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(More customer reviews)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 a 120 watt electric radiant burner (not induction) with three settings, hi, med, and low. It is not designed to heat anything up, just to keep already hot things warm.
I haven't had much of a chance to use the oven yet, but from what little I've used it, it seems to work well. It has three heavy enamel coated racks that you can leave in the oven during self cleaning. That's a big plus because those big racks don't fit in the sink, so your only other option would be to wash them in the bathtub or take them outside. I've done it both ways with our old stove and neither is fun. So I'm happy I don't have to do that anymore with these. They also slide very easily in the oven too and there are six positions for them. This oven uses what is called True European Convection. Meaning that there is a third element around the fan itself. During convection cooking only this element is used and the fan blows and circulates heated air into the oven cavity. This particular system also reverses itself every 70 seconds which is supposed to aid greatly in the evenness of the temperature throughout the oven cavity. I have read that it works quite well so I can only assume great results when I really get a chance to use it. It also comes with a temperature probe that will come in quite handy when cooking whole birds, hams, and roasts. The convection fan is fairly quiet too. Much quieter than the one on my convection microwave. There's also a small fan in the cooktop that cycles on and off occasionally to keep the electronics in there cool. That too is very quiet and goes unnoticed quickly if even noticed at all. The kitchen has to be pretty quiet to hear it.
I have only had it a few weeks but so far I love it. The only problem I have had, if you can call it a problem, was trying to figure out a particular feature it has. If you own one of these or are going to buy one this may be of interest to you. If not interested, you may want to skip this and move on to the next paragraph. So here goes. I asked three different people at GE, the local rep, the email tech support, and the phone tech support and nobody had an answer for me, so I had to just figure it out myself. You see, the convection oven has a feature called "Convection Conversion". The user manual is written for many different models, but doesn't cover "convection conversion". It does however talk about "Auto Recipe Conversion" which is basically the same thing. They differ though in how the end result is executed. Both features when set to "on" are designed to automatically reduce the convection cooking temperature by 25 degrees since convection cooking is more efficient than conventional baking. This way you can just follow the standard temperature in a recipe, cook with convection and the temperature reduction is automatically taken care of for you. Sounds easy enough right? Well, according to the manual under "auto recipe conversion", (remember, there is no mention of "convection conversion") when you set say 350 deg and press start, you are supposed to see it say on the display, CON, 325 (the -25 deg thing) and then go to pre-heat. When it reaches 325 deg it will signal it's ready. But mine doesn't do that. If I set 350, there is no CON, 325. It just goes to pre-heat and signals it's ready at 350. So where's -25 deg's I'm supposed to be seeing? One GE rep said it was broken and wanted to schedule to have it fixed. I said no, I'll do some further checking myself before fixing something that may not be broke. The one at the store wasn't plugged in, so I couldn't see how that one worked either. So I decided to test it with my infrared thermometer since I don't have an oven thermometer to see if the actual temperature was 25 deg lower than indicated when convection conversion was set to on. Sure enough, with it set to 350 deg (and showing 350 deg on the display) it was actually 325 deg in the oven according to the infrared thermometer. When I turned the convection conversion off, the temp in the oven went all the way to 350 deg. Problem solved. And I prevented a repair man from tearing my new stove apart only to discover that it did the same exact thing again when he was done. Amazing that nobody at GE had the answer for me though. I guess this is a "new" feature that hasn't made it into the books yet, or anywhere else for that matter. Anyway, hopefully this has answered the question for someone else reading this that may be wondering the same thing too.
I am very happy I got this range. I had my heart set on getting the GE Café model because I really like the up-front controls and the pro look. But then I read the article in Consumer Reports on ranges and read about the induction cooktop. This induction range was about the same price as the GE Café model too. I had never even heard of induction before so I decided to do some research on it. Turns out induction has been around for about 30 years! In Europe, it out...Read more›
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GE Profile : PHB925SPSS 30 Freestanding Induction Range, 5 Cooking Zones, Convection, Self Clean
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