Gas Stove

Building our current house – just this last August, I wanted a gas stove. For years now we’ve had an electric stove due to the house we’ve been in, and building gave me a chance to choose. I was so excited to finally get my gas stove. The cookies I love to make at the holidays especially needed a gas stove – almost 30 years ago I had to swap to an electric iron to cook them, because they just weren’t doable on an electric stove.

I’d love to have one of the large gas stoves with the grill in the middle and the double oven, but for now I’m just happy that I have a gas stove! That being said, 30 years of electric stoves, makes cooking on gas an adjustment, and the stove we have specifically set out to make it harder. I know I’m attributing feelings to a stove, but it did seem to be trying to discourage use. I love gas stoves for a few reasons that include not having to worry about breaking or scratching the glass, the flame adjustment, and the best part being that they are usable in a power outage. The first thing I noticed though with our new stove was that the flame didn’t seem to change on the burners when you turned the knob. The front burners (and we all know we have a favorite burner!) only operated at full tilt and I had a super hard time not burning everything. I’m sure I set the fire alarm off ten times before the final straw.

The final straw came when the using the stove and flames shot out the knob on the front. I, of course, screamed, my husband ran in and said why don’t you just turn it off – which he did luckily figure out how, and we got the gas turned off to the stove. Being only 3 months old, I located the warranty information and requested they service it. The knob had melted! When the repair person came, he had never seen anything like it. Several parts inside had to be replaced at the time, a knob had to be ordered, and he also adjusted everything to adjust the flames, and showed me how to adjust the temperature in the oven to get it working right. I now keep a temperature gauge in the oven just in case. As scary as it was at the time, it is a future funny story.

Now that the stove is working more the way it should be, I’m slowly adjusting how to cook with gas. Of course our fire alarm is about 5 feet from the stove, so any mistake is heard everywhere in the house. I’ve been trying to use lower temperatures – I think my gas stove definitely goes hotter than the electric I had, use covers more, and use the fan frequently. I also am super careful of boil overs, I’ve noticed the boil overs put out the flame on my stove. Any other suggestions?

I do have to wonder about them repairing a stove that obviously cost less than what they spent to repair it. – Though repairing the old is good for the environment.

stove knob