Energy Saving Tips 4: Cooking
There is nothing like a home cooked meal, but it can be energy intensive to create. Here are a few tips to help reduce energy costs when using your kitchen:
Hobs
The hob you cook on can differ in the amount of energy it needs to allow you to cook. There are three common types of hobs on the market, from least efficient to most efficient (in terms of heating and energy consumption) are:
Ceramic or Plate Hob (Electric)
These are electric powered hobs which use a heating element to heat a surface, which then heats the pot or pan for cooking. While improvements have been made over the years, there is a lot of energy loss to get these pots and pans hot enough to cook on.
A ceramic hob has a smooth glass surface and the heating areas glow red when heating. A plate hob will have a raised heating surface with either solid or coiled heating elements.
Gas Hob
A gas hob uses natural gas which is ignited to heat the pot or pan directly. The gas hob is more efficient than the Ceramic or Plate Hob to heat a pot or pan as the flame warms it directly. There is still a lot of heat loss as not all the energy from the flame heats the pot or pan and is lost to the air.
Induction Hob
This is another type of electric hob, but it is different to a Ceramic or Plate hob because it uses a magnetic field to heat the pot or pan. As a magnetic field is used, the cooking surface is not heated, so only the pot or pan heated. This makes an induction hob very efficient as the heat the pot or pan far quicker and with far less energy than gas or ceramic hobs.
Cooking on the hob
If you cook on the hob, there are a few tips you may or may not be aware of. These are simple changes that can help reduce the amount of energy needed to cook your delicious food.
Use lids on pots – this helps contain the heat used to bring water to boil.
Switch off the hob a minute early – if boiling vegetable for example, the residual heat will maintain a boil for around a minute, reducing wasting energy.
Boil a kettle – this is quicker than doing it in the pan and you can boil the kettle quicker by using only the correct amount of water needed for cooking.
Preparation is key – prior preparation will reduce cook times, have your ingredients all prepared and time cooking with anything in the oven to avoid keeping food warm on the hob.
An energy saving tip will be if you cook pasta, for example, the water needs to first come to the boil, then go to a rolling boil, then you need to add the pasta and return to a rolling boil. This process can use less energy by having a lid on the pot to bring the water to the boil. Once at a rolling boil, you add the pasta. This requires coming back up to the boil, so adding a lid will reduce the time this will take. Once boiling, you may need to set the lid ajar to prevent overspill. When the water and pasta is back at a rolling boil you could reduce the heat setting down from the maximum, the lid will help maintain the rolling boil for the duration of cooking, but using less energy.
The Oven
Similar to the hob, there are some tips to help reduce the energy needed to cook your delicious food.
Keep your oven clean – ensure there is not any excess grease or dropped food which will absorb the heat from the oven.
Remove excess trays – removing excess trays and shelving will stop the heat generated being absorbed by these unused trays and racks.
Preparation is key – prior preparation and timing will reduce the need to use the oven, time putting items into the oven so that they cook at the same time.
Cooling Fan – only if it’s safe to do so, leave the oven door ajar/open to cool the oven down after use. This will reduce the cooling fan run time.
Kitchen
Other areas to look into for energy saving include:
Boiling a kettle – only boil the amount of water needed. This reduced the energy required to heat the kettle to boiling point.
Refrigerator – learn about the setting in your fridge, can you turn it down? Plan what items you want to get out of the fridge to reduce the time its open.
Freezer – if your freezer becomes iced up, consider doing a defrost. The ice build-up reduces the performance of your freezer and requires more energy to keep not only your food frozen, but keeping the unrequired ice frozen.
Microwave – Keep it clean! Spilled food will be reheated by the microwave each time its used, keep it clean to help heat only what you want heated. Switch off your microwave if not in use, this will stop the vampire device aspect of the microwave.
Vampire Devices – Switch off vampire devices such as coffee makers, bread makers and smart speakers when not in use.