Walk into a home with an Aga range cooker, and you’re walking into pure cosiness. It’s the kind of cosy that your parents or grandparents homes were embued with and conjures up childhood memories of griddle bread and freshly baked apple pie. The beauty of an aga cooker is that it’s often the heart of the kitchen and makes your kitchen the heart of your home. It was not just cosy, but incredibly practical, able to heat most of the house, provide hot water, grill, bake, roast, steam, stew, fry and simmer every wholesome dish known to man, or woman. The sheer versatility of the aga and it’s ability to cook numerous dishes efficiently and simultaneous is a big plus point for retaining your aga. This cast iron giant radiates heat to your home providing a toasty glow throughout the house due to its sheer cast iron bulk. It’s wonderful reputation for longevity is well known, with some models running for in excess of 50 years. The Aga is tremendously productive with sometimes 2 3 and 4 ovens available for cooking a variety of foods. Some of the ovens are hotter than others and the cooler ones can be used for slow cooking and simmering. This doesn’t include the hob with a hot plate, boiling plate and simmering plate.
Many households have an Aga cooker which was installed many years ago. As the heart of the home Aga cookers provide amazing ambient heat and convenient cooking facilities. This has over the years been a big plus point for Aga range cookers, the downside being that the traditional Aga requires a constant heat source to run and it isn’t always easy to regulate its temperature.
Many were fuelled by fossil fuels such as coal, oil or gas. Use of coal to fuel the Aga, was often not always the cleanest or most convenient fuel and many Agas fell out of favour with their owners because they required lots of cleaning, emptying of ash and general maintenance to keep them running efficiently. Moreover, use of gas and oil proved expensive because the traditional Aga is never switched off and as such always requires fuel even when not in use. This makes having an Aga somewhat expensive to run in the longerterm.
Thus, many people have either removed older Aga cookers from their homes which depended on fossil fuel or they have had to soldier on with the Aga in its current state. With concerns about the Aga are its costs to run. Because the Aga is always on, it can be expensive to run and sometimes difficult to control, so in the summertime it’s often too warm to use at all. However, its not all doom and gloom there are opportunities to change your Aga cooker without upgrading it to a newer ultra-controlled model.
Converting your Aga can provide the perfect solution. Modern Aga cookers can now be finely tuned and controlled by the touch of a smart phone. If you do have one of the older models, converting it to electric can be an excellent way to provide much more flexibility in terms of use
For example, it will enable you to still have the full range of cooking and heating functions that your Aga cooker provides but you’ll have a lot more control.
- Electric Aga conversions enable you to keep all the advantages of having an Aga range cooker
- You’ll be able to control when you use your Aga and how often it is turned on.
- You will have the ability to control costs
- Converting your Aga to electric will enable you to independently control each hotplate and oven.
- You will no longer require a flue system
- Servicing will be less frequent.
- Your aga can be cool in the summer and warm in the winter
- You can use timers installed to set the time for ovens to come on or turn off when you require.
- Electric conversion means that there is no need for a chimney or flue and this in turn means a more constant temperature
- No longer burning fossil fuel means that your Aga is not emitting
- Risk of fire is greatly reduced because there is no naked flame and also no risk of gas explosion.
- There is no longer any worry of fuel leakage of oil or gas as you’ll be able to operate your Aga with the flick of a switch.
- Electric Aga conversion will prolong the life of your Aga and make servicing it much simpler more cost efficient due to bigger servicing intervals.
- Your Aga will be more environmentally friendly and healthy as it will no longer be emitting dangerous particulates or gases.
One of the advantages of an Aga is that it stores heat due to the properties of the cast iron. This means that it emits and radiates heat in the wintertime and enables you to cook efficiently on it and in its ovens when you require. Once your Aga is converted to electric heating hobs from cold can take just 35 minutes and some ovens only require 1.5 hours to heat from cold. Being cast iron, the Aga holds heat much longer and you can plan your cooking and roasting much more easily. You may even be able to control your electrically converted aga with your smart phone and have it ready to cook your evening meal by the time you come home from work in the evening. Moreover, your home will be cosy and warm as soon as you walk in through the door.
More information at https://www.thekitchenthink.co.uk/conventional-oven-aga-pros-cons/