Cookware for induction cookers: how to choose and use?

The appear­ance of a new type of cook­er with an inno­v­a­tive induc­tion cook­ing mech­a­nism has aroused increased inter­est among house­wives, espe­cial­ly since they are eco­nom­i­cal in terms of elec­tric­i­ty con­sump­tion. Among the many ques­tions relat­ed to the fea­tures of induc­tion cook­ers, one of the most impor­tant is what kind of cook­ware is suit­able for cook­ing?

The main characteristics of dishes

The main thing to con­sid­er when using a new stove is to under­stand what char­ac­ter­is­tic qual­i­ties should be inher­ent in the dish­es that will be used on it.

The pri­ma­ry require­ment is the pres­ence of fer­ro­mag­net­ic prop­er­ties in the raw mate­ri­als from which the bot­tom of the dish is made. To deter­mine the suit­abil­i­ty of dish­es, you should lis­ten to the fol­low­ing rec­om­men­da­tions:

1. Take note of the main points of the instruc­tions for using cook­ware on stoves with an induc­tion heat­ing mech­a­nism.
2. With the help of a mag­net, which should be attract­ed to the bot­tom of the dish, it can be con­clud­ed that such dish­es are suit­able for use.
3. On the wall of the dish­es there may be a mark — “induk­tion”, which allows using it on the stoves of the type in ques­tion. Some­times man­u­fac­tur­ers leave a spe­cial icon in the form of a twist­ed spi­ral on the dish­es.

This video, pre­sent­ed to your atten­tion, describes prac­ti­cal tips on how to choose the right cook­ware for an induc­tion cook­er — what prop­er­ties and char­ac­ter­is­tics it should have.

The principle of operation of the induction hob

The mech­a­nism of oper­a­tion of the device has unique fea­tures, which con­sist in heat­ing only the dish­es and the food con­tained in it, and the sur­face of the stove remains cold. This fact allows you to cook food in a safe envi­ron­ment.

Heat­ing occurs due to the influ­ence of elec­tro­mag­net­ic waves. The heat­ing ele­ment, unlike gas burn­ers or an elec­tric coil, is a coil that is a source of a high-fre­quen­cy mag­net­ic field. Induc­tion cur­rent in con­tact with a fer­ro­mag­net­ic field sets the elec­trons in motion. And thus, there is heat­ing.

The new type of heat­ing device has a num­ber of obvi­ous advan­tages: min­i­mal pow­er con­sump­tion, a sig­nif­i­cant reduc­tion in cook­ing time. How­ev­er, many house­wives are in no hur­ry to switch to an induc­tion cook­er, fear­ing prob­lems asso­ci­at­ed with the require­ments for dish­es.

Indeed, it is rec­om­mend­ed to use only the one that cor­re­sponds to the para­me­ters spec­i­fied in the instruc­tions. But you should not think about the prob­lems, because they are all eas­i­ly solved, you just have to take a clos­er look at the wise advice of pro­fes­sion­als.

Requirements for the condition of the bottom of the dishes

The pri­ma­ry con­di­tion is a thick­ened bot­tom. This con­di­tion is due to the fact that under the influ­ence of increased heat trans­fer of the plate, a thin mate­r­i­al may under­go defor­ma­tion. The bot­tom will become uneven, which will lead to insta­bil­i­ty on the sur­face of the plate, as well as uneven dis­tri­b­u­tion of heat. An uneven bot­tom will also cause unpleas­ant sounds that will come from the stove dur­ing cook­ing.

Mate­r­i­alwhich was used in the man­u­fac­ture of the bot­tom, can be as fol­lows:

• enam­el;
• steel;
• cast iron;
• high-qual­i­ty met­als with fer­ro­mag­net­ic prop­er­ties.

Often man­u­fac­tur­ers use alu­minum as a mate­r­i­al for the man­u­fac­ture of induc­tion cook­ware, but such kitchen uten­sils nec­es­sar­i­ly have an induc­tion bot­tom.

Is enamelware suitable?

Many house­wives have cho­sen enam­eled dish­es. It is visu­al­ly attrac­tive and easy to use, it is easy to wash and clean. In this regard, the ques­tion of whether it is pos­si­ble to cook in it on an induc­tion hob is quite rea­son­able.

The answer is com­fort­ing. As it turned out, enam­eled pans can be used, but on con­di­tion that the enam­el is applied to a lay­er of iron that can be mag­ne­tized.

Kitchen items made of ceramics, glass, aluminum and stainless steel

Man­u­fac­tur­ers are try­ing very hard to meet the needs of mod­ern house­wives, cre­at­ing unique sam­ples of kitchen uten­sils. It can be ceram­ic pots, saucepans or fry­ing pans with a mag­ne­tized bot­tom. The com­bi­na­tion of dif­fer­ent mate­ri­als, first­ly, makes the dish­es styl­ish, they can be a great addi­tion to the kitchen inte­ri­or. Sec­ond­ly, it is easy to keep clean. Food cooked in it stays warm and tasty for a long time.

There is also glass­ware with met­al bot­tom. Most often, teapots or bra­ziers are made from glass, less often — pots. Aes­thet­ic appear­ance is one of the impor­tant advan­tages. For exam­ple, a glass teapot goes well with a Plex­i­glas tea set.

Light­weight, prac­ti­cal, cheap­er than the types list­ed above, alu­minum uten­sils with a steel bot­tom are also suc­cess­ful­ly used on mod­ern stoves with an induc­tion heat­ing mech­a­nism.

cop­per uten­sils also no excep­tion, it must also be equipped with a fer­ro­mag­net­ic bot­tom.

Buy­ing a pot from of stain­less steel, it must be tak­en into account that this mate­r­i­al does not always have fer­ro­mag­net­ic qual­i­ties. It is nec­es­sary to con­sid­er the pres­ence of mark­ings, ask the sell­er or check it your­self with a piece of mag­net.

Steel uten­sils It has antiox­i­dant prop­er­ties that keep food fresh for a long time. It is light­weight, com­fort­able, prac­ti­cal and durable. In addi­tion, it has an aes­thet­ic appear­ance.

It is nec­es­sary to choose a pan made of steel very care­ful­ly so that there is no nick­el in the com­po­si­tion of the alloy. Food cooked in it may con­tain aller­gens.

You can choose any of the named types of dish­es, but in order for it to last as long as pos­si­ble, you should strict­ly fol­low the rec­om­men­da­tions for car­ing for it.

Is cast iron suitable?

As for cast iron cook­ware, it is quite suit­able for cook­ing on an induc­tion hob, but it is desir­able to select a per­fect­ly smooth bot­tom. Oth­er­wise, irreg­u­lar­i­ties may dam­age the glass-ceram­ic plate. Due to the fact that cast iron cook­ware has an impres­sive weight and not always a per­fect­ly smooth sur­face, it should be han­dled with extreme care so as not to dam­age the glass-ceram­ic lay­er of the induc­tion hob.

Despite the exist­ing pre­cau­tions, you should not refuse cast iron cook­ware. After all, it is in such dish­es that the most deli­cious dish­es are obtained. In addi­tion, they remain warm for a long time and retain their use­ful and taste qual­i­ties as much as pos­si­ble.

It is worth giv­ing pref­er­ence to cast iron cook­ware with an enam­eled lay­er, with­out which cast iron is not immune from cor­ro­sion, which can ruin its visu­al appeal.

Care Tips

We must agree that spe­cial uten­sils for induc­tion pan­els require par­tic­u­lar­ly del­i­cate han­dling and adher­ence to use­ful rec­om­men­da­tions:

1. Use only gen­tle deter­gents that do not con­tain abra­sive com­po­nents.
2. After wash­ing, wipe with a dry cloth to remove stains.
3. It is unde­sir­able to keep a fry­ing pan with­out food on the burn­er for a long time, this can ruin the integri­ty of the non-stick coat­ing.
4. To pre­vent crack­ing of the sur­face lay­er, do not start clean­ing the dish­es until they have com­plete­ly cooled down.
5. It is bet­ter to wash the dish­es imme­di­ate­ly after cook­ing (as soon as it cools down), then you will not have to exert addi­tion­al efforts that destroy the sur­face.

Do not think that you will have to spend too much time in han­dling spe­cial kitchen uten­sils. This is exclud­ed, because food prac­ti­cal­ly does not burn on such stoves.

Which manufacturers have the best cookware?

Ital­ian man­u­fac­tur­er Risoli cre­ates bud­get sam­ples of alu­minum dish­es worth from 3,000 rubles.

Com­pa­ny Tefal pro­duces all types of cook­ware for induc­tion cook­ers (from 3,000 rubles).

Ger­man com­pa­ny Fissler pro­duces expen­sive, but high-qual­i­ty prod­ucts (from 6,000 rubles). The range includes:

• pots;
• pans;
• bra­ziers;
• saucepans;
• teapots.

Firm Woll (Ger­many) also pro­duces expen­sive table­ware. High-qual­i­ty raw mate­ri­als with a non-stick coat­ing made of tita­ni­um-ceram­ic are used (from 6,500 rubles).

Finnish com­pa­ny Hack­man pro­duces cast-iron kitchen uten­sils for use on induc­tion pan­els (from 6,500 rubles).

Ceram­ic and high-qual­i­ty steel uten­sils are pro­duced by the com­pa­ny Cristel (France), which costs from 7,300 rubles.

Alu­minum uten­sils are pro­duced by the man­u­fac­tur­ing com­pa­ny Swiss Dia­mond. It is cov­ered with a reli­able non-stick crys­talline lay­er (from 8,000 rubles).

Is it possible to do without special dishes?

There is a way out that will allow you not to wor­ry about pur­chas­ing spe­cial dish­es. How­ev­er, you still have to bear the cost of buy­ing a spe­cial device — an adapter. It is a stand that plays the role of an adapter. It allows you to use cook­ware with­out spe­cial fer­ro­mag­net­ic prop­er­ties.

There are sev­er­al com­pelling argu­ments for decid­ing in favor of an induc­tion cook­er. First, con­ve­nience, safe­ty and econ­o­my. Sec­ond­ly, if the house does not have suit­able dish­es, it is not nec­es­sary to say good­bye to the old one and pur­chase a new one, you can get an adapter. Third­ly, do not wor­ry if a pot or pan with­out a fer­ro­mag­net­ic prop­er­ty acci­den­tal­ly appears on the stove. The mech­a­nism of the stove sim­ply does not work, she “does not see” such dish­es.

Based on this, it is easy to draw the right con­clu­sion: the induc­tion cook­er is a mod­ern inven­tion designed to alle­vi­ate the lot of the host­ess and help save the fam­i­ly bud­get.

The com­plex­i­ty of choos­ing dish­es for this appli­ance lies in the rich assort­ment, but this is more like­ly not a prob­lem, but a bless­ing. One has only to remem­ber a few basic rec­om­men­da­tions and buy dish­es that would suit both the stove and the finan­cial capa­bil­i­ties of the host­ess.