"Nicholas JS Gibson" > wrote in message >...
> I've just moved into a house with an AGA range
> (http://www.aga-rayburn.co.uk/), and am having difficulty getting the
> temperature right. Basically the lower oven is about 215F (not quite warm
> enough for granola) and the top oven is about 400-450F. The plates on top
> are however not that hot -- things take an age to come to the boil on the
> boiling plate. The thermometer on the front suggests it is running a little
> cool, but if I turn the knob on the side and wait 24 hours for it to warm
> up, the lower oven ends up about 250F (just right for granola) but the top
> oven ends up being 450-475F, which is too hot for most things.
>
> Am I missing something, or is that Just The Way Things Are?
>
> It's a 2-oven gas-fired model (possibly a Mk II), but it does have a
> mysterious metal dial on the front, with numbers inlayed into it. It is
> currently set at 3, for what that's worth. I've not been able to find any
> information about what this dial does, nor indeed any pictures of other AGAs
> with such a dial. I do wonder whether this dial might in some way influence
> the apportioning of heat to the plates vs. the ovens...
>
> Thanks,
>
> Nick

Hi Nick - I'm in the US but lived in the UK for three years in a house
with a 2-oven AGA and learned (mostly) how to live with it. The short
answer is no, you're not missing anything and yes, that's Just The Way
Things Are - but perhaps I can give a couple of suggestions. First, I
highly recommend getting (or borrowing from the library) a copy of
"The AGA Book", by Mary Berry. It's an excellent resource for hints
about how to get along with an AGA and will tell you everything I'm
about to say and more.

Mostly, you have to change your style of cooking. As you've
discovered, the hot plates don't stay that way very long - they work
because massive amounts of heat are stored in those chunks of metal
but they start cooling down as soon as you lift the lid and the AGA's
burners can't keep up with heat loss. So it's great at boiling a few
hundred mL of water but terrible at boiling a big pot for pasta - the
house I was in had a gas hob that I used for that. So the idea is,
you start things out on top - sauté some vegetables, brown some meat,
that kind of thing - then finish things off in one of the ovens.

You can get something approximating 350 in the top oven - at least for
a short time. Your AGA should have come equipped with a "cold shelf"
- a sheet of aluminum the size of one of the oven racks. You slide it
in the middle of the top oven and, at least for 30-45 minutes, you get
a lower temperature underneath it - long enough to bake some things.
Of course, you never know what temperature you really have; also the
temperature is massively uneven (warmer to the back and left, towards
the burner). So successful AGA baking involves (1) lots of rotating
and (2) cooking things until they're done, not on time. It's not easy
but decent results can be coaxed out of the beast.

I hope that helps you - bottom line, cooking on an AGA requires
adjustments and there are some things it just doesn't do very well.

- Mark W.