GE Profile CleanDesign PHP960
16 February 2010
“Ain’t No Evolution”
An induction cooktop has so many advantages that it’s hard to know where to begin. Perhaps we should begin with what is normally the end, namely the cleanup, because that is a feature I find myself especially appreciating about them. I have never actually been blessed with one of these in my own home, which means that I have always used the conventional stove kitchen range, which means electric or gas, but the setup is essentially the same for both of them. There’s a burner, and around the burner that here is a flash pan of some sort, which is where all the cooking grease and any kind of spill ends up accumulating. And then, life being what it is, a body normally does not wipe down the stove after every use.
Oh, when you first get that brand-new stove, you tell yourself you will wipe it down after every use, and maybe for a month or two you really do it, but then life intervenes: kids, spouse, drop-in guests, hurried meals, one thing after another, and suddenly those good intentions are gone and all that is left is various food spills baking themselves into a kind of material that, honest to goodness, should really be incorporated into some kind of enamel paint. I mean, really now, once that stuff goes down, it’s hell to get it off the stove, right? I guess the only saving grace such a mess has is the feeling of satisfaction one derives from occasionally breaking out the cleanser can and going to work on it. But, hey, what I wouldn’t give for a stovetop where that sort of thing simply was not necessary. And so with that, and whatever trumpet fanfare we can arrange, we can introduce the subject of today’s blog, the GE Profile CleanDesign PHP960 36″ Induction Cooktop. Before I can talk about this cooktop, though, I first have to talk about the fact that it’s an induction cooktop, because that is a large part of the difference it makes in a kitchen.
Like everything else in life, there are pluses and minuses to using an induction cooktop. The minus is that aluminum cookware will not work on it. The elements beneath the cooking surface produce a magnetic field that causes the electrons in the ferrous metal pan to vibrate and produce heat, so only steel or iron will do for this. It also will not work with woks or with pans that do not have flat bottoms, because the pans have to be in contact with the cooking surface. The plus, though, is that for the pans it works well with, man, does it work well with them! Heat is produced in the cooking pan, and it cannot be generated until a pan is actually placed on the cooking surface. I’m told that you can bring a pan of water to boil in ninety seconds, which is probably at least twice as fast as using a blow torch! And the other really important feature is this: the cooking surface itself does not heat.
I have seen demonstrations in which they cut a frying pan in half and put it on a burner, then deliberately drop an egg on it so that half is in the pan and half is on the burner. The egg in the pan cooks, the egg on the rest of the stovetop is still raw! Man, think of the possibilities for a cleanup after the cooking is done.
The PHP960 has a large 11″ Element that generates 3700 watts on High Setting and a number of safety features, including Control Lock Capacity, which is important for those with small children, and a “pan detect” that detects when a burner element is left “on” and automatically shuts it off when not in use. It also has electronic touch controls that replace the traditional knob controls with digital buttons that are precise and easy to use and clean.
And that brings us back to where we started, because with a cooktop like this, wiping it down after use would be no more of a chore than wiping down the kitchen counter, and with a smoothtop design like this, it really is pretty much part of the counter itself. This GE Profile PHP960 is more than a CleanDesign now; it’s a revolution.
Joseph
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