Powerful and fast is the best way I can describe the cooktop on GE’s new Induction Range. It is so incredible it even surpassed all my expectations. It boils water so fast you don’t even have time to get the food ready to go in before the lids rattling off the pot. Yet it heats so low that you can melt a large bar of chocolate directly in a pan without having to use a double boiler! It will have it melted and ready to use in 15 minutes, and you can leave it on for hours without worrying about it scorching. Now that’s versatility! And the temperature change response time is instant. You can take that pot of boiling water with the lid rattling and reduce the heat to simmer, and the water instantly stops boiling and goes to a gentle simmer in a second. I don’t mean in a few seconds. I mean right now! This thing blows gas away so bad it’s not even funny. I’ve used both gas and electric, and gas being the closest contender doesn’t even hold a candle to the power and speed of this induction cooktop. Now I can already hear the nay sayers out there saying no way, gas is the best. But seeing is believing. And this thing is truly amazing. That’s not all though. It has even more tricks.

I use both cast iron and tri-ply stainless steel cookware on it. The stainless cookware gets used directly on the glass cooktop, but I’m afraid to use the cast iron on it for fear of scratching it. So I place a paper towel between the cast iron and the cooktop. You read correctly. I’m cooking on paper towels! Since the cooktop doesn’t generate any heat at all, and the only heat the cooktop receives is the heat reflected back to the cooktop from the cooking utensil itself it doesn’t get hot enough to ignite the paper towel. Then when I’m done cooking I use the paper towel to clean up the cooktop. This is a cinch because the cooktop doesn’t get hot enough to burn anything on it anyway. Just a simple wipe with a damp paper towel or sponge and a quick sprits of window cleaner and the thing looks brand new again. I’ve found that a good streak free window cleaner works the best at keeping it looking new

The induction elements will make your cookware perform at the highest level it can. Since the utensil itself is the actual heating element instead of a wire coil or a ring of flame, there are absolutely no hot spots in the cooking utensil. As long as the utensil fits close to the size of the element circle, it will heat perfectly uniformly from edge to edge. The electro-magnetic energy field extends ½” beyond and above the element, so my 12″ cast iron or stainless steel skillet heats perfectly edge to edge on the 11″ element. And my 10 X 20″ reversible cast iron grill/griddle works too despite the fact that the rim holds it about ¼” above the cooktop. It still fits within the range that the electro-magnetic field will respond to. And yes, I cook with it on top of paper towels since it is cast iron. It cooks very well spanned across the two 8″ elements on the left side as long as you give it at least 15 minutes to warm up so the heat can spread out across it. The utensil size does not have to perfectly match the size of the element circle as the electro-magnet will automatically adjust to various sizes within a given range. And none of the element outside that range gets hot. Only the utensil gets hot. Think of it in the same way that a microwave gets only the food hot, the induction element gets only the cooking utensil hot. Not the food in the utensil or the cooktop itself, just the utensil. And in turn the heat of the utensil cooks the food that’s in it just like it does on any other cooktop. It’s just a microwave for your pots and pans! You can read all about how it works at this website: [...]. The 11″ element can be used on a utensil with a bottom diameter as small as 7″. The two 8″ elements can go as small as 5 ¾”, and the 6″ as small as 4 ¾”. You can also use a utensil larger than the element as well. I use a 14″ cast iron pizza pan as a griddle on the 11″ element and all but about the outer 1 ½” of the pan are evenly heated. The heat tapers off somewhat around the outer perimeter.

This thing is really built too. Weighing in at 240 pounds, it outweighs the Samsung induction range by 32 pounds and the Kenmore induction range by a whopping 50 pounds! We’re talking impressive build quality here. The stainless steel is a very nice quality and is easy to keep looking good.

The control panel is a one piece glass touch panel with no knobs. It responds very well to touch and is easy to use. There is a slight learning curve since you’re cooking by number instead of turning a knob. But I adapted quickly to it and don’t even think about it anymore. There are 19 steps from low to high for each element. All 4 induction elements are high power and have a “boost” cycle that makes them quite capable of boiling a pot of water very quickly. There is also a fifth element that is a warming burner. It’s…

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Stephen Kizewic “kiz1960″ (Toledo, OH United States) –

  

Wow all i can say is I have had this range since mid august! I had so much trouble with the Samsung induction model I bought in Janaury and was lucky enough to be able to return. I had done some searching for the GE range but could not find one that I could actually see so I settled for the Samsung at Lowes. Since it was being returned I knew that I had to find what I was going to replace it with. I again searched for the GE and finally found that Appliance Center had one. Went to see it and was sold immediately.

First of all this thing is built rock solid. It definetly is heavy for sure. I also love the way it cooks. I am also using paper towels under the pot every time I use the cooktop. Its amazing how this really works. No scratches on the surface. Still looks great. I definetly recommend using the paper towel method. I am also only using All Clad or Le creuset products for my cooking vessels.

The speed that the pan heats up is amazing. Very fast to say the least. Also when you turn the temp down its instantaneous as well. Different size pans fit on the burners also. I know they talk about the middle back burner being a warming one but I have put cold butter and cream for mashed potatoes and it has heated it right up from cold. The cooktop is very quiet. I know ther is a fan in there somewhere but its nearly undetectable to my ear. I love the fact that boil overs dont cook them selves to the cook top either. Dont have to stand there with a razor blade scraping away at my mess after it cools off.

The oven is gigantic also. Having had Thanksgiving this year I couldnt believe what I could fit in there. I had the turkey, sweet potatoes,stuffing, rolls and green beans all in there at the same time. That was truly amazing since I usually need another hot plate as well as my toaster oven to assist me in getting everything to the table on time. I put a thermometer to test the temperature and its nearly dead on so no need to adjust the temp for being off a little bit. The convection part is all I have used so far. The fan is so quiet as well. You can hear it for sure but its like a whisper! I also like how it compensates for the convection by lowering the temp by 25 degrees automatically.

I just used the self clean part of the oven on Sunday. It does take 5 hours to complete but I will say this there was really no smell like other self cleaning ovens when they are super heated up. When I opened it on Monday all I really had to do was wipe off the window from the inside. Everything else looked great and it was sure nice to not have to remove the racks from the oven.

I cant say enough about this range. It is really amazing and if you dont want to fool around with gas lines etc this is a really good alternative. I know its hard to believe but if the word gets out about induction everyone would have one its so efficient and easy to use.

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Jan Wolter (Ann Arbor, MI USA) –

  

I need to say out front that this is by far the best range I have ever used. The stove top heats amazingly fast. You’ll have to revise the way you do all your cooking, because you really can’t do much of anything “while you wait for the water to boil.” The convection oven does a great job of baking things at a uniform temperature, even when you put three baking sheets in at once. We wish our other kitchen appliances were half as good as this. Having said that, I’m going to spend the rest of this review griping about all the little things that annoy me about this thing, because, after all, shouldn’t it be perfect?

First, the manual is awful. They seem to have decided to write one manual for all their stoves. You’re supposed to pick out the bits that apply to your stove, except they aren’t all there. For example, there is lots of discussion of what kinds of pots you can use on glass cook tops, but nothing on what you can use on induction cook tops.

Speaking of which, it seems that the pots that work are cast iron, hideously expensive stainless steel custom made for induction cooking, and really cheap stainless steel. The only pots we had that worked on this were our cheapo Akia pots. Cheapo pots are clearly the way to go. Who needs a $100 stainless steel pot that says you shouldn’t scour it because you might ruin the finish. Is that a cooking pot or modern art?

The control panel is up behind the cooking surface, where kids can’t reach it (which is good or bad depending on the kids), and where you have to reach over boiling pots of water to touch the controls. The controls are labeled gray on black, so they are pretty much impossible to read in poor light, so you always have to turn the hood light on before you operate the controls. You’ll never learn the locations of the buttons because the controls for the four main burners are arranged in a weird asymmetrical way. It’s all push button control, so to change the temperature, you have to go pushity-pushity-pushity, or hold the button down for a while. Either way, much slower and clumsier than twisting a knob. To mitigate this, there are some shortcut buttons, asymmetrical again, with three burners having a button that sets the temp to 3, while the other has a button to set it to HIGH.

The black glass cook top has the burners dimly marked again in gray. Since the pots tend to slide around easily when you stir, they can easily drift off the center of the burner without you noticing. Once I had a metal measuring spoon that happened to land on the part of the burner beside the off center pot, and I was surprised to find it getting quite hot, because I hasn’t noticed it was on the burner. I suppose marking the burners more clearly wouldn’t be as sleek looking, but it’d be better.

One less obvious advantage of an induction stove is that that handles of pots usually don’t get hot. Since the base of the pot is being heated directly, there isn’t heat streaming up the sides of the pot, so the handles don’t get heated directly. They only way they get hot is by heat conducted through the pot, and most pots are designed to limit conduction of heat into the handles.

The cook top is very easy to clean, but there is a bit of a groove around the edges that take a bit more effort to clean.

Sometimes you get a weird buzzing noise when the induction is on. Probably this is harmless, but it can be disconcerting.

The oven seems to pre-heat a bit more slowly than other, non-convection, ovens we’ve owned. If that’s the price you have to pay for the consistent and uniform baking temperatures that it gives us, then that’s no bad deal.

So on the whole, a great range, well worth the high price if you cook a lot, but I personally would prefer if they’d focused a bit more on the practicality of the controls rather than a stylish look.

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