Keep Cookin'

With the ever-increasing cost of gas and electricity, I started to think about ways that perhaps we as a family could start to try and reduce our increasing bills.  One way that perhaps I had not considered before, is in the kitchen; obviously I would not want to revert to using a microwave oven to cook all meals, but there are a few simple steps we’ve put in to place to help keep costs down.

• When boiling water,  cover the pan and it should bring it to the boil in approximately half the time it would take uncovered.

• Flat-bottomed pans will ensure full contact with electric cooking rings – if the pan is not in full contact, then heating the pan will be far less efficient.

• Certain pan types will conduct and retain heat far more efficiently, for example, copper-bottomed pans will heat up quicker than stainless steel. In addition to this, cast-iron pans retain heat far more efficiently, result in more evenly-cooked food and do not require gas/electric rings to be turned up as high, helping to reduce energy usage and therefore cost.

• Ensure the size of the pan matches the electric ring, otherwise a percentage of the heat produced will be lost as waste.

• Reducing cooking times sounds obvious, but when using the oven, try not to open the door part-way through cooking; the heat lost has to be replaced, which means the oven has to work harder and use more energy.

• Try alternative methods for cooking, for example, for certain food types, it may be far more efficient to use a microwave, rather than an electric hob ring, or use an electric toaster rather than the electric grill in an oven.

• Keep the electric hob rings clean – any dirt or burnt foodstuffs left on the rings will absorb heat and therefore, energy.

• Keep the reflective areas below gas rings clean – again, the more reflective the surface, the far more heat will be radiated and the more efficient they will be

If you decide to adopt any of these, drop me a line and let me know how it has affected your energy bills – I suspect it will not make a huge difference, but should make some impact and afterall, anything is better than nothing.