Sadly, it is never the burner, it is what one does with the burners!
From an electric stove to gas as recently as 3 years ago, it sure is
nice. It is an average GE gas stove. The trick to duplicating good
Chinese food from the restaurants is not the amount of heat but the
magic of ingredients go into the "fire" that you are able to duplciate
the flavour of the dish.



Dimitri wrote:
>
> "TammyM" > wrote in message
> ...
> > I've been following the previous cooktop thread, and also doing some
> > research in preparation for buying a new gas cooktop. The one I have
> > now is an O'Keefe and Merritt 4-burner, circa 1957 (?) It is a PITA
> > to clean. It has one high-power burner, I've no clue what are the
> > BTUs on that baby.
> >
> > From what little online research I've done (and I'm about to embark on
> > an in-person research expedition to the local "established in 1937"
> > appliance store), it would seem that cost goes up significantly for
> > cooktops that have a 15K BTU burner. Aside from wok cooking for which
> > I can understand that big fire power is desirable, is there a
> > compelling reason to spend the extra dosh to get a CT with a 15KBTU
> > burner? Or would something in the 11-12.5K range do me just ducky?
> > All of the medium price-range cooktops I've looked at with less than
> > the 15kBTUer have low simmer burners (and that strikes me as an
> > advantage that every cook here would enjoy!), closed burners (hoooooo
> > boy, does that seem like a huge advantage to me after cleaning my
> > present cooktop for 10 years!!!), and continuous dishwashable grates.
> >
> > So. What say ye? Is 15K BTU overkill, or absolutely necessary for
> > any cook worth her salt?
> >
> > TammyM, not looking to spend money unnecessarily!
>
> There is no finite answer to your question. The average burner today is about
> 9300 BTU. One of the burners on my cooktop is 11,000. 15K sure why not? The
> answer is how quick do you want to heat water? How quick do you want the water
> to recover to the boiling point? How much cooking do you do in a wok? Do you
> like Blackened food in an old cast iron pan? How much cooking do you do fro a
> crowd? Do you use a Dutch Oven as a Deep Fat Fryer?
>
> Dimitri