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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

WTF is the deal with Agas?

58 replies

PrincessNutella · 12/08/2021 14:01

So this is a thing upper middle class British Mummier -than-thou people have? And it's an oven that stays on all the time, wasting gas? And you can cook stews and warm up your blankets in it? Why is this better than any other oven or dryer? Isn't it bad for the environment? Does it cause fractious rifts in families to discuss the pros and cons of agas? And if you don't have one, would you desperately want one? Are you pro aga Yes) or anti (no)?

OP posts:

DynamoKev · 12/08/2021 14:11

Had one once, it came with the house - was good for some things, not others. Ours was electric - heated up overnight on economy 7, then ran the whole day from stored heat.
I wouldn't go out of my way for another but it was OK (we had a "normal" cooker too).

Iwant2move · 12/08/2021 14:13

I have an aga. It came with the house. I was supposed to have an aga in my previous house (a new build) but I made the builder put a gas range cooker in instead.
I could have bought an aga with the money I spent replacing range cookers.
I have no choice other than to have an aga where I live. I'm on oil. My electricity supply is dire. I love my aga. You can make anything in an aga apart from a creme brulee.
Pizza cooks in three minutes on the floor of the hot oven.
Rice is amazing.
Vegetables are steamed in the top left hand slow oven. They taste amazing too.
Eggs are fried with no oil on a mat on the right hand hot plate with the lid closed.
Aga toast is delicious.
I was determined to hate mine and now wouldn't be with out it. I've turned it off for the summer for the first time and really miss it.

HirplesWithHaggis · 12/08/2021 14:14

I'm not middle or upper class, but have experience of a Rayburn and an Aga. The Rayburn was solid fuel (coal, anthracite, logs, dead things the cat left on the doorstep...) and as well as cooking, heated the whole kitchen and supplied tons of hot water. You could also open the firepit and toast your toes, lovely. When a winter storm brought the power lines down and we were without electricity for three days (rural), we still has a cooker for hot food, tea etc, a warm kitchen, and hot water. Our all-electric neighbours sought refuge with us, and were welcomed! Marvellous. But a pita if we went out for the day, because it could go out and then needed time to heat up again. Would have one again, if they were more environmentally friendly.

The Aga was in the next house and oil fired. You needed an engineer to come out in September each year to switch it on, and then it was switched off in May, otherwise the kitchen got far too hot in the summer months. Don't think I'd bother.

mayblossominapril · 12/08/2021 14:18

I promised myself a rayburn in my last house and didnt put one in because I decided to sell. Next house is getting a rayburn. I struggle to manage without one

Picklypickles · 12/08/2021 14:25

They were the norm in our village when we first moved here back in the 80's, nobody had gas in the village back then! There was a rayburn in our house and at some point fairly early on it was replaced with a bigger and newer one and they only got rid of that one a few months ago.

I don't remember mum doing an awful lot of cooking in it but it was always on, heating up the house and the water etc or there'd be a kettle or a stew bubbling away on the stove top.

They do look beautiful and keep the house lovely and warm, great in power cuts etc but they are also very messy!

EBearhug · 12/08/2021 14:36

I grew up with a solid fuel Rayburn. We let it go out for the summer (at which point hot water was much more limited, as it was from the electric immersion heater.) Turning it on in autumn was a big deal. It was great for things like stews, baked spuds and the like, but could be temperamental when doing things like cakes that needed more accurate baking temperatures, so Mum usually did them in the electric. It also had a wire rack over the top at about shoulder height, which Mum usually put freshly laundered clothes to air (not while cooking.)

We were on a farm, so usually had enough logs from there every year, as there would be a couple of tree falls most winters.

I wouldn't rush to install one, but if a good house already had one, that would be fine.

Ginmakesitallok · 12/08/2021 14:38

Don't have one, but my grandparents did and so did my mum. Great toast.

Glwysen · 12/08/2021 14:41

I grew up in a house with a solid fuel aga. It heated the hot water and central heating and was our only oven / stove. I hated the bastard thing. Smelly nuisance and causes of endless rows about who had let the fire nearly go out / who was going to go out and get the coke.

CounsellorTroi · 12/08/2021 14:45

There is one in a holiday cottage my DH and I stay in regularly. It's ok but doesn't make us desperately want to own one!

Ponoka7 · 12/08/2021 14:45

I love agas. Grew up around them in very WC areas in the 70's. It's mad that they've become middle class, because the association was with big poor (Catholic) families who had to cook because they couldn't afford shortcuts, or eating out. I still know plenty of WC people who have them.

CounsellorTroi · 12/08/2021 14:46

Also my gran had a Rayburn when I was growing up. Memories of making toast on toasting forks in it, and boiling hot baths.

PattyPan · 12/08/2021 14:48

They have a bit of a cult status but yes they are awful for the environment. I’d never have one. Give me induction over aga cooking any day!

UrsulaPandress · 12/08/2021 14:52

I worship at the doors of my Aga.

It may be expensive but we have no other heating in the downstairs of the house, never turn it off, don't really use it to its full capacity now only two of us at home but I will have to be torn from it screaming when/if we ever move.

CoffeeWithMyOxygen · 12/08/2021 14:56

I’m a bit confused - if you turn it off for the summer then how do you cook if it’s your only oven?

Glwysen · 12/08/2021 15:01

We had it because it was cheap (or at least my parents thought it was cheaper than gas)

It would go out if it got really hot. Then we would eat a lot of salad or what could be cooked in the microwave or deep fat fryer (gadgets which were only purchased because of the bloody aga) Eventually we bought a hob for summer use. No oven cooking was done if the aga was out

bilbodog · 12/08/2021 15:03

They are marmite - you either love them or not. Ive had one for 20 years and love it - its the heart if the home. 2 years ago we moved into a more modern house so i put in an electric one which uses economy 7 to store up heat overnight. We hardly have the heating on in the house over winter at all.

There is no doubt they are expensive both to buy and run although most of the modern ones are controllable now - but i like the traditional ones on all the time. I never turn mine off - just open doors and windows in summer if its hot.

We only run one small car so its our equivalence of a range rover!

RIPwalter · 12/08/2021 15:03

When we viewed our current house there house next door was also on the market so we viewed that too. It had an aga Rayburn, it was a scorching hot summers day and walking through the front door was like walking into a wall of heat. I'd always had a dream of owning an aga. It ended that day. Next door neighbours ripped it out after a few years of owning the place, it took up valuable space in the smallish kitchen, was a PITA to maintain and compared to our heating bill (we both has identical oil boilers, but we didn't have an additional aga) theirs was nearly double for a house slightly bigger than ours.

DingDongDenny · 12/08/2021 15:10

We got one with the house as well and I wasn't convinced, but now I wouldn't be without it. It heats the water, does lovely stews and baked pots and means one room of the house is always warm. Since we live in an old, cold house which we are slowly doing up that's a godsend

BrightBlue1 · 12/08/2021 15:10

It’s a country house thing, like having stone flagstones, wooden windows, labradors and whippets in your listed house. 12 years ago when we bought our country house with 4 acres, pool and tennis court the house had a double oven British racing green aga. I hate agas, the heavy lids and doors are a deal breaker. No idea how to use them and no I didn’t want aga cookery lessons. My dad was a policeman and I was born in a bungalow. Anyway, I had it removed (fascinating, they literally took it apart in a dozen pieces, it took hours) by a firm that bought and refurbished agas, got about £400 for it. Replaced it with a Rangemaster induction hob. Neighbours and friends deeply appalled.

TooBigForMyBoots · 12/08/2021 15:12

I don't have one. I don't want one.
There was a solid fuel Rayburn in the house where we spent our holidays every year. It was nice for some things, but made the house too hot and was a massive PITA for my mum. She relished returning home to her cooker.

Modern Agas seem expensive and wasteful. They are going to have to adapt.

womaninatightspot · 12/08/2021 15:17

I have an aga it came with the house, I've put in a normal cooker as well and now just run it in the winter nice to come down to a toasty kitchen but it'll go eventually. We're rural and theres generally an annual power cut for a day or three in winter. Between the Aga and the two wood stoves I casn generate enough heat to warm the house through even when it's freezing outside.

Original poster

PrincessNutella · 12/08/2021 19:14

I have only seen the outside of one, so I am having a hard time imagining how toast would be made in one. Does it take a long time?

OP posts:

bilbodog · 12/08/2021 20:08

www.agacookshop.co.uk/aga-toast.html

Aga toast

AlfonsoTheMango · 12/08/2021 20:24

In my fantasy life I have an Aga in the kitchen. Along with wooden window frames and flagstone floors. And orchards. And a huge garden.

CaptainHammer · 12/08/2021 20:28

Anytime someone mentions an aga it reminds me of the middle class aga family in Monkey Dust

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