Induction hob on top of work surface?

[aderbyshirelad]

Morning All. My google-foo is failing me this morning.

Basically, we’re looking at options as alternatives to the electric AGA we have in the cottage we rent. The damn thing never works properly but the landlord is looking to sell in a year or so and won’t be keen on replacing it. They’re very good to us and I have no problem in spending a few hundred quid on an alternative as we’ll get that back in two months from the saving on the electricity bill! (We don’t need an oven as like every house I’ve been in with an Aga, we have a ‘proper’ electric oven as a back up!!!)

So, I’ve started looking at plug in induction hobs. A couple of questions…

Can we just buy a hob an sit it on top of the marble worktop as we can’t recess it / fit it and will be taking it with us.

I have seen portable versions which get round this but they are very small and only seem to have two ‘rings’. Are there any larger ones anyone could recommend?



Thanks in advance,

J

[bristolbaron]

As we currently have a temporary kitchen I can offer my experience.
I looked into plug in four ring hobs and found they’re massively underpowered. The idea was I’d sit it on the worktop and then hardwire into the new kitchen, but I didn’t want to be stuck with something permanent that wasn’t good enough just because it solved a temporary issue.
I went for ikea worktop hobs and have a double and a single. They’re £39 single or £79 double. They do what they need to do and seem to hold half their price on gumtree etc so I’ll move them on once I’m done.
The alternative was to find a second hand four ring, but with nothing suitable locally the ikea ones have done the job.

[aderbyshirelad]

Thanks for the insight.

My worry was they’d be under powered (though we’re used to that with the AGA!). I’ll take a look at the IKEA ones…

[fizz47]

Moved out to Switzerland and we have a huge dislike for Electric cookers and unfortunately our apartment came with electric.

https://www.nisbets.co.uk/caterlite-touch-control-...

We purchased a two ring induction job which sits on top of the electric cooker (which was 4 ring).



Almost 3 years later it’s what we have used everyday.

Occasionally it would be nice to have a 3rd ring but found we actually get by pretty good and when hosting larger dinner parties etc - just requires some planning

[aderbyshirelad]

Thanks for the recommendation. I’ll take a look at those now…

[Biggy Stardust]

Note that induction hobs need compatible pans.

[aderbyshirelad]

Thankfully I think the AGA ones are! To be fair, they’re amazing pans. Maybe they should stick to making those…

[SpeckledJim]

fizz47 said:

Moved out to Switzerland and we have a huge dislike for Electric cookers and unfortunately our apartment came with electric.

https://www.nisbets.co.uk/caterlite-touch-control-...

We purchased a two ring induction job which sits on top of the electric cooker (which was 4 ring).



Almost 3 years later it’s what we have used everyday.

Occasionally it would be nice to have a 3rd ring but found we actually get by pretty good and when hosting larger dinner parties etc - just requires some planning

Slide them to the side and you have a 3rd - to - 6th ring don't you?

[ooo000ooo]

I bought a single induction ring from lidl a couple of years back to see if induction was as good as everyone said, set it on top of our ceramic hob or to the side and it was my main "ring" for a couple of years until i invested in a proper induction cooker. It came in handy when the new cooker blew up, while waiting for it's replacement to arrive.
Recently moved house to a solid plate electric hob so it got dusted down and been used again for a few weeks until i got round to swapping the existing hob and oven for our induction one again.
Handy thing to have lying about for the price.