Induction Hob

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earthwormgaz

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Does anyone else have one of these instead of gas? Are they any good for boiling a big pan of wort? Not even sure my pan will work on it. My kitchen is a dump so a new one is in order, and these are getting hype, however, it must work for ale brewing :)
 
I have one ( single 'ring' portable)but never got it to work consistently enough. I tried to use it with a 50L stainless pot.(maybe quality issue)

I am sure others have had better success.
 
I have an induction hob in the kitchen. We refitted our kitchen last year after having a gas hob (4 burner) for a decade. The new hob is the same size, but induction instead of gas.

Ours is a Bosch model, and it comes with a "boost" function on it where it can turbocharge a ring as long as you don't have the other ones on. I think that it basically turns it into a ~5kW ring. This boils a pan of water faster than our big gas burner ring on the old hob. One advantage of induction is that all the heat goes straight into the pot and doesn't escape up and around the sides like gas does.

It has 18 levels for each ring (0-9 with half step between each number) so it's just as adjustable as a gas ring (actually moreso because you can remember that "4.5" is Good simmer on the front ring the big pot that you just can't do with a turny knob).

My wife loved gas and was skeptical, but will never go back to gas now we've got induction. It's so much easier to clean. Nothing ever gets burnt on because the hob itself never gets heated directly, only the pans). And they come with timers so you can set a timer for each ring individually to turn off on your schedule (it also beeps) so you can leave things to simmer for an hour and then just leave it.

You'll need to make sure your pans are capable of working on induction. If a magnet sticks to the bottom it will probably work (though be careful because one of ours didn't work despite a magnet sticking to it - it was a steel pan with an aluminium base and a thin layer of steel on the bottom - it didn't work on induction). But to be honest, if you're spending a grand on a hob (and many many thousands on a new kitchen) then £50 for an induction pan is a pittance.

In short, induction will easily boil 50L of wort rapidly (even faster if you have a huge pan that goes over multiple elements or a "flex" zone like ours) and probably better then a gas hob. If your brewpot is 20-30 litres then it'll do it no problem - was faster than the 3kW elements you get in AIO 30L (or even 40L models). Check your pan. But they are so much easier to live with than gas that it's worth buying new pots!
 
We had an IKEA induction hob fitted early this year replacing an IKEA gas hob which had become quite mucky. I use it with a 15l pot, generally about 10l max, works perfect. The surface is ceramic(?) which is easy to clean. And it look sleeker than than the gas burners.
 
I have a 4 ring Smeg one and it boils a 17L pan full of wort fine, like AG said though if you want to use the boost function you have to make sure you're not using any of the other rings. Also for cooking you can't use all the rings at once. I guess most of them have built in timers too. With my one you can turn one ring into two and use it vertically for bigger pans etc. I haven't found a pan I can't use on it. Yet. 😅

If you do buy one I recommend this cleaner, it's amazing. Everything from that brand is amazing.

https://www.onbuy.com/gb/p/hg-hob-c...fuO4Udr810SuF1pUjzjKfRnHsm9gb3qBoCKXUQAvD_BwE
 
I have a portable (Buffalo) 3kW induction hob. Used with a 32L (8 US gallon) pot filled to 7g. Works well enough for me. You do need to ensure your pot is compatible with induction.
 
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