Aga, Aga, Aga . . .

There are stoves, and then there are stoves. Some of you may remember the British cooking show, "Two Fat Ladies". Sometimes Jennifer and Clarissa could be seen cooking on a stove like this.

What is this AGA stove, and why do people wax prosaically over it? The doors look impossibly small, but behind the doors one discovers a deep cavity which can hold several dishes at once. One can cook 5 trays of cookies at a time, or pop in a 28lb turkey and have it done in 4 hours. How is this accomplished? Simple - radiant heat which cooks the food from all sides, not just from the top or the bottom. The heat is generated by the burner which is on 24/7 (fueled by natural gas or propane) and stored by the cast iron shell.

A little bit of history - it was invented in 1922, by a Swedish physicist, Gustaf Dalen, who had been blinded by an explosion. While recovering, he saw how much work it was for his wife to do the cooking. He resolved to invent a stove that would be easy to use and consistent in performance. This is the result. It is so well-built that stoves dating from the thirties, with proper maintenance, are still working just fine today. Curiously, it has become a British icon. I still haven't figured out just how did it turn out that a Swedish invention could come so wildly popular in Great Britain.

It is possible to cook a full course dinner in just 30 minutes. Yes, I'm not kidding - Bruce and I went to the demonstration at Design Solutions in Annapolis. For appetizers we had grilled parmesan wafers, a creamy bite-sized meat dish which tasted seafoody (I don't remember what it was exactly), and dollar-sized apple-cinnamon pancakes (which took like 2 minutes to cook - honest!). And for dinner we had chicken breast seasoned with only salt and pepper which came out wonderfully juicy and flavorful, grilled steak, baked potatoes, rice cooked with onion and chicken broth, salmon, and mesclun salad with pine nuts and feta cheese (okay, this one wasn't cooked), and rolls that were browned evenly on top and bottom. And for dessert we had apple pie. Normally, I don't eat apple pie, but after taking a bite from Bruce's slice I just had to have my own slice. Wow. What. a. meal.

It may take some getting used to a new style of cooking where much of the cooking is done in the ovens. But once you realize that the process is the reverse of how we usually cook (cook 80% on the stovetop, 20% in the oven), you can then adjust recipes. There are cookbooks available from Aga Ranges, and there's an email group in Yahoogroups called agalovers.

Okay, you're all thinking - what about the heat? Well, from what I've read, the heat that you feel is just about the same as 12 people in one room. Much of the heat is retained inside the stove. And yes, there are people who have this in California, Texas, Florida, all over the South. And of course here in the Washington DC metro area (I've discovered that there are about 5 retailers in the area carrying this AGA line). During the summer, you can just turn down the temperature a bit - the food will just take longer to cook.

I'm seriously in lust with this stove. Someday, we will own one. And then I'll have lots of fun experimenting with dyeing on this stove (just fill the pot with water, put it on the boiling plate, and 3 minutes later slide it over to the simmering plate and position it so that a certain temperature will be maintained) and drying my sweaters (lay it on top of the covers or move the fair isle framers close enough and have my Fair isle vests and cardigans dry in about a hour or so).