Oh how neat!! I suppose it is electric?

Yep. Our house is all-electric and it was a very deliberate choice to not put any gas in our home.

Our decision to have an all-electric home was not an easy one, but based on past experiences (including a leaking heater that exploded and burned DH) with both natural gas and propane gas, it felt like the right decision for us, and one we've never regretted.

Luckily, we have a great electric co-op that keeps are rates pretty low. Electricity rates where we used to live in Texas have at least doubled since we moved here, but our rates here are virtually unchanged these last 9 years. And, we do have a propane grill out on the patio, which is about as close as gas will ever get to our house.

I can't wait to try out the dehydrate feature on the stove.

Dawn

Dawn, I have toyed with going all-electric myself, but I've always wondered if canning would be an issue on an electric stove. Do you do much canning and is it as difficult as I have been led to believe?

That's neat that the convection oven will dehydrate things. You can also make your own yogurt, then. I used to work with a woman who said she would never use anything other than a convection oven. She was on her second one, having worn out the first one!

I have always done quite a bit of canning at peak times and I haven't had it cause any burner problems or anything, but then I don't can CONSTANTLY like some of the folks on the Harvest Forum do.

On the old stove, it is only the oven that has gone out, so we are going to hang on to it a while....just put it out in the garage/barn. I am not sure about canning on the new stove, and need to do some research (and quickly!). I've thought about getting a big turkey fryer and using it to do my canning....lots of people do that so they can do the canning outside and avoid heating up the house.

Speaking of not heating up the house.....one of our neighbors lives in a home his relatives built in 1912. I love that old house! The kitchen is so large you could live in it alone! They have a separate "summer kitchen" about 60' from the main house, and it is the only home around here with a summer kitchen still standing, although I don't think they've used it as a summer kitchen in many years. I'd love to have a summer kitchen.

I AM real excited about the convection oven. We never would have spent the money to get a stove this fancy at regular retail prices (living on one income, we've learned to be pretty thrifty). Getting it at the outlet store, though, saved us about 30% and it was brand new--not used/returned/repaired like some of them are (described on their tags as "reconditioned"). It had "damage".....a scratch on the side that you won't see because that side sits next to a wall, so it was a terrific deal. That scratch was the only thing "wrong" with it, and I can't believe a 4" long scratch saved us hundreds of dollars.

I suspect the new stove is smarter than all of us humans. For example, I can set it on the convection mode and tell it I am going to bake a cake at 375 degrees (the temperature given on the cake recipe). The stove then will automatically adjust the temperature downward as needed since a convection oven cooks more quickly. I also could adjust it manually, but will just let the stove's brain figure it out! It also has a warming drawer which our older stove did not.

While we were at the Sears outlet store, I was drooling over some of the French Door refrigerators with the freezer compartment on the bottom. I also saw some new ultra-modern and gorgeous stainless steel freezers. Now, I don't need a new refrigerator or freezer yet, but I know what I do want when (and if) either one of them ever die.

Dawn

Dawn,

I'm all electric too. It was an intentional choice as well. Someone once ask me why I would intentionally pipe something into my home that could blow it up if I didn't have to. I laughed, but also realized he had a point. Still sometimes I kind of wish I had a gas cooktop, you don't ever see electric stoves on the cooking shows. We're rural electric as well so it hasn't been too bad for us either on the bill. When I picked out the stove for this house, I started to get a ceramic cooktop but the salesman at the builders warehouse said the only downfall was not being able to cook with pressure cookers on them. He said the coil type electric cooktop worked fine but the pressure cookers didn't do well on the completely flat surface of the ceramic ones. He didn't recommend them for people who intended to can anything. I don't know for sure if he knew what he was talking about, but he was a quite experienced older guy. That was also about 7 years ago, so technology might have improved, plus I was looking at middle market priced Maytags, not anything as nice as what you got. Congratulations BTW! My mother had a Sharp microwave/convection oven combo many many years ago. She loved the convection part especially for pies.

Jill

Hi Jill!

I agree that we did not want to pipe in gas that could blow up our house. Are the odds slim? Probably. But I knew a man who was killed when a natural gas leak under his house caused the house to blow up, and to this day I cannot forget what happened to him.

I did some research on using pressure cookers/canners on a ceramic-top stove and found mixed results. IF you have a smaller canner with a flat bottom, it can work. But, one feature of these stoves is that they self-regulate themselves and shut the burners off and turn them on again to keep the heat from exceeding a certain level. This isn't a problem in regular cooking, but can cause problems while canning.

Our BBQ grill has a gas burner that you can use to cook a side dish while grilling, and I think I probably will use it when canning. Some people on the Harvest Forum DO both pressure and water-bath canning on ceramic-top stoves, but others do not and will not. With some ceramic-top stoves, using a pressure cooker or canner can void the warranty, but I haven't read my manual yet to see if that is true with ours.

I think I probably will play it safe and not do any canning on the new stove since I could use the BBQ grill burner to do the same thing.

I am excited about the new stove and can't wait to try it as a dehydrator!

Dawn