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Original poster

What cooking gadgets do I need to survive without a cooker (aga)

31 replies

BergamotMouse · 13/05/2023 07:04

I have an aga. It's our only cooking source. But with gas prices as they are I want to turn it off for the summer.

I don't want to fill the cupboards with lots of cooking gadgets so what's the bare minimum we could get away with.

I thinking:
Slow cooker
Combi microwave
Air fryer

But not sure how we'd do pasta and rice etc.

Perhaps a single induction plate.

Has anyone made the same choice and survived the summer?

I realise this is quite a specific audience!!

OP posts:
KateyCuckoo · 13/05/2023 07:07

Get an all in one like a Ninja.

NotMeNoNo · 13/05/2023 07:10

Those single induction hobs are the business and will work with cast iron cookware. Combi microwave and air fryer sounds like a good combination.

peachespeachespeaches · 13/05/2023 07:12

My parents have a solid fuel Rayburn that they don't light in the summer. They use a portable induction hob doodad from ikea - www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/tillreda-portable-induction-hob-1-zone-white-70493503/

And they ended up sacrificing half a kitchen cupboard for a normal small/standard electric oven for baking etc as they haven't lit it in summer since I was a child. They don't have a microwave but do have a toaster to save having to have a grill in the oven, kept the size down.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about this subject:

General food
cosmiccosmos · 13/05/2023 07:21

15 in 1 Ninja - bakes, airfrys, pressure cooks etc but they aren't that big, I reckon ok for 4. You can cook a whole meal in them by layering the food.

One of the IKEA induction hobs, these come in double too but not all pans work on them.

TheShellBeach · 13/05/2023 07:29

You can cook pasta and rice in a slow cooker.

Mum2jenny · 13/05/2023 07:31

You can cook rice in a microwave

Diplidocus4 · 13/05/2023 07:38

Air fryer and slow cooker or one of those padded bag type things ? You heat the item up and place in the padded bag and it slow cooks .

EmmaStone · 13/05/2023 07:46

We ended up getting rid of the Aga, partly for this reason (and because we may as well have been burning £20 notes, it was so expensive to run), but the previous owners had an old cooker tucked away that they could use in the summer (although from what I could tell they just kept the Aga running through summer, and kept all the windows and doors open constantly).

But I would have an induction plate and a microwave (and be pissed off)

Marmite27 · 13/05/2023 07:52

I have a crockpot multi cooker that pressure cooks, sautés, simmers and slow cooks (amongst other things) a ninja 400 dual air fryer and a microwave.

my oven is completely redundant and the hob is only used for frying eggs these days.

I have a systema microwave rice cooker, which was about a tenner and cooks rice perfectly.

FannythePinkFlamingo · 13/05/2023 07:59

I grew up in a house with an oil fuelled Aga. We still had a cooker which got used mainly in the summer. By the time you buy a few gadgets to cook on, you may as well get a cooker. Although having said that, I do love our Ninja 11 in 1, but there is only me and DH now. Any more people than that and I do need to use the cooker.

Veryfishy · 13/05/2023 08:05

We’ve just had our oil fired aga removed ( too expensive and inefficient to keep , and we’re soon having a new kitchen installed )
We have
Airfryer
Microwave
Single induction hob ( the same one that @peachespeachespeaches linked earlier )
Oh my goodness ! The power and speed heating up of the hob is incredible , if I had to choose one out of the three , I’d choose the hob

AlisonDonut · 13/05/2023 08:08

I don't even have a proper oven hob combo any more.

I have a two ring hob, a small worktop oven, an air fryer and a remoska. For years I only used the remoska as our oven broke and we couldn't afford a replacement.

Eightytwenty · 13/05/2023 08:10

We turned ours off from late June - early December last year and survived with a combi micro oven, a large & small induction and a gas BBQ. Will do the same again this year but having had a smart meter installed I’m surprised that without hearing / water being on our Aga costs less than £1 per hour. It doesn’t feel as bad as I thought given that it warms up out north east facing kitchen, helps dry clothes etc.

sashh · 13/05/2023 08:13

Marmite27 · 13/05/2023 07:52

I have a crockpot multi cooker that pressure cooks, sautés, simmers and slow cooks (amongst other things) a ninja 400 dual air fryer and a microwave.

my oven is completely redundant and the hob is only used for frying eggs these days.

I have a systema microwave rice cooker, which was about a tenner and cooks rice perfectly.

I fry eggs in a toastie maker, as long as you don't mind triangular eggs.

OP

My carer has never had a conventional oven. When he moved in to his flat he had a plug in hob and a halogen oven.

When the halogen stopped working he got a toaster oven, I gave him a microwave and now he has an air fryer.

Pasta can be cooked by putting in a pan or dish and pouring over boiling water, leave for 10 mins and you have cooked pasta.

I have a rice cooker but only because I was buying a kettle and a toaster and Argos had a 3 for 2 offer on.

Eattheeel · 13/05/2023 08:13

I do this every summer (Rayburn owner). We have a portable double induction hob, a combi microwave and a gas BBQ. Of those, the BBQ gets used the most - not for traditional burger-in-a-bun BBQ food, but for fish/chicken/vege kebabs/haloumi, served with salad kinda meals.

ProfYaffle · 13/05/2023 08:16

I love my instant pot, I do all my rice and pasta in there and it's great for curry. The model I have had a saute function so you can fry things in it. Between that, the microwave and the air fryer we don't have the oven on very often.

ProfYaffle · 13/05/2023 08:17

Oh yes, the sistema pasta/rice cooker is great. My student dd has one and has just made us buy one for our house while she's home over the summer!

AuntieJune · 13/05/2023 08:17

I've got an instant pot (similar to ninja) and use it a lot - it sautes like a frying pan, pressure cook, slow cook. You can get lids that air fry for it too. Takes a while to get used to it but it's very handy.

I do everything from boiled eggs to curry to pot roast in mine. Pressure cooking works similar to boiling but it's faster, I'm sure you could do pasta in it.

That and a combo grill microwave would be fine. Just an instant pot would be enough really.

dontchaknow · 13/05/2023 08:22

Depends how many you're cooking for, and what it is that you like to cook. As a family of four, we managed just fine with a good combi microwave and a plug in hotplate for a few years. Batch cooking cakes etc was fine, only awkward thing was a giant Turkey one Christmas. We took the legs off to make it fit, and cooked the body and legs separately. And it was fine. When we eventually redid the kitchen, I was so impressed with the combi microwave that rather than a conventional oven, we bought another combi microwave and built both of them in. You can cook rice and pasta in a microwave if you like - one of ours even has auto settings for that. The plug in hob that we bought is still in use now that we have a proper built in one, we use that in the garden alongside barbecues.

DragonbornMum · 13/05/2023 08:24

Another vote for a Ninja. It does all the things you mentioned and cooks rice, pasta etc. We rarely use our oven now: the ninja is used minimum 5 days a week.

DistrictCommissioner · 13/05/2023 08:26

We have an Aga, fortunately we also have a 2 ring induction hob, microwave & an electric oven. I keep the Aga permanently turned off, can’t afford it now. Cooking on 2 rings works fine for us, sometimes so juggling around but feasible.

Hall84 · 13/05/2023 09:01

We have the ninja 14 in 1 and only use the oven now for pizza/pasta bakes. That and a microwave/toaster would probably be enough. Off to Google the sistema rice cooker . . . .

YorkieTheRabbit · 13/05/2023 09:16

Aga here too, it gets turned off in summer as the house gets too warm. I use an instant pot, air fryer, just swapped from an old tefal one to a dual zone ninja and a bbq. We got rid of the microwave years ago and haven’t felt the need to buy another.

reluctantbrit · 13/05/2023 09:18

It obviously depends on your space but by the time you pay for and store all the extra gadgets, can't you go for a simple 4 ring hob?

We had no kitchen for 8 weeks when we re-did it, it needed full guttering and all the jazz. We had a microwave, BBQ and a single induction hob. Doable but I was glad when I had my hob again.

I cooked a lot of curry and pasta sauces in advance and froze them so they could be reheated in the microwave and then added to the pasta/rice cooked on the induction hob. Or I cooked them first and kept hot while cooking the pasta/rice. Quite annoying I found.

An airfryer would have been useful.

Caterina99 · 13/05/2023 09:33

In the exact same boat. Family of 4

I have a large 2 drawer air fryer and a plug in electric hob thing, electric kettle and toaster come out the cupboard. Oh and a combi microwave grill. We also have a gas bbq that DH cooks on a lot in the summer

I have the odd thing that I can’t cook easily, but otherwise it’s completely fine. The air fryer is awesome. I don’t really do slow cooked things in the summer. I do miss the aga for drying clothes though.