For $60, You Can Stop Using Your Crappy Gas Stove All the Time

This is One Thing, a column with tips on how to live.

Cooking with gas is bad for the environment, and bad for your health. How bad for your health is something researchers are looking into, but it’s clear that it is not good: Burning gas releases nitrogen dioxide, which can cause or exacerbate respiratory problems, particularly for kids, who are still growing and whose noses are near burner-level. Nitrogen dioxide has also been linked to mental health conditions, and (again, for kids) may be associated with lower cognitive performance. Gas stoves also release benzene, a carcinogen linked to higher leukemia risks; it can leak even when stoves are off.

You might have heard of a simple way to reduce these risks: turn on the vent fan in your kitchen when you cook. The problem is that this is advice no one really wants to hear. Vent fans are loud, and we like to chat while we cook. Or we watch dumb TV—either way, the fan is annoying. (For the fan to work right, you are also supposed to clean it every three months. Do you?) There’s also the inconvenient fact that many older homes, including mine, don’t have vent fans at all. Other homes have fans that don’t vent outside. In that case, the advice is to keep the window open when you cook, weather be damned.

Another solution is to just switch to an induction stove. Homeowners can get a tax credit when they purchase one. But I’m a renter. This winter, I found the perfect solution for renters, and for homeowners who are not ready to take the plunge on a whole new stove: the Ikea Tillreda portable induction cooktop.

This sleek, polished black burner uses induction—basically, magnets—to speed cooking time and save energy compared to traditional electric coils. It’s faster and prettier than a regular hot plate. And it’s only $60.

I knew induction cooking would give me peace of mind, but I didn’t realize how much I would actually like it compared to cooking on my apartment’s finicky gas stove. This winter, I hosted a weekly soup night: Friends and neighbors showed up with bread and Girl Scout Cookies, and we squeezed around the table to warm up on red lentil dal, potato leek, and minestrone lentil. I cooked each soup atop the induction cooktop—my new pride and joy. Six soup nights and three months in, I can confidently say: This is a more pleasant cooking experience from start to finish.

My induction stovetop turns on with a few taps, so I no longer have to find a lighter when the pilot lights are twitchy. When I put on a pot of water, it boils slightly faster than it did on my gas stove. When I turn my soups to simmer, the induction burner never accidentally turns itself off—my least favorite gas stove surprise. Then, after cooking, I don’t have to lift a heavy, greasy grill to chase crumbs; I just give the smooth burner a quick wipe. And, for anyone who spends their commute wondering if they left the gas on: There is no chance that this stove will blow up the house!

The one true drawback is for wok cooking, where you need to get the sides of the pan super hot. (Devoted wok hei fans who want to explore induction can consider a wok-shaped induction cooker.) The burner also has a quiet hum, but it is incomparably soft compared to the roar of a gas stove vent fan. While even induction cooking can cause air pollution—anything you sear enough to smell delicious, for example, is probably releasing unhealthy particulate matter—I don’t worry about that too much with the induction burner. That’s partly because gas itself produces particle pollution, too, so I’m already ahead. It’s also because I run a HEPA filter: It can trap particles, but not gases like NO2 or benzene. Now when I air out my home (which you should do no matter how you cook), there is simply less pollution to air.