Cooking on gas!!!
When I cook I tend to use a two tier steamer placed on a gas hob. Until very recently I used to virtually fill the bottom pan with water and placed it on the largest gas burner.
There are a few things wrong with this approach, firstly, it takes ages for the water to boil and secondly once I’ve steamed all my
vegetables I ended up empting all the water down the sink. I thought this wasted energy and I was doing this everyday!!!
My solution day 1
I measured a set amount of water and recorded it, 800ml of water and placed it on the largest gas buner as before. It took ages to heat up and I think that I spent about five minutes just heating water, until the steam started. Once I had finished cooking, I measured the remaining water and it was 650ml. I really couldn’t believe it, I’d heated three quarters of the water for no reason!
Day 2
I decided to add 600ml of water this time, which might sound too much but I didn’t want to boil it dry. As you’d expect I ended up with a quite a lot of water, again poured down the sink. But I did manage to turn down the gas and the pre-heating time was much shorter.
Day 3
500ml of water, pan placed on the smallest burner and turned down to half and I ended up putting about 180ml down the sink.
Conclusion
With a few more days of reducing the water gradually, I found that the kitched steamed up less, the overall cooking time was reduced. I wasn’t pouring lots of energy down the sink.
Whilst to some people this might seem very trivial and perhaps pointless. It doesn’t take any effort to do, after the initial testing. I would certainly recommend that you analyse your cooking habits and methods to see whether it is possible to reduce something or do something different. For example I use gravy granuals. So instead of heating up more water, I use all of the water from my steamer and if necessary top it.