How to Find the Right Gas Range

Federal Hospitality Equipment stocks a variety of gas and electric range ovens and it’s often intimidating trying to select the right one for your commercial restaurant, café, takeaway shop or even your home. However, many don’t even consider the possibility of the dual fuel range units, which many professional chefs and caterers consider to be the best and most practical ovens in the business.

While your typical gas range ovens heat the cooktop and oven with gas, and the electrical ovens heat the cooktop and oven with electricity, the dual fuel range units utilise both – heating the oven with electricity, and the cooktop with gas.

The main benefits and advantages of the dual fuel range ovens is their ability for precise temperature control when heating the interior, whereas the gas ovens often exhibit temperature fluctuations. However, a gas range oven comes at a discounted price in comparison to the dual fuel oven, so there needs to be some consideration made in selecting what one is right for your restaurant, café or hospitality business.

Gas ovens can usually complete the job of cooking to perfection, especially smaller food choices and basic meals – meats/veggies, but more practical and reliable usage is guaranteed to be given with the installation of a dual fuel oven.

Whereas gas and electric ovens can be reliable to cook your general ingredients, they’re not without their limitations – food delicacies and meals that are complexly and intricately processed in the kitchen have a more significant chance of leaving the oven burnt or raw in comparison to your dual fuel unit. Desserts and intricate roast dinners, for example, will always come out to perfection with a stabilised oven temperature.

While the dual fuel oven is considered to be a higher performance unit, it might only be a possible choice for commercial businesses with the bigger budget. Smaller businesses like corner stores, cafes and takeaway shops will need to weigh up this option much more carefully and consider whether it’s an affordable choice. Ovens are highly expensive, but they’re also a rare purchase that usually lasts years on end (depending on quality), so there needs to be careful consideration made.

In the end, it is vital to ask questions when making your final decision about what oven to purchase, such as:

• How often will the oven be used? (how many meals will require oven use? Will it be used every night?)
• What’s your budget look like? Can you afford a dual fuel range unit?
• If you are on a budget do you think you could save money with a gas range option and better spend it elsewhere?
• What do you cook? (Basic meals or dishes that require a methodical approach?)
• How do you see the future with the inclusion of your new oven? (Will you use an oven more or less?).

Whatever you select, it’s important to know that an oven is one of your most important assets when it comes to cooking, regardless of whether you’re running a kitchen in a high-end restaurant or cooking meals straight from home. An oven can be your bread and butter when it comes to making the most perfected dishes possible.

Answer yourself these questions, plan and set out your budget, your costs and expenses, the usage and performance require for your hospitality business, reliability of your equipment and the future use in the context of your kitchen workspace.

It’s clear that having the right equipment in your kitchen is essential for achieving great results with your cooking. If you’re looking for top-quality equipment to enhance your culinary endeavors, you might want to check out some of our other products. We offer a variety of equipment, including bain maries and chest freezers in NZ, that are designed to help you achieve your culinary goals. Whether you’re a professional chef or a home cook, our equipment can make all the difference in the quality of your dishes. So why not take a look and see what we have to offer?