"Peter Lampione" wrote in message
om...
Is 13 minutes normal for bringing 3.5 quarts of water to a boil?

I have recently (today!) purchased an electric ceramic top range
(a GE unit), and compared with my older electric-spiral Jenn-Air
unit, I find it takes quite a bit longer to bring water to a
boil.

I am using a Calphalon pot, which is reasonably flat bottomed
(with a ruler, I can detect 1mm of space between the ruler
and the center of the bottom, but I have not seen pots
that are better than this). I fill it with 3.5 qt of water.
It takes 13 minutes to bring the water to a boil.
Is this normal? I notice that once the water is hot (but not yet
boiling), the "burner" cycles, perhaps 30 seconds on and 8 off.
This, I am told, happens when the pot is not perfectly flat,
but the Calphalon seems to be as flat as they come.

Is the cycling normal? Is the time reasonable?
I would also appreciate comparisons with the time people are
getting from gas ranges.



I am not about to get out a stopwatch, but that seems in line with what I
experience on my Dacor. The cycling is normal too - as you probably know it
is to prevent the burner from getting too hot and damaging itself. You have
also seen that not-perfectly-flat pots are perfectly usable on a flattop
range even if not quite as efficient as one that is perfectly flat. Given
that metal expands when heated it is probably unrealistic to ask for a pan
that is flat when cold and when hot.


--
Peter Aitken

Remove the crap from my email address before using.