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The following information is provided
courtesy of The Catering Equipment Suppliers Association.
Understanding Cooking Ranges
The cooking
range is the traditional heart of a kitchen. There is little
that can’t be cooked in one. There are four types of cooking
range.
Open top
burners
Open top
cooking ranges are either gas burners or electric radiants with
an oven underneath. The most common configuration is for either
four or six burners or radiants, but a greater number of burners
or radiants are available for very busy kitchens. Their big
advantage is fuel efficiency, since almost all of the heat is
directed at the cooking pan and not into the kitchen
environment. Direct contact with the heat source also means pans
can be heated very quickly.
Key points to
look for when buying a range include at least one burner or
radiant that is more powerful than the others for fast boiling
or heating large pans. Also look for ease of cleaning as ranges
get very dirty. Ensure you buy a model with a build
specification rugged enough to meet the demands of the kitchen
and check for availability of spare parts.
Solid Tops
These have
a solid cast iron top heated underneath either by strategically
placed gas jets or electric elements. They will have an oven
underneath the same as an open burner range. Their advantage is
that size for size, they can accommodate more pans than an open
burner range and pans can be moved around from fierce direct
heat to a cooler part of the top. Can be wasteful on energy
where there are unused areas of the top being heated.
Key points to look for on a solid top include seeing if it just
part of the top can witched on when just a few pans are cooking
to save energy and has the stove got a rapid heat point for fast
boiling?
Boiling tables
The top is
exactly the same as a standard cooking range, but with a boiling
table there is no oven below. This is useful for reducing
purchase cost when there is already sufficient oven capacity in
the kitchen. The space below is also a convenient storage area
for pans.
Island Suites
These combine
a cooking range with other prime cooking units such as a
salamander grill, deep-fat fryer, pasta boiler, griddle and char
grill. Their reputation is for withstanding the most punishing
of cooking demands in busy kitchens. The closeness of cooking
functions saves on space and allows chefs to control several
cooking functions close to hand. While they are mostly an
“island” situated in the centre of a kitchen allowing chefs to
work from both sides of the range, they can be wall-facing so
that all the cooking stations are in a line. There are two types
of island suites.
Modular Island Suites
This system
is usually bespoke in construction, with the individual cooking
units that a kitchen needs bonded together to for a seamless
unit. There is a wide range of options which can include a
burner range, a solid top, fryers, pasta cookers griddles,
ovens, griddles, grills, char-grills, induction hobs – in fact
any type of prime cooking process.
One-piece island suites
These are
usually built as a solid cooking suite in the factory and as
well as off-the-shelf configurations, bespoke units can be built
to order. Since these
are modelled
on the
classic
tradition of island suites, they tend to stay with dry heat as a
cooking medium rather than offering fryers and water-based
cookers as part of the configuration.
Look After
It!
All
professional catering equipment is engineered to take hard use
and to be easy to use, but there are few items as simple to
operate and look after as the cooking range. There is just one
golden rule to keep performance high and unnecessary maintenance
costs low – keep it clean.
With gas
fired cooking ranges, there will be high performance burners
designed to deliver the maximum energy efficiency conversion
from the gas to the heat output. Gas burners almost always
operate on a star system with mini jets of flame shooting out of
the burner in a circle.
The way
burners are designed is that the hottest part of the flame is
just beyond the deep blue core of the flame. To burn at maximum
efficiency the gas needs to be mixed with air which will come
through a vent in the gas burner delivery pipe. The efficiency
of a cooking range burner assumes that the burners and the air
vents are clean and not obstructed by food debris.
In a busy
kitchen, food spillage on the cooking range is inevitable. When
food falls into a gas burner it immediately burns, turns to
carbon and blocks one or more of the jets, either completely or
partially. This disrupts the gas flow and the mix of air and gas
and causes energy conversion inefficiency. Cooking is slower and
more costly.
Any major
spillages on gas jets should be cleaned immediately, minor
spillages should be cleaned at the end of shift. A useful tip
for gas cooking ranges is to have tin foil spread underneath the
burners so spillages can be binned and wiping down made easier.
Cleaning
behind and underneath cooking ranges is as important cleaning
the surface. Having a cooker on castors with a flexible gas
connection hose makes this easy, a point to consider when buying
a cooking range.
Most cooking
ranges have an oven underneath and the same cleaning principles
surrounding spillages and gas burner efficiency apply. What is
common to both electric and gas cooking range ovens is that door
abuse costs money.
Doors need
closing firmly, not slamming, which will give premature hinge
and closing fastener damage. If the oven door is pull-down
rather than side opening, there is an additional damage risk if
the drop-down door is used as a step to reach shelves above the
range. Where the cooking range is part of an island suite and
cooking utensils are stored above the unit, it is a too common
practice by chefs to use the drop-down oven door as a
stepladder.
Electric hob
cooking ranges are built around stainless steel surfaces. The
hobs will burn off any food spillage, but other spillage will
drip onto the stainless steel top. Stainless steel used in
cooking range construction is tough and polished to make
cleaning easy. Scrubbing burned-on food debris with hard wire
scrubbers will damage the surface of the stainless steel and
lead to harder work to keep the stainless steel clean. It is
better to use a professional detergent spray formulated for
cleaning cookers and a recommended cleaning pad.
When a
service engineer calls for scheduled routine maintenance part of
the service call will be ensuring that the oven cavity and the
burners are clean. The engineer will do this, but the cost will
far higher than if the kitchen staff had done the cleaning
first.
The cooking
range may be simple to use and work with, but needs the same
level of operational care as any other item of prime cooking
equipment.
In brief
Do
Clean any
spilt food from a range immediately
Ensure gas burner jets are not clogged
Clean pan supports weekly
Putting sheets of tin foil under the gas burners makes cleaning
easier
Clean oven cavities weekly
Don’t
Use harsh
abrasives on stainless steel
Stand on drop-down doors
Have pans too near the edge of the range
Slam oven doors
Leave jets turned on when there is no cooking
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