). And the sides don't heat up like gas. And you can't use copper or clay pots like gas. And like many electronic things but unlike gas or the old resistive coil tops, induction seems to have longevity problems (perhaps that gets better as the technology matures, or perhaps it runs into the same electronic parts availability issues that plague modern appliances, I tend to think the latter). Induction is fantastic for boiling water, and good for many things, but there's too many shortcomings to declare "superior than gas".

acdha 2mo ago
Those are either artifacts of a bad stove or using extremely thin pans. We have a fairly low-mid range model and the low mode doesn’t burn anything and the coils match the sizes of the pans we use. I agree it’s not great to get rid of a pure copper pot but those (and even many of the Korean dolsot pots) seem to be easily available with induction bases now. The flip side was that our cheap $5 IKEA cast iron works even better so we use it more, and this was also true of some Costco ceramic skillets which weren’t trying to be so light that they didn’t have a hefty iron slug. Between air quality and child safety, my general decision tree is simple: “are you a chef doing things like wok cooking?” Induction is probably better if you don’t have a specific technique requiring unusually high BTU output. I have had to learn to stop saying “come on” when we visit relatives with gas stoves, though.
- PhotonHunter 2mo ago
  > Those are either artifacts of a bad stove or using extremely thin pans. We have a fairly low-mid range model and the low mode doesn’t burn anything and the coils match the sizes of the pans we use. It’s a smaller than advertised coil, 6”, causing the problem, which is endemic but not limited to portable hobs. Warped a Lodge carbon steel pan the first time I used induction (2mm thick). Then I dove deeper and saw the issues others had. Since then I moved to a larger coil (first a Max Burton, now a Nuwave PIC Titanium). On reddit, you can find any number of examples of shattered cast iron pans and warped pans and ruined seasoning, and it’s not just portable hobs causing the issues. The issue with simmer is well-known and rears its head if you’re working with delicate sauces. Most people don’t. Induction bases don’t fix that gas heats the sides too and if you’re able to use that feature it’s not something you want to give up. And actually, wok cooking on induction is pretty darn good if you have one of the specialty wok hobs, better than a wok ring on gas (but not better than a specialty wok burner). Again, my point isn’t that induction sucks, it’s that it isn’t superior to gas across the board. My dream setup? One proper induction burner, one induction wok burner, a French top in the center, and two proper gas burners on the other side, all with a giant vent fan.

KellyCriterion 2mo ago

- only time fire is vastly superior - ....and on a grill/smoker! :-D