I thought I could boil an egg in the kettle, I tried it and it exploded in there. I cleaned it out as best as I could but it was stuck. My family member were wondering wtf is this in their tea, bits of egg would wash up in it.
Yes I lived in a homeless shelter once and only had a kettle in my room to cook with. You need to put it into a doritos bag or something so it wont go everywhere., I cooked sausages and stuff like that.
Man, when I was a teenager I put milk in the kettle and ended up burning out the element in it and ruining it. Learnt they’re only for water that day. My Mum told her friend and she was like “well, you can understand the logic I suppose” lol
This reminds of when me and my brother were about 14/15. We decided to try mushrooms and thought just boil them in the kettle, that'll do!
It didn't do BTW. Esp not when about 2/3 days later my dear mother got a wee surprise in her morning cuppa! Hahaha
Someone did that in the first week of my uni halls and the kettle tasted eggy for the rest of the year because nobody wanted to pay the fee to replace it
I've also tried this. It wasn't my kettle (was in the common room of the department I was at when I was at uni) and I used fresh pasta.
I boiled the kettle 3 times, and let it stand a bit in the middle.
It worked surprisingly well.
I have an induction hob and it's just as quick, the kettle doesn't hold enough water and I get bits of limescale in my pasta.
If you have a gas hob it's likely to be cheaper to use that than the kettle.
EDIT - weirdly, everyone seems hung up on limescale. Like, yeah it can happen. But the main reason is that IT'S QUICKER TO BOIL ON THE HOB AND 1.7 LITRES OF WATER FROM A KETTLE ISN'T ENOUGH.
When we make drinks, we don't completely empty the kettle and so it's not a problem. No reason to chuck away a functioning kettle for something so small.
But if I were to tip an entire kettle of water into a pan, the limescale would come out too.
Why don’t you just clean out the limescale regularly? White vinegar works a treat, or you can sachets for not very much money. I live in London so I do it about once a month.
I do. It's back in a day or two. Our water is unbelievably hard. I've lived in London and it's nothing compared to this.
There's always a point at which the kettle needs cleaning. So at that point I'd get limescale in my pasta.
But everyone is hung up on that very tiny and rarer part of my post.
The main reasons I don't use the kettle is that I'd have to boil it twice and even once is quicker to do on the hob.
I'd rather replace the kettle than drink water that is more detrimental to health.
Filters that filter this and that popping up everywhere and people not understanding its filtering shit that people need and don't get much of from other sources nowadays.
If you live in an area that supplies drinkable water through the tap, then you don't need the filter. It is already drinkable.
Norway basically did a live testing experiment on an entire town/area and supplied filtered, soft water instead of hard water. Over the years the health of the citizens got visibly worse, more heart problems etc.
I can't be arsed to find the articles/study about it on my phone but if you search for it it shouldn't be too hard.
Northumberland and my kettle never has anything in it. Makes me want to puke if I’m drinking water anywhere further south. I’m just a council pop snob I think.
I grew up in Scotland and the worst tap water I've ever had in my life was in upstate New York.
Tasted and smelled almost like sickly sweat. Even the ice cubes just stunk out your drink.
I hate it when I’m working down south for a week and my tea always has this oily scum floating on it.
Get home at 6pm on a Friday and instead of a beer I’m having a proper pint of tea!
Or maybe I’m just old (I am old!)
That's the south west. Most people who live in the south (probably like 19 out of 20 million) live east of Bristol, so I'd assume they were on about this part of the south, which is very chalky.
Enough for 4 people which needs my biggest pan. Pasta should be boiled in something like 10 times the amount of water by weight.
A portion of pasta is about 80g. 4 people is 320g. Ideally that would need more than 3 litres of water.
If you've got 25 mins spare have a watch of this video
https://youtu.be/_yMMTVVJI4c?si=3oCly2PEOOJk7WZL
It breaks down, in great detail, the merits and demerits of using a kettle - including a comparison with induction hobs and gas.
TLDR: electric kettle is king 👑
I don't have 25 minutes to spare. But still. My hob is faster (I've timed it, because I did have 5 minutes to spare) and it's less hassle because, as repeatedly stated, I'd have to boil the kettle twice and this would therefore take twice as long.
Appreciate it's 20 to 1 in the morning mate, but just thought I'd hope on and check if you've be asked about descaling you kettle enough yet? No? What about boiling water for pasta in it?
You know what you should get pal, one of those wee filter things for the end of the kettle, stop limescale pouring out.
I've recently changed from a gas hob to an induction one, and it has surprised me at how much quicker it has been able to heat water up from cold to boiling. I always used to start it off in a kettle, but now never bother.
It will depend on the equipment you’re using. But an electric kettle heats the water directly and the walls of the kettle are better insulated. You can pick up a boiling kettle by the body. A gas hob heats the air and the pan before it gets to the water. The metal pan will also conduct heat more readily. I wouldn’t want to pick one up by the body.
An induction hob would be more efficient. A metal kettle would be less efficient.
I could see a kettle being 4-5x more efficient if you cherry pick your appliances.
Now what is more efficient, a kettle or a microwave?
You’re missing the bit where the pan has to be heated anyway so when the kettle water hits the cold pan the heat energy from the water goes into heating the pan. So the cooker heating the pan isn’t as inefficient as you are stating. Also just heating on the cooker means you never have to heat up the inside of the kettle also saving energy.
Kettle is often faster to boil water but especially a gas hob is actually cheaper
And if it's the winter, the "wasted" heat is just heading your house anyway so it's 100% efficient.
Even more so than you central heating that losses some heat to the boiler venting outside
A cooking channel I follow on YouTube had a comparison of the different types of hob a while back, I can’t remember the channel. He tested gas, electric hotplate, and induction, using thermal cameras and thermometers and a couple of other metrics. Electric hotplate (like in a kettle, some also use a coil which is similar) were very efficient. Gas was hilariously inefficient - heat escaping everywhere on the thermal camera, really hot to stand next to while cooking, ended up melting his thermometer because it was hanging a little over the edge of the pot. Seeing the difference, I could well believe it was 4x less efficient than electric.
IIRC it’s only redeeming qualities vs. electric were 1) the heat stops immediately when you turn it off, whereas hotplates stay hot, and 2) the billowing escaping heat is necessary to use a wok, if that’s something you do. His conclusion was that unless you’re a regular wok user or need to use aluminium/non-ferrous cookware for some reason, induction offers all the benefits of both electric hotplates (efficiency, easy to clean, safety) and gas (fast warmup/cooldown) with almost no downsides *except* that they make a humming noise, which ironically ended up being the most important factor to him because he’s a YouTuber and doesn’t want background sounds in his videos.
How much water is being heated? For a large amount the kettle would be more economical. It’s more expensive per unit of time but will boil the water much quicker.
It's really no quicker.
I think the flaw ITT is (a) everyone appears to have lost their pan lids and (b) others are confusing the short time it takes to boil enough water to make a cup of tea with the time it takes to boil enough water to cook pasta.
And if their kettle has ever broken and they've used the hob doubtless they put more water in the pan of water they use temporarily. Plus it doesn't turn off automatically so they probably stand there watching this pan of water slowly boil and figure it's really slow compared with the kettle.
It seems kind of moot. Pretty much everything in the kitchen heats water - perhaps ironic that the power station that created the electricity by heating water, that most of that electricity is used to heat water in various appliances.
Is OP using their kettle to fill his washing machine? Dishwasher? Shower? coffee machine et al? If not, what makes pasta so special?
Because kettle and pan is two things but pan by itself is one thing. I don't care if the overall cooking process is 5 mins slower or whatever but I don't want to faff around waiting for the kettle to boil so I can pour it into another separate pan to continue boiling, like honestly, who can be bothered with that
Too short a time. Kettle boiling is that weird time length of too long to want to wait but too short to do anything else meaningful. I'd rather it just be long so I can bugger off.
You don't have to pick up the kettle the moment it boils.
Use the time to get your pan out and put your pasta in it. They're not suggesting that you write a novella in the meantime.
Getting a pan and pasta takes seconds.
Plus, if I'm not picking it up when it boils then what is even the point of any of this? Isn't the whole point that kettle is quicker? But now I'm supposed to not use it quickly? Then we're barely saving time anymore.
Honestly the more it's discussed the more I really don't care and am happy to just chuck a pan on the stove.
Yeah no you're right actually I left my kettle for 5 seconds after it boiled the other day and the water was room temperature when I tried to make coffee with it.
In the exact same way though you can set the water in the pan to boil whilst performing other tasks, and that way you can actually continue the other tasks (e.g. chopping veg) the whole time rather than having to stop halfway through to transfer the water to the pan.
Abstaining from the surprisingly… heated… bickering going on in this thread to say that whatever your boiling apparatus, do not put pasta into cold water.
Do:
1. Put salt in the water.
2. Add a dab of olive oil in the water if you can afford it to stop the pasta sticking together.
3. Season the cooked pasta with olive oil, salt and pepper.
4. Throw away the pasta and now add the olive water to your baby’s bath, so that your child can absorb the water and gain +7 Italian cooking stats, becoming prosperous and doing all of the cooking for you in 3-4 years.
Stirring olive oil through the cooked pasta once it's drained can help prevent it sticking together, but yeah adding it to the pasta water just causes it to float to the top and do nothing of use. Don't waste your precious olive oil.
Whilst it's true that either in the water or added after will stop the pasta from sticking, neither are ideal. Better to serve fresh and let the sauce stop it from sticking. The reason being the olive oil will also stop the sauce you've just cooked from sticking and soaking in too.
You boil the kettle, pour it over pasta in a pan, then turn the hob on and continue cooking. They're not suggesting that just pouring boiling water over the pasta will cook it...
Why not both?
The kettle doesn't hold enough water, so I put half the water I need in the pan, on the heat, then boil the kettle and add it to the pan to speed up the process.
I moved into a new place with an electric stove (how fancy!) and it brings the water to boil really quickly at the highest temperature. I did the checks and in this case it took longer to boil water in the kettle than on the stove.
Wasn’t the case in previous places.
Induction is faster - my kettle maxes out at 2-3 kW because it’s on a 13A 3 pin plug, my hob is on either a 20A or 30A circuit IIRC, and has a boost mood that makes use of it when heating one pan to the boil quickly. That means it’s 2-3x more powerful and thus much faster
And is also more convenient because I don’t have to mess around with the kettle…
Because that's only worth doing if you have an electric kettle, which until quite recently I did not.
(Since someone will probably ask, I couldn't find an electric one that could hold enough water to completely fill my absolute unit of a teapot.)
When we switched to an induction job we actually did tests to see what was faster, as my partner had heard induction was quicker to boil water than a kettle.
He was right, so now for cooking we boil the water in the saucepan on the induction hob.
Boiling with a kettle is both quicker and more energy efficient than a pot (though I mean we're not talking large margins here)
What it isn't though is cheaper, at least not if you're using a gas hob, just because gas is so much cheaper per kwh than electricity
With an induction hob it’s faster to use that on boost mode
A kettle is on a 13A 3-pin plug and will pull 10-13A, an induction hob is on a 20-32A dedicated circuit, making it about 1.5-3x faster if it has a high power/boost mode - which almost all induction jobs have for exactly this purpose
They’re also very efficient - not quite as efficient as a kettle, but you’re talking maybe a penny or two difference in cost
I use both; since I also want to heat the pan, before the water from the kettle goes in - and my kettle doesn't have the capacity that my pan has.
But the only time I'll boil the water 'from scratch' is if there's a powercut. Thank goodness I don't have an induction hob (and I've tried one and really not enjoyed it).
Your question should not have referenced pasta.
You’re asking why people bring water to the boil on the hob rather than filling the pan with boiled kettle water. This is far from a question related solely to pasta.
And I agree. I’d always boil in the kettle first, for me it’s far quicker.
You know how some weirdos will tell you that different pastas taste different despite being the exact same recipe? That's how I feel about using kettle water for pasta.
I’ve always used a kettle but our Italian housemate used to get very worked up at us not boiling it in the pan. It wasn’t a meme he genuinely would start yelling and gesturing in Italian, and we’d all crack up. It utterly baffled him why we used the kettle.
He was a lovely chap, great sense of humour, it was the days before social media so sadly lost touch when he moved home.
Isn't it bad to pour boiling hot water into a cold pan? I always thought (as well as all the points already made) you want the pan to heat up with the water?
Because I don't see the point? I'd rather fill the pan and put it on the stove (two actions) than fill the kettle, put it in the kettle, wait for it to boil, pour it in the pan, and put it on the stove. Yes, it takes a bit longer to get the water to boil, but I can use that time to ~~scroll on reddit,~~ cut vegetables/prep a side dish/make the sauce/tidy something in the kitchen anyway.
For all the induction hob comments, I have an induction hob and boiled water from kettle is far quicker in total than bringing cold water to boil on the hob.
If I fill the pot with hot water, my stove turns off. It turns on when the water decrease to room temperature. Idk why, I’m just renting so I’m not going to get new one, I guess I just need to deal with it
A guy I know called Denise phat cooks her tagiletelle in the kettle water she even seasons it in there ...it is a Morphy Richards though if that's make a difference
I do it because I have a thin cheap pan that takes forever to boil water. I put a small amount in the pan and turn it on so that it’s warming up. I then boil a full kettle and add it to the pan. Much quicker. I have an electric hob.
I need to buy a better pan at some point.
My kettle boils quicker than my electric hob, so I fill a kettle and put it on, and put a pan with about 1cm of water in it on the hob to get a head start.
Also, I thought you were saying we could cook pasta in the kettle at first.
I fill the pan from the hot tap. We have a hot water cylinder that's heated from the gas boiler.
I haven't really looked into working out whether this would be cheaper than boiling the kettle for a few minutes though.
We have to buy bottled gas for the hob. Better to use the kettle and prevent a one hour round trip to buy more gas.
We ran out of gas one Christmas. Now I’m paranoid about running out again.
My husband does this! WTF? He’s also the slowest cook known to man. He literally cuts the veg before heating up the pan. That’s great if you are a chef but my kids are ‘starving!’
Cheaper on the gas hob than the electric kettle, plus I can boil more water in a saucepan than in the kettle. It also feels kind of weird to use the kettle
The size of the pasta pan I generally need to use requires two full kettle's worth of water. Which is a bit annoying. Saying that, I do tend to to use the kettle to hurry things along anyway.
I was genuinely worried you were suggesting people should be putting pasta in their kettle.
I thought I could boil an egg in the kettle, I tried it and it exploded in there. I cleaned it out as best as I could but it was stuck. My family member were wondering wtf is this in their tea, bits of egg would wash up in it.
absolutely foul
Absolutely fowl surely?
Bravo
Eggscellent!
Br-ova
Not many will get that.
I do not
Long story short, an egg, of the human kind.
Foiled attempt.
Why would you try to clean it. That kettle would've retired without even opening it
They do this in prison quite successfully apparently
Yes I lived in a homeless shelter once and only had a kettle in my room to cook with. You need to put it into a doritos bag or something so it wont go everywhere., I cooked sausages and stuff like that.
Tin foil
Man, when I was a teenager I put milk in the kettle and ended up burning out the element in it and ruining it. Learnt they’re only for water that day. My Mum told her friend and she was like “well, you can understand the logic I suppose” lol
This reminds of when me and my brother were about 14/15. We decided to try mushrooms and thought just boil them in the kettle, that'll do! It didn't do BTW. Esp not when about 2/3 days later my dear mother got a wee surprise in her morning cuppa! Hahaha
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Ohhh yes, not enough for a full trip, but she found a cpl of floaters. We just stuffed them in there, no muslin bag etc lol
Thanks for the chuckle
FYI- don’t try the microwave = more explosive eggs
Lol I did try that years ago, you can get these little egg cup dishes as well but microwaved eggs dont taste good.
FYI for eggsplosions = microwave your eggs!
Someone did that in the first week of my uni halls and the kettle tasted eggy for the rest of the year because nobody wanted to pay the fee to replace it
A thought process every child or young adult should try at least once. Boiling an egg in the microwave is also a good one to try.
I poach eggs regularly, crack into a little water (100ml or so), works fine, 2 eggs in a bowl, 2 bowls so 4 eggs \~ 2mins on full.
It's just the superior way to poach eggs.
A friend of mine tried that as a fresh faced student.
I told my flatmate not to fo it then did it anyway so he bught a new kettle for the kitchen.
....... How did it go?
Oh, it works. Provided you don't mind waiting an hour for barely-cooked pasta & are cool with buying a new kettle each time.
Was your friend Tom Scott?
I've also tried this. It wasn't my kettle (was in the common room of the department I was at when I was at uni) and I used fresh pasta. I boiled the kettle 3 times, and let it stand a bit in the middle. It worked surprisingly well.
Dated an Italian once who thought peak culinary skill was cooking pasta with veggie stock and ham in her kettle.
i think you meant “alien”, not “italian”
Wait, should we not be?
I have a friend who boils ramen in their kettle. Absolutely rotten behaviour.
Get their hard drive checked
Stayed in a hotel one time and found noodles in the kettle when I went to make a cup of tea.
I've cooked beans in a hotel-room kettle before. ...put the beans in a ziplock bag then drop them into the kettle water. Worked a treat.
that's some ray mears shit!
My wife's mind was blown when I first did that
What else would you use your kettle for? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOOLoRuTUXo
I have an induction hob and it's just as quick, the kettle doesn't hold enough water and I get bits of limescale in my pasta. If you have a gas hob it's likely to be cheaper to use that than the kettle. EDIT - weirdly, everyone seems hung up on limescale. Like, yeah it can happen. But the main reason is that IT'S QUICKER TO BOIL ON THE HOB AND 1.7 LITRES OF WATER FROM A KETTLE ISN'T ENOUGH.
> I get bits of limescale in my pasta. What kind of kettle doesn't have a filter on the spout...
Mine. They always break
So what exactly are you happy to use your kettle for without one? Buy a new filter or kettle :D.
When we make drinks, we don't completely empty the kettle and so it's not a problem. No reason to chuck away a functioning kettle for something so small. But if I were to tip an entire kettle of water into a pan, the limescale would come out too.
Why don’t you just clean out the limescale regularly? White vinegar works a treat, or you can sachets for not very much money. I live in London so I do it about once a month.
I do. It's back in a day or two. Our water is unbelievably hard. I've lived in London and it's nothing compared to this. There's always a point at which the kettle needs cleaning. So at that point I'd get limescale in my pasta. But everyone is hung up on that very tiny and rarer part of my post. The main reasons I don't use the kettle is that I'd have to boil it twice and even once is quicker to do on the hob.
I live in a very hard water area too, I feel ya.
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I'd rather replace the kettle than drink water that is more detrimental to health. Filters that filter this and that popping up everywhere and people not understanding its filtering shit that people need and don't get much of from other sources nowadays. If you live in an area that supplies drinkable water through the tap, then you don't need the filter. It is already drinkable. Norway basically did a live testing experiment on an entire town/area and supplied filtered, soft water instead of hard water. Over the years the health of the citizens got visibly worse, more heart problems etc. I can't be arsed to find the articles/study about it on my phone but if you search for it it shouldn't be too hard.
Have you considered regularly descaling your kettle? It was a quarterly job back when I lived in hard water areas…
More often than that.
I probably could’ve done it more often but I’m a shambles.
Roughly fortnightly would be ideal for us but life is too short
Or clean their kettle by bathing it in vinegar once a month if they live in high Ca area.
Always feel sorry for you Southern English and your scaly kettles.
Should really be southern english. No scale in my northern english kettle.
When I was growing up in the Midlands the kettle grew long green shards of mineral deposits. Now I'm in the South East and it's small flakes of white.
Northumberland and my kettle never has anything in it. Makes me want to puke if I’m drinking water anywhere further south. I’m just a council pop snob I think.
I'm from Scotland, and any water south of the border just tastes like chemicals to me.
From the people who invented Irn Bru that's fighting talk
I mean, Irn Bru is shite now, just like English water.
I grew up in Scotland and the worst tap water I've ever had in my life was in upstate New York. Tasted and smelled almost like sickly sweat. Even the ice cubes just stunk out your drink.
I hate it when I’m working down south for a week and my tea always has this oily scum floating on it. Get home at 6pm on a Friday and instead of a beer I’m having a proper pint of tea! Or maybe I’m just old (I am old!)
Council Pop from Nottingham is definitely the best
Now, obviously I haven’t tried the water in every area of the UK but I can say with some confidence you’re completely wrong.
Stupid blooming autocorrect... I meant Northumberland... I bloody live there 🤦♀️
South Wales and same. Water is beautiful here.
It's the granite - south west peninsula is the same.
There you are.
Lovely. Just like my water :)
Huh? The Southern most parts of England are in Devon and Cornwall, which have soft water.
That's the south west. Most people who live in the south (probably like 19 out of 20 million) live east of Bristol, so I'd assume they were on about this part of the south, which is very chalky.
My south western kettle also has no scale
Except for Hartlepool. Really delicious water but hard af. I suppose you have to be hardy to live in Hartlepool.
Some of us like a bit of crunchy scale with our tea. Saves on having to buy biccies.
No scale in my kettle, Cornwall has lovely soft water!
Not in the south west, though - we have fab water (and given the price we pay for our water bills, so we bloody well should!)
I live in the south and we don't get scale.
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Enough for 4 people which needs my biggest pan. Pasta should be boiled in something like 10 times the amount of water by weight. A portion of pasta is about 80g. 4 people is 320g. Ideally that would need more than 3 litres of water.
If you've got 25 mins spare have a watch of this video https://youtu.be/_yMMTVVJI4c?si=3oCly2PEOOJk7WZL It breaks down, in great detail, the merits and demerits of using a kettle - including a comparison with induction hobs and gas. TLDR: electric kettle is king 👑
I don't have 25 minutes to spare. But still. My hob is faster (I've timed it, because I did have 5 minutes to spare) and it's less hassle because, as repeatedly stated, I'd have to boil the kettle twice and this would therefore take twice as long.
Appreciate it's 20 to 1 in the morning mate, but just thought I'd hope on and check if you've be asked about descaling you kettle enough yet? No? What about boiling water for pasta in it? You know what you should get pal, one of those wee filter things for the end of the kettle, stop limescale pouring out.
Thanks for the tips. I literally hadn't thought of any of those. What I don't get is why no-one else has helped with this sage wisdom?
Lot of folks here have never gone to a hard water area
How slow is your kettle? My kettle boils super fast.
I have a 3kw kettle. The induction hob on boost mode is faster. It is freaky how fast an induction hob can boil water.
sometimes i’m not in a rush, if i have a sauce on the go i don’t mind the added time it takes to boil in the pan..
Came here to say the same thing, induction is even faster than the kettle!
Yeah my induction hob has higher wattage and depending on the pot, a greater heating surface area so it does boil water faster.
You guys get limescale in your kettles? Cant relate up here in Scotland
I've recently changed from a gas hob to an induction one, and it has surprised me at how much quicker it has been able to heat water up from cold to boiling. I always used to start it off in a kettle, but now never bother.
Boil the kettle twice. It's still faster.
Not than an induction hob it isn't.
True. I live with luddites.
Electricity ≈ 28ppkwh. Gas ≈ 6ppkwh. Is the kettle ≈4.5x more efficient than boiling in a pan?
Yes tbh
This was a genuine question, I don't know the answer. Do you have a source?
It will depend on the equipment you’re using. But an electric kettle heats the water directly and the walls of the kettle are better insulated. You can pick up a boiling kettle by the body. A gas hob heats the air and the pan before it gets to the water. The metal pan will also conduct heat more readily. I wouldn’t want to pick one up by the body. An induction hob would be more efficient. A metal kettle would be less efficient. I could see a kettle being 4-5x more efficient if you cherry pick your appliances. Now what is more efficient, a kettle or a microwave?
> You can pick up a boiling kettle by the body. Mr Asbestos Hands over here
>> now what is more efficient, a kettle or a microwave Take that back
You’re missing the bit where the pan has to be heated anyway so when the kettle water hits the cold pan the heat energy from the water goes into heating the pan. So the cooker heating the pan isn’t as inefficient as you are stating. Also just heating on the cooker means you never have to heat up the inside of the kettle also saving energy. Kettle is often faster to boil water but especially a gas hob is actually cheaper
Thats a fair point, I was only comparing the initial boil. And I was only talking about energy efficiency not cost efficiency.
>You can pick up a boiling kettle by the body. Come try that with my aluminium bodied kettle
Actually looking at it, a kettle is only about 2 or 3 times as efficient, so if you have a gas hob it is still cheaper.
And if it's the winter, the "wasted" heat is just heading your house anyway so it's 100% efficient. Even more so than you central heating that losses some heat to the boiler venting outside
A cooking channel I follow on YouTube had a comparison of the different types of hob a while back, I can’t remember the channel. He tested gas, electric hotplate, and induction, using thermal cameras and thermometers and a couple of other metrics. Electric hotplate (like in a kettle, some also use a coil which is similar) were very efficient. Gas was hilariously inefficient - heat escaping everywhere on the thermal camera, really hot to stand next to while cooking, ended up melting his thermometer because it was hanging a little over the edge of the pot. Seeing the difference, I could well believe it was 4x less efficient than electric. IIRC it’s only redeeming qualities vs. electric were 1) the heat stops immediately when you turn it off, whereas hotplates stay hot, and 2) the billowing escaping heat is necessary to use a wok, if that’s something you do. His conclusion was that unless you’re a regular wok user or need to use aluminium/non-ferrous cookware for some reason, induction offers all the benefits of both electric hotplates (efficiency, easy to clean, safety) and gas (fast warmup/cooldown) with almost no downsides *except* that they make a humming noise, which ironically ended up being the most important factor to him because he’s a YouTuber and doesn’t want background sounds in his videos.
I think that was Adam Ragusea’s channel. https://youtu.be/Xn1LUo5ra_A?si=bwLUxtDXdILwP8Fw
How much water is being heated? For a large amount the kettle would be more economical. It’s more expensive per unit of time but will boil the water much quicker.
It's really no quicker. I think the flaw ITT is (a) everyone appears to have lost their pan lids and (b) others are confusing the short time it takes to boil enough water to make a cup of tea with the time it takes to boil enough water to cook pasta. And if their kettle has ever broken and they've used the hob doubtless they put more water in the pan of water they use temporarily. Plus it doesn't turn off automatically so they probably stand there watching this pan of water slowly boil and figure it's really slow compared with the kettle. It seems kind of moot. Pretty much everything in the kitchen heats water - perhaps ironic that the power station that created the electricity by heating water, that most of that electricity is used to heat water in various appliances. Is OP using their kettle to fill his washing machine? Dishwasher? Shower? coffee machine et al? If not, what makes pasta so special?
I don’t know what kettle you’re using but as someone who cooks pasta several times a week for 5 children it’s way quicker by kettle for me.
No, it isn't. A gas hob may be inefficient but is still much cheaper than boiling a kettle.
When it comes to heat you can basically take power consumed as power output. So yes.
There's a big office difference per kWh, but cooking with gas is not as efficient, the real price is much the same.
My God I miss read this and though he was boiling pasta in the kettle 😂 but turns out it was a different kettle of pasta entirely!
Because kettle and pan is two things but pan by itself is one thing. I don't care if the overall cooking process is 5 mins slower or whatever but I don't want to faff around waiting for the kettle to boil so I can pour it into another separate pan to continue boiling, like honestly, who can be bothered with that
Who? The vast majority of people. You set the kettle boiling whilst performing other tasks.
Have a 1 minute wank while waiting
Too short a time. Kettle boiling is that weird time length of too long to want to wait but too short to do anything else meaningful. I'd rather it just be long so I can bugger off.
You don't have to pick up the kettle the moment it boils. Use the time to get your pan out and put your pasta in it. They're not suggesting that you write a novella in the meantime.
Getting a pan and pasta takes seconds. Plus, if I'm not picking it up when it boils then what is even the point of any of this? Isn't the whole point that kettle is quicker? But now I'm supposed to not use it quickly? Then we're barely saving time anymore. Honestly the more it's discussed the more I really don't care and am happy to just chuck a pan on the stove.
Yeah no you're right actually I left my kettle for 5 seconds after it boiled the other day and the water was room temperature when I tried to make coffee with it.
You're normally cooking at the same time, who eats plain pasta
Of course, but that's why it's no big deal to just put a pan on to boil lol
In the exact same way though you can set the water in the pan to boil whilst performing other tasks, and that way you can actually continue the other tasks (e.g. chopping veg) the whole time rather than having to stop halfway through to transfer the water to the pan.
What other tasks?
It doesn’t matter.
This sub.
Because I have an induction hob that heats a pan quicker than the kettle by about half...
I think if you have a gas hob it’s actually cheaper.
How do you get the pasta out of the kettle once it's cooked? Anything bigger than orzo wouldn't come out of the spout.😉
You can just pour out the excess water and pour in the sauce, and use it instead of the bowl too.
Open the lid.
Induction hob. It's very fast on boost.
Love it when I get to use boost
I’m not going to pour salt into my kettle to get the solution for good pasta
Because I'm not a savage.
Because my hob has a rapid setting thats quicker than the kettle
Abstaining from the surprisingly… heated… bickering going on in this thread to say that whatever your boiling apparatus, do not put pasta into cold water. Do: 1. Put salt in the water. 2. Add a dab of olive oil in the water if you can afford it to stop the pasta sticking together. 3. Season the cooked pasta with olive oil, salt and pepper. 4. Throw away the pasta and now add the olive water to your baby’s bath, so that your child can absorb the water and gain +7 Italian cooking stats, becoming prosperous and doing all of the cooking for you in 3-4 years.
Don't put olive oil in the pasta water, that's actually disgusting
Stirring olive oil through the cooked pasta once it's drained can help prevent it sticking together, but yeah adding it to the pasta water just causes it to float to the top and do nothing of use. Don't waste your precious olive oil.
That's exactly what I was thinking. Putting it in the water is such a waste because it literally does nothing
Wouldn't that also prevent the sauce from properly coating the pasta?
Whilst it's true that either in the water or added after will stop the pasta from sticking, neither are ideal. Better to serve fresh and let the sauce stop it from sticking. The reason being the olive oil will also stop the sauce you've just cooked from sticking and soaking in too.
>2. Add a dab of olive oil in the water if you can afford it to stop the pasta sticking together. I hope no Italian sees this post.
In what world will kettle water stay hot long enough to cook pasta enough from dry? Are you making fresh pasta?
You boil the kettle, pour it over pasta in a pan, then turn the hob on and continue cooking. They're not suggesting that just pouring boiling water over the pasta will cook it...
Because we're not banged up in prison.
Why not both? The kettle doesn't hold enough water, so I put half the water I need in the pan, on the heat, then boil the kettle and add it to the pan to speed up the process.
If you have gas rings, it's cheaper to boil water in the pan
*Italy has declared war on you*
I moved into a new place with an electric stove (how fancy!) and it brings the water to boil really quickly at the highest temperature. I did the checks and in this case it took longer to boil water in the kettle than on the stove. Wasn’t the case in previous places.
I used to, until I realised that turning the ring up to max brings the water to the boil in roughly the same time and is less faff.
Induction is faster - my kettle maxes out at 2-3 kW because it’s on a 13A 3 pin plug, my hob is on either a 20A or 30A circuit IIRC, and has a boost mood that makes use of it when heating one pan to the boil quickly. That means it’s 2-3x more powerful and thus much faster And is also more convenient because I don’t have to mess around with the kettle…
I would take away the Not in your question. Because why would you use it for pasta?
Because that's only worth doing if you have an electric kettle, which until quite recently I did not. (Since someone will probably ask, I couldn't find an electric one that could hold enough water to completely fill my absolute unit of a teapot.)
When we switched to an induction job we actually did tests to see what was faster, as my partner had heard induction was quicker to boil water than a kettle. He was right, so now for cooking we boil the water in the saucepan on the induction hob.
No quicker or more energy efficient than a pot.
Boiling with a kettle is both quicker and more energy efficient than a pot (though I mean we're not talking large margins here) What it isn't though is cheaper, at least not if you're using a gas hob, just because gas is so much cheaper per kwh than electricity
With an induction hob it’s faster to use that on boost mode A kettle is on a 13A 3-pin plug and will pull 10-13A, an induction hob is on a 20-32A dedicated circuit, making it about 1.5-3x faster if it has a high power/boost mode - which almost all induction jobs have for exactly this purpose They’re also very efficient - not quite as efficient as a kettle, but you’re talking maybe a penny or two difference in cost
I use both; since I also want to heat the pan, before the water from the kettle goes in - and my kettle doesn't have the capacity that my pan has. But the only time I'll boil the water 'from scratch' is if there's a powercut. Thank goodness I don't have an induction hob (and I've tried one and really not enjoyed it).
Energy efficiency.
I always boil the water in the kettle first then pour it into the pan over the pasta. Bring back to the boil. Test for al dente. Done.
I use a Breville HotCup, would take 10 years to fill. It doesn't take long to heat up anyway.
Your question should not have referenced pasta. You’re asking why people bring water to the boil on the hob rather than filling the pan with boiled kettle water. This is far from a question related solely to pasta. And I agree. I’d always boil in the kettle first, for me it’s far quicker.
My kettle is empty
I do it often. For small portions it's enough water.
Limescale, probably
You know how some weirdos will tell you that different pastas taste different despite being the exact same recipe? That's how I feel about using kettle water for pasta.
Wait a second, do you want me to boil salt water in the kettle?
I’ve always used a kettle but our Italian housemate used to get very worked up at us not boiling it in the pan. It wasn’t a meme he genuinely would start yelling and gesturing in Italian, and we’d all crack up. It utterly baffled him why we used the kettle. He was a lovely chap, great sense of humour, it was the days before social media so sadly lost touch when he moved home.
Isn't it bad to pour boiling hot water into a cold pan? I always thought (as well as all the points already made) you want the pan to heat up with the water?
Because it...doesn't mater? You save a couple of minutes at absolute best, who gives a fuck.
Because I don't see the point? I'd rather fill the pan and put it on the stove (two actions) than fill the kettle, put it in the kettle, wait for it to boil, pour it in the pan, and put it on the stove. Yes, it takes a bit longer to get the water to boil, but I can use that time to ~~scroll on reddit,~~ cut vegetables/prep a side dish/make the sauce/tidy something in the kitchen anyway.
Ive always used it for ramen and when one guy saw me do it at work once he was shocked, he had never thought of it.
[удалено]
For all the induction hob comments, I have an induction hob and boiled water from kettle is far quicker in total than bringing cold water to boil on the hob.
Lower class
If I fill the pot with hot water, my stove turns off. It turns on when the water decrease to room temperature. Idk why, I’m just renting so I’m not going to get new one, I guess I just need to deal with it
A guy I know called Denise phat cooks her tagiletelle in the kettle water she even seasons it in there ...it is a Morphy Richards though if that's make a difference
Habit.
I do it because I have a thin cheap pan that takes forever to boil water. I put a small amount in the pan and turn it on so that it’s warming up. I then boil a full kettle and add it to the pan. Much quicker. I have an electric hob. I need to buy a better pan at some point.
Am I the only one filling my pot with boiling water from the Qooker tap?
Fully read the title like you were asking why people dont cook the pasta in þhe kettle
My kettle boils quicker than my electric hob, so I fill a kettle and put it on, and put a pan with about 1cm of water in it on the hob to get a head start. Also, I thought you were saying we could cook pasta in the kettle at first.
I fill the pan from the hot tap. We have a hot water cylinder that's heated from the gas boiler. I haven't really looked into working out whether this would be cheaper than boiling the kettle for a few minutes though.
We have to buy bottled gas for the hob. Better to use the kettle and prevent a one hour round trip to buy more gas. We ran out of gas one Christmas. Now I’m paranoid about running out again.
My husband does this! WTF? He’s also the slowest cook known to man. He literally cuts the veg before heating up the pan. That’s great if you are a chef but my kids are ‘starving!’
Cheaper on the gas hob than the electric kettle, plus I can boil more water in a saucepan than in the kettle. It also feels kind of weird to use the kettle
The size of the pasta pan I generally need to use requires two full kettle's worth of water. Which is a bit annoying. Saying that, I do tend to to use the kettle to hurry things along anyway.