Our new place uses propane for heating and cooking and I am just wondering, as far as cooking is concerned, how does propane compare to natural gas for the BTU's. I have cooked on wood, natural gas and electricity but propane is new to me.

It does seem to take longer to boil water or maybe it is just my imagination or another senior moment (I seem to be having more and more of them)

Thank you in advance.

-- Cordy (ckaylegian@aol.com), September 19, 2001

Answers

Cordy When we moved to our farm I had the best propane stove available put into the house, replacing an electric range. Big Mistake - you are absolutely right, the propane doesn't burn as hot, it's harder to get a good oven heat and frankly I was mightily disappointed with propane cookin. I put back my lovely electric stove, which doesn't cost that much to run, and I'm much happier.,

Also, we do a lot of canning and canning on propane was a bust - it was too hard to get the canner pressure up and keep it up.

Now, it's possible that if I'd have taken more time, other than about the six months that I did cook on propane, that I would have adjusted and been fine, but I'm not known for being patient about these things!

Ann cats

-- Ann Cats (anncats2@Yahoo.com), September 19, 2001.

I have found propane to be the same as natural gas to cook with, and I prefer a gas stove because of it's infinite ajustability and quicker responses to changing the settings than electric. But the old electric stove I had was so wore out from years of canning that the burners were half working so my comparison may not be valid!!!

Most professional chefs will have nothing else but a gas stove.

-- Annie Miller in SE OH (annie@1st.net), September 19, 2001.

Propane has more BTU's per unit than natural gas. The difference is when you install burners for your stove. Larger opening ones for natural gas, smaller ones for propane. With that in mind I would imagine that the cooking rate would probably be about equal. Hope this helps.

Talk to you later.

-- Bob in WI (bjwick@hotmail.com), September 19, 2001.

Good heavens! I have used a propane stove for cooking, canning, baking, broiling, boiling, searing, singeing, and just generally heating anything above room temperature. We do not have natural gas here, unless you count the aftermath of beans, beer, and boiled eggs. If you DO count that, I will be forever grateful for your hints on containment. But I digress. Electric stoves are an invention of the devil, or conceiveably, DemocRATS. You must remove the pan, pot, or frying pan from the heat if the heat gets too high. Turning down won't do it! Contrarily (is that a WORD?). a gas (any gas) stove is instantly adjustable. If you are an electric stove afficianado, you are neither a homesteader nor a cook. You are someone who feels a bit guilty about cooking everything in the microwave. If you want to get really close to the life beyond the sidewalks, go with a wood stove. I use it to grill, sear, and bake. But I cannot figure out how to make a really good pie, and Maggie (the expert) can't either! This is why the gas stove is here. An aside - does anyone know a pie crust recipe made with Crisco or any other chemical based "fat" that can challenge one made with real lard? I am about to render out about 30 lbs of leaf lard. Can you believe the folks (7) who bought the rest of our pork/ham didn't want the leaf lard! I can understand not taking the fatback, but the leaf lard!!! Experiences from others who render lard, please! GL!

-- Brad (homefixer@SacoRiver.net), September 19, 2001.

sorry Brad I recall the electric range being the result of a collaboration between the devil and the republicans. :)

-- jz (oz49us@yahoo.com), September 19, 2001.

Thank you to all who responded.

To Brad: I loved the part about the beans, and yes, my favorite way of cooking is on a wood cookstove, but I need to replace mine, so in the meantime, I am cooking on gas.

Nothing beats a soup or stew slowly simmered on a cookstove. In fact, the only thing I had trouble with was baking an angel food cake.

As far as baking a pie, you should not have any problems. I bake pies to sell at a farmer's market. Here is the crust recipe I use: This will make 6 - 9" pie shells.

4 cups flour 1 TAB sugar 2 tsp salt 1-3/4 cup Crisco 1/2 cup water 1 egg 1 TAB vinegar (white not cider)

Mix flour, sugar and salt together. Cut in shortening. Mix water, egg and vinegar and gently add to dry mix. Divide into 6 portions and chill.

I do this in the Cuisinart and it is a snap!

A funny story about a cookstove. My younger sister came to visit when we were in WI and at that time her oldest was about 1 1/2 years old. She wanted to cook Dana a 3 min egg so I said go ahead. She had never cooked on a cookstove. Anyway, when the egg was done, she asked my "HOW TO YOU TURN THE STOVE OFF" I had to tell her, you don't, you just wait for the wood to burn up.

Thanks again to everyone who responded.

-- Cordy (ckaylegian@aol.com), September 20, 2001.

I used electric stoves until moving here & I LOVE my propane stove. The only hassle is lighting the pilot light for the oven when we change tanks. Someday we'll get one of those big tanks.

I thought electric stoves & baseboard heaters were a collaboration of Democrats & Republicans! I'm a "registered independant". Is that an oxymoron? :)

-- Bonnie (stichart@plix.com), September 20, 2001.

Propane shouldn't be any different than natural gas insofar as cooking and heating. I've never noticed that it took any more or less time to boil water (altitude is more of a problem) but if you're watching the pot waiting for it to boil, time seems to go more slowly. Keep in mind, though, that propane has a distinctive rotten egg odor (worse than natural gas) and if you smell it - call your provider ASAP and ask them to come out and look for leaks in the lines and the gas-burning appliances immediately. Most commonly, a tiny leak may occur in the cookstove somewhere, but if there is a leak in the line, it releases toxic levels of nitrogen into the air and soil that will kill your trees and shrubs.

-- Claudia Glass (glasss2001@prodigy.net), September 21, 2001.