Gas or electric hob on an island

[anotherlongwalk]

I want electric as I think it looks sleeker and on an island will look tidier. DH is adamant he was gas.

For context we currently have electric (not in an island... the island will be appearing in new kitchen extension) but DH has always wanted gas as he feels it's easier to control.

Aha , a kitchen island! I thought you meant that you live on an island!

Electric would be safer.

@Qc16

Gas for me - otherwise how do you use a proper Chinese iron wok for stir frying. Most professional chefs seem to use gas - the only one I saw using an induction hob was on Saturday Morning kitchen 😳 - was an Australian chef cooking from her kitchen down under who was showing a guest on the show how to cook a dish - the guest was finished first and hers was also more browned.

Across Asia Induction is preferred for home or professional cooking as they’re cheaper to run and safer (piped gas is unreliable even in east asia and explosions happen a lot). Stoves or gas cannisters are usually only used for street food or by people who can’t afford anything else.

I saw an induction hob recently (also doing my kitchen) where you could put your pan down anywhere and the hob recognised its presence and you set the temperature for that pan on that spot... I remember with my last gas hob I bought you chose from big rings at the back or front or mix etc etc and of course the rings are a fixed distance apart.... but if you can put your pan down anywhere, suddenly you're flexible - yay.
It was a siemens one btw though there are others.

I'm a gas girl. Our area is prone to power cuts. Induction neighbours were very jealous that we could still boil water for a cup of tea 🙂

Induction - so easy to keep clean and cooks quickly.

On a different note, I wouldn't want any cooker on an island, but I do quite a lot of stir-fries and frying in general so will splutter oil everywhere. I also don't have nice pots and pans so it would look a mess.

I would probably go for induction but look carefully at specs, they differs in how they heat up and control temp. Some have more hotspots and some have temp control in waves. It is a bit of a learning curve.

On an island I would say induction all the way.

We have ours on the island, we nearly went for gas having been gas devotees before this kitchen. Last minute change to induction and I am soooo glad we did.

It’s much safer - we have paperwork on the island a lot and it could be dangerous to use gas

The breeze from the kitchen door or skylight would mess with a gas flame

It’s sooooo much easier to clean, about 1000x easier. Honestly this is a good enough reason all by itself.

It’s safer for kids sitting at bar stools - no flame

You can use it as extra worksurface - so for example I can chop veg right next to my pan with the board on an unused area of hob, or I can lay plates on the hob ready to serve onto, without them being all wobbly and precarious like they would be on a gas hob.

Looks sleeker

Clever functions. Mine has a count down timer - I can set a ring to turn itself off after say 8 minutes. So I can go do the laundry and not overcook the veg. And a “keep warm” setting. And a “perfect fry” setting where it helps you brown without burning. Turns itself off if no pan is placed on it, or even with a pan on if nothing is touched for several hours.

Did I mention easier to clean??

The negative reviews of induction are usually about older or cheaper models where there isn’t much flexibility over where to put pans or where there isn’t enough power to create good quick heat. Get a high end Bosch or Siemens or equivalent and you’ll have all the power you need for wokking etc.

You could compromise and get one of those mosaic hobs where you can choose what you want.

My dream one would have an induction plate, a big gas wok ring and a warming plate.

Neither.

I don't like hobs (or sinks) on kitchen islands.

The other benefit of induction is that you can have an integrated extractor which looks a lot neater on an island.

I am a die hard gas fan. But in our new kitchen we are going for an induction in the island... mostly because we have very low cottage ceilings and there is a beam running perpendicular to the island, so an overhead extractor was out of the question... then once I started researching, I have to admit I fell in love with the idea of it being easy to clean, being able to set individual timers and keep warm functions, plus how sleek it would look on my lovely new island. I cant wait to have it fitted in a few months

Also google nitrogen dioxide emissions from gas hobs - its quite shocking if you dont run the extractor fan all the time, every time you light the burners

Induction. You'll never look back...

You still need to have an extractor for any hob! It's for the steam from cooking not the fuel emissions!

I wouldn't put the hob on an island, because I'm in the minority who hate induction. It was probably the one we inherited in the house, but the only good thing I could say about it was it was easy to clean. 1-5 did nothing. 6-9 boiled furiously. It couldnt deal with our small milk pan (wouldnt accept a pan could be that small - it was suitable for induction). Beeped incessantly at me tell me I was doing something wrong when I was doing what I wanted to do. I HATED it, and was regularly found swearing at the thing.

I have a lovely Neff induction hob on my island. It's fabulous - looks amazing, so controllable and a doddle to clean. I would never go back to having a gas hob. Once you have cooked with induction you do realise how much a gas hob smells (even if it is working correctly!)

I love my island based induction hob.

I like talking to guests while I cook. When the hob was on the work top I used to feel excluded.

Another induction convert here and you wouldn’t spoil the lines of your island. We have ours against a wall rather than island though so we could have a splash back and extractor above. The island is ‘L’ shaped with a sink in the shorter side.

We have induction in one house and gas
In the other. I’m used to gas. Induction is as responsive as gas and very easy to keep clean. But according to something I read in a Good Housekeeping magazine your not meant to slide things around on an induction top it can break so for example you have to be careful if you get a rotray out of the over you should avoid sliding it across the halogen top.
So on this basis and because I’m just so used to gas I think if I had to choose one of the other it would be gas.

Well Mumsnetter's, thank you for your advice. I've shown DH this thread and he's read it all and, despite being offended by the couple of posters who seemed to assume that because he's a man he doesn't do much cooking and cleaning (which is hilarious because we split cooking and he does way more housework than me!) he has taken on all of the information and ..... (drum roll please....) he has said that induction does sound like the way to go!

So I'm now looking at induction hobs.
Thank you!

Hoorayyy, thanks for the update.
Glad your dh had had the opportunity to bust some assumptions too.

@LittleOverwhelmed - do you have an induction hob currently
?. We’re having a range cooker with a gas hob along the wall but even if I was having a hob on my island I think it would still have a gas hob.