On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:38:47 +0000, Andy Hall
wrote:

On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 16:00:39 +0000, Peter Parry
wrote:

Ah, I didn't realise you had moved to Stornoway.

No, although I sometimes think that it would be nice.

I've spent several months there - I'd advise having one leg shortened
before going as it makes leaning into the wind much easier.

The plates are substantially larger, and one can easily fit pans partly on or partly off them.

Really good - one part burned the other cold.

Not unless you are incompetent. It's pretty hard to burn something
on the simmering plate.

It's rather easy to do it on the other though.

You can slide a pan to a certain position and pretty much leave it -
for example simmering milk with zero risk of it boiling over.
Same with rice or pasta.

You can pile them on the simmering plate and they won't boil over -
that's simply because they won't boil at all. On the boiling plate
they will boil over. Putting them bit on one and a bit on the other
and playing slidey pans until they all obtain a form of equilibrium
is an interesting but futile way of spending your time.

Hob time is relatively short in most cases because usually one
initially boils the item there, transfers it to the simmering oven and
then if need be, back to the top.

Of course - one gets bored with sliding them around.

One of the more
impressive fires I once went to was someone who had tried making a
large amount of jam on an Aga like device and had gone to answer the
phone(I couldn't tell if it was a real Aga or not as by that stage
most of the kitchen was lying on top of it.)

One has to wonder what on earth he was doing. It would be pretty
difficult to achieve that, even for those of Darwinian stupidity.

It is remarkably easy, Agas actually account for far more fires than
you would expect from the number in use. You put something on the
boiling plate and forget it for a bit. With potentially about 5kW
available things go from cold to boiling over and ignition very
quickly.


In the Aga you actually almost a continuum from bottom left to top
right. I've measured it. In a given oven, there is, through
convection, a difference between top and bottom.

Either it is an efficient heat store - in which case there will be
thermal equilibrium all around each stove or it isn't - in which case
the heat loss will generate a thermal gradient proportional to the
rate of heat loss. You can't have it both ways (or if you want to
please explain how it can happen!).

The
thing is so useless you can't even bake a decent fruit cake in the
two oven version without buying an accessory "Baking box".

I don't know where you got that from, but I've never heard of it.

Aga:- "If you want to cook large cakes which take more than 45
minutes to cook, such as fruit cake, Madeira cake, cherry cake, etc.,
with a two oven Aga you should invest in an Aga Cakebaker."

"On a two-oven Aga, the Aga Cakebaker is used for cooking large
cakes...While you are making your cake and lining the tin you preheat
the empty outer container and lid on the floor of the roasting oven.

When you are ready to bake the cake, place it in the carrier, and
move the Cakebaker to the simmering plate while you gently lower the
carrier and cake in. Make sure the tin is perfectly flat in the
carrier or you will have a lop-sided cake. Replace the lid and return
to the floor of the roasting oven. Lower the simmering plate lid and
cook in the normal way."

Can you identify the accessory on the Aga Cookshop site?

http://www.agacookshop.co.uk/epages/agacookshop.storefront/43ca915b0095baf42743c35c4d1006c4/Product/View/AG236


It might do in a coal or old oil one. It changes very little in a
modern gas one.

The "modern" gas one dates from 1968 (upgraded 1993). I suppose in
Aga terms that is modern.

Aga "technique" is very simple and takes about 30 seconds to learn.
I did go on an Aga cooking course (paid for by the owner who thought
it was essential) and sat through a dreary day the highlight of which
comprised instructions on drying labradors in it.

.... and added bonus then.

Have you ever tasted dried labrador? Quite inedible.

Indeed, but not many meals require the expenditure of anything
remotely like 10kW/hr of energy.

It doesn't need to be for an hour though. If you add up having 3-4
burners plus an oven running, you are using 10kW easily.

Indeed but it usually isn't for long so the effect isn't particularly
severe (unless on chooses to do a full roast dinner on a July
evening).

No - that's effective. However something isn't efficient if it is
putting out a kilowatt of energy non-stop every hour of every day
whether it is needed or not. You may find you need a 1kW heater
going all day every day I suggest that most would not. That alone
makes the device inefficient.

I was really talking about 700W.

I appreciate that, but your Aga appears to be especially frugal, I
was using figures from Aga.

If you think about it, many people have that sort of figure in
lighting and appliances.

All the more reason not to put another 0.7/1.0 kW/hr on top.


--
Peter Parry.
http://www.wpp.ltd.uk/