Simmer Burners--What's the Big Deal?
15 years ago
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Simmering Culinarian(, batman)! [photo heavy - ignore if on dialu
Comments (150)After cooking on and adjusting my CC for the past four months or so I think I have come to the conclusion, as others have, that you will never get a CC with its current burner configuration to get low enough for most of us regardless of how you adjust the "Simmer" screw or igniters. I am not going to get hung up on the "Book" definition of "Simmer". Why would I make such a bold statement? The CC burner has 92 ports or holes � 36 in the outer ring (39%), 36 in the middle ring (39%) and 20 (22%) in the inner ring. Let�s ASSUME for the sake of the discussion that all of the ports are the same and the output is equally divided between the 92 ports at all settings. Now look at the picture below: As posted at the start of this thread this is how one of my burners is adjusted � no flame in the outer ring and no "Clicking". If you follow my calculations above this means this burner is operating at 61% of the burners total capacity and much lower than most of the burners shown on this thread. This week end I cooked two pot roasts at the same time on the CC. One was in a 6 � qt Lodge enameled, cast iron pot and the other in a 13" aluminum oval roaster. Both had a 3 to 4 pound roast, broth, veggies, etc. On "Simmer" this burner produced a temperature of 205F with more bubbles that I would call a low simmer and the other burner was 207F with bubbles. I believe the 92 or 56 ports (the inner and middle rings) will never be able to be adjusted to produce a low enough Btu output to satisfy the average cook. This is why myself and several others believe that CC will ultimately have to redesign the burner to something like a single 20 port ring (like the inner ring on the current burner) with the appropriate office and air shutter to achieve a true "Low Simmer". I would to see Mr. Kalsi and Capital produce a burner that had a range of something like 100 Btu to 23,000 Btu, but I don�t think it can be done and I know the current burner is no that adjustable. Side Note: Has any manufacturer ever published the Btu output of its burners at its lowest setting? If they have I surly have not been able to find it. All they publish is the MAXIMUM output and I have no idea what the lowest setting is when expressed as a percentage of the maximum....See MoreCulinarian - Some Service Guys Adjust the Simmer Too High
Comments (72)breezygirl, That's a great question for the factory. The CC installation instructions are TERRIBLE wit respect to the regulator and gas pressure and their role in the installation. I've also wondered about the role of the regulator in all of this because I assume the factory adjustments are made a certain gas pressure. Without the regulator attached (or with the regulator attached but adjusted to a different pressure) the gas pressure on the CC at home will be different from the gas pressure on the CC as adjusted at the factory. I don't know how sensitive the CC adjustments are to gas pressure -- they may not be sensitive at all or they may be sensitive depending on the gas pathway design in the CC. Perhaps more relevant to us is *how sensitive is the CC simmer setting made at the factory to a different gas pressure as used in the home*? Again, this may or may not be an issue, but I think you should call the factory about your installation without the regulator. There is some possibility this is a building code and safety issue as well... Thanks for your comment and please report back. Billy...See MoreSimmer question
Comments (11)I believe I can shed some light on the subject of rating a simmer burner by degrees vs. BTUs. I work for Monogram and we also have dual stacked burners on our cooktops which are rated at 140 degrees. When it comes to simmering, temperature really is the best way to measure performance. While BTUs measure output, there are other factors involved in determining how much heat is delivered to your food. These factors include the diameter of the burner and the distance between the burner and the top of the grates. For example, if you had a 500 btu burner that was the size of the tip of a pen, it would be a very hot burner that would not be well suited for simmering. On the other hand, you could have a 20,000 btu burner that might make a great simmer burner if the grates were say 2 feet above the burner. When dealing with a delicate sauce, it's excessive temperature, not BTUs, that will make it break. That is why Monogram and DCS rate their burners by temperature instead of BTUs. In fact, Wolf rated their stacked burners by temp (approx 200 degrees) instead of BTUs for a while but went back to BTUs for some reason. So why 140 degrees? Some bacteria can live or potentially grow at temperatures below 140 degrees. How is the temperature measured? I don't know the exact testing method but I believe a certain amount of sauce (marinara I think) is placed in a pot and simmered for a specified amount of time (an hour maybe). A thermometer is then inserted to measure the temperature of the sauce. If the sauce is 140 degrees, the burner is rated at 140. All of the cooktops mentioned above are fine products. I can tell you that the all of the burners on the Monogram ZGU385 (36") and ZGU384 (30") cooktops are rated at 140 degrees. This means you are not confined to simmering on 1 or 2 dedicated simmer burners. The ZGU385 was introduced last year and replaced the ZGU375 cooktop which was rated #1 by Consumer Reports 4 years in a row. I hope you enjoy whichever cooktop you choose....See MoreYIKES! Sodium in foods a major big deal!
Comments (10)You're certainly right to be concerned if sodium is a problem for you. But it needs to be remembered that only 5-10% of the population actually IS sodium sensitive. Drs always tell everyone diagnosed with high BP to avoid as much sodium as possible. I was put on meds for high bp 20+ years ago, and also avoided sodium for years, hating how bland food was, then learned that it's only a small percentage who will have a problem with it. I've gone back to using as much salt as I please. Was just at the drs on Wed--BP was 120/72--not bad for an old gal like me! There are, of course, other medical conditions where sodium needs to be avoided, but it's time for drs to be honest with us about who needs to avoid it in the case of high bp--not all do. Cooking from scratch from fresh ingredients (which I do a lot) is a good way to reduce a lot of the sodium added to processed foods. It's the 'across the board' suggestion that makes the most sense, really. But you know what really gets me about sodium use? We are being told to all avoid it, pretty much, right? And yet sodium is now being wholesaled in stuff where it really doesn't belong--what about all the sea-salted desserts, candies, goodies out there these days? And bacon--turning up in desserts, under chocolate, etc? This post was edited by azzalea on Sat, Feb 16, 13 at 9:25...See More- 15 years ago
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