With summer now in full swing and temperatures set to rise, things are starting to heat up across the country. Never is this more true than in the kitchen during meal prep, where things can boil over pretty quickly – especially on a hot summer’s day.

While the phrase “if you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen” springs to mind, here at Cooker Spare Parts, we believe that the kitchen should be accessible to all – even if you suffer from thermophobia!

If your kitchen is prone to bouts of boiling heat, we’ve got a few choice tips to help keep your kitchen running smoothly without resulting in a meltdown.

Reduce heat in the kitchen

First things first, the easiest and most obvious way to reduce heat in kitchen areas is to simply crack open a window.

The additional airflow can work wonders in no time, while patio doors can also provide ample ventilation.

But what if you don’t have patio doors or only have a small kitchen window?

Is all hope lost? Is it time to throw in the tea towel? Should we resign ourselves to cooking in inferno-like temperatures for the rest of our days?

Not quite. Here’s a few ways to beat the heat in your kitchen this summer.

Oven Embargo

Oven cooking has a knack for heating up the entire kitchen, particularly if your kitchen is small and compact.

While this can be great news in the wintertime when the weather is colder than a mother-in-law’s kiss, it’s not as welcome when the kitchen is already hotter than a heatwave in hell.

Avoiding oven cooking during the bouts of baking sun is a wise move. Instead, try to rely on other kitchen appliances, like a slow cooker or microwave.

Bake Smart

Oven cooking can’t always be substituted and sometimes you may find there’s simply no alternative. If this is indeed the case, try to plan ahead and schedule your oven cooking at cooler times of the day, such as the early morning or late at night.

Boiling Over

Boiling water on a stove top can have a dramatic effect on the kitchen environment. Even with an extractor fan above the hob, it’s still common for the whole kitchen to become a sauna, misting up the windows like a culinary steam room.

Opting for boiled foods during hot weather is asking for trouble, so try to avoid stove-top boiling during bouts of extreme heat outside.

The Great Outdoors

If you feel like your kitchen is too hot to cook in, why not revere that psychology somewhat and use the weather to your advantage?

Hot weather is a prime setting for alfresco dining, so why not take advantage of the conditions and go the whole hog by cooking outside too?

Embracing barbeque season can have multiple perks, from the social aspect of a BBQ to the sheer novelty of cooking outside.

Best of all, it gets you out in the open and out of the kitchen, minimising the kitchen heat considerably. 

There you have it: four fool-proof ways to reduce the heat in your kitchen his summer without affecting your cooking. For more information on how to reduce heat in your kitchen, drop us a line on 02920 452 510 or click the button below to get in touch online.

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If your oven is taking longer to heat up or you find your meals aren’t cooking evenly, it may be due to valuable heat escaping from your oven.

If your cooker is unusually venting heat, the most common cause of this issue is a worn oven gasket. The gasket operates as a seal, insulating your oven and preventing the hot air from escaping.

Naturally, any wear and tear to this seal will likely result in a dip in performance, not to mention a potential hazard, causing your oven to run less efficiently.

If this sounds familiar, don’t get hot under the collar or blow a gasket yourself – help is at hand!

Prepare for the Worst

Like any kitchen appliance, an oven won’t last forever. Sadly, when it comes to oven cooking, Sod’s Law will usually dictate that your cooker will go to pot at the least convenient time.

Nevertheless, there’s never a good time to receive bad news, so the best way to limit the impact is to get ahead of the curve and prepare for the inevitable.

It can be wise to inspect your oven regularly, particularly at the first sign of an issue. This can help you to pre-empt a major fault and allow you to rectify the problem before your oven becomes completely unusable.

Diagnosing a Faulty Door Seal

While it can be both annoying and frustrating when your oven seal does eventually go down, it can also be largely foreseen if you know what to look for.

The tell-tale signs of a faulty gasket range from an unusually hot outer door to melted cooker knobs. Meanwhile, it could be something as simple as undercooked food.

If you spot any of the above, be sure to check the seal for any obvious signs of wear or damage. Cracked, split or eroded seals are not fit for purpose.

Next, turn the oven on and inspect the perimeter of the door for escaping heat. If heat is unusually permeating from the door, you’ll need to replace the gasket.

These steps should help identify any issues with the seal; however, if no seal issues are evident, you may want to enlist the help of an expert.

Replacing a Door Seal

Once you have identified the problem, your next port of call is to take appropriate action. For a broken seal, replacement is in the best place to start.

Luckily, replacing a cooker seal is fairly straightforward. Simply head over to our dedicated section of oven door seals and gaskets, locate the model required using our easy-to-use search tool and order your replacement door seal.

Once your substitute seal has arrived, it’s time for out with the old and in with the new!

Remove a Damaged Door Seal

Before you go any further, be sure to unplug your oven or switch it off at the mains. If your oven is hot, wait for it to cool before you attempt any repairs.

Once it’s safe to do so, remove the damaged seal by opening your oven door and locating the gasket. This will either be on the door itself or on the outer border of the oven opening.

The seal will often be held in place by small clips or pins at select points (often the corners). These can be easily removed by gently wiggling them out of place.

Once removed, prise away at the meshy perimeter to loosen it from the oven wall and proceed to gently pull away in a methodical manner.

Working around the boundary of the oven, pull away until the seal has been completely removed.

Fitting a New Door Seal

To replace the oven seal/gasket, you have to effectively work in reverse. With that mindset, feed the seal around the perimeter so that the pins/clips line up with the relevant holes.

Fasten the clips into place and ensure that the remaining lining is nestled comfortably in place around the outside.

Once the new gasket is securely in place and the clips have been fastened into their corresponding holes, feed any remaining excess into the two bottom holes provided to create the full air-tight seal.

For more information on replacing a cooker seal of replacing an oven gasket, why not drop us a line? Call now on 02920 452 510 or get in touch online using the button below.

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When it comes to cooking do’s and don’ts, there’s a long and varied list of things that can (and usually will) go wrong – particularly if you’re a white belt in culinary kung fu.

Luckily, the trusty oven usually provides a fantastic “Get Out of Jail Free” card for anyone who has not quite graduated from the foundation level of student cooking standards.

That being said, oven cooking isn’t always as simple as throwing a few potato smilies in with a fistful of fish fingers; there are still plenty of problems that can arise from even the simplest of oven cooking.

To help prevent any catastrophic kitchen nightmares, we’ve collated a mini list of oven cooking do’s and don’ts to stop you getting hot under the collar and keep mealtimes casualty-free.

Cooking Do’s

It’s often said that a bad worker always blames their tools. While this may be true at times, it’s far from the rule. After all, sometimes the tools really are to blame!

When it comes to the kitchen, the tools at your disposal can make all the difference and an unreliable appliance can hold the fate of your meal in its molten, steely hands.

With that in mind, here’s a few preparatory pointers to help keep you cooking and set your nutritional voyage off in the right direction.

DO use timers and clocks

Keeping track of cooking times can be the difference between bon appetit and burnt offerings. Worse still, failure to set your alarm can be a real recipe for disaster when it comes to kitchen safety.

To keep your meal prep running like clockwork, make the most of your oven timer. This can be invaluable when you’re cooking a variety of dishes: whether you're frying a steak, boiling pasta of roasting a Christmas turkey.

DO keep your oven in working order

Figures published by Which? in 2018 showed that cookers and ovens were the cause of 11% of house fires, more than any other cooking appliance.

Meanwhile, GOV.uk maintains that cooking appliances account for a sobering 48% of all house fire ignition from April 2017 to March 2018.

Bottom line: keep your oven in working order. Failure to do so could not only land you in hot water but could quite literally see your home go up in smoke.

DO use oven mitts and handles

While it may seem logical to use a wet mitt or cloth to protect yourself when handling hot pans and trays, heat travels extremely fast through wet material, leaving your hand unprotected.

Always use a dry oven mitt (or, if absolutely necessary, a dry tea towel) to handle hot items. This should provide ample insulation to prevent your hand from the burning.

The same also applies for grilling. If you don’t already have one, avoid feeling the burn by taking additional precautions and investing in a pan handle for your grill.

Cooking Don’ts

Isaac Newton rightly once theorised that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In the kitchen, this is just as applicable and for every “DO”, there’s an equally important “DO NOT”.

So open wide and prepare for a freshly baked batch of sugary glazed “DO NOTS”, as we run down a five culinary faux pas that you’d be wise to avoid.

DON’T use ovens with damaged doors

The smallest crack could lead to big safety issues once temperatures rise and can even cause your oven glass to break completely.

Similarly, microwaves with damaged doors can be just as dangerous, if not more so. An unsealed microwave door can lead to radiation emission that has the potential to provide a nasty burn.

To play it safe, if your oven door is faulty, be sure to get it replaced or fixed before you turn up the heat and get cooking.

DON’T overload your oven

Overloading an oven can not only increase cooking time, it can also affect how your items cook, preventing heat from adequately circulating.

More importantly, it can also increase the risk of a hazard, especially if you’re trying to cram too many items on a single tray (we’ve all been there).

If your oven is beginning to look like a game of Tetris at mealtimes, it may be worth investing in additional oven trays and grill pans to avoid unnecessary stacking.

DON’T ignore a wobbly cooker

If you have a free-standing oven, a wobbly cooker can be a major annoyance at the best of times. Worse still, it can be extremely dangerous at the worst.

Wobbly ovens often mean an unstable stove. When you subsequently use that stove, it can become very dangerous very fast, particularly when you’re using the stove for boiling water, soups and sauces.

Spills and mishaps can occur with effortless ease when your cooker is unsteady. Avoid a rocky horror kitchen stove by securing your free-standing cooker with level cooker feet.

For more information on safe oven cooking and cooker maintenance, why not drop us a line today? Call now on 02920 452 510 or use the button below to get in touch online.

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If the record viewing figures of The Great British Bake-Off have taught us anything, it’s that Britain is a nation that loves baking. Millions of viewers tune in each week to see the would-be bakers get hot under the collar in their quest to become Star Baker.

For further proof, look no further than Greggs. The home of the Steak Bake is the most popular high-street dining brand in the UK according to YouGov, handily beating off the likes of McDonald’s, Subway and Wetherspoons.

There’s no denying it: us bake-loving Brits can’t get enough of our beautifully British baked goods.

Sadly, like any great love story, there can be hardships and tragedies along the way. Kitchen hiccups and mechanical mishaps can put your baking dreams on ice in an instant, particularly when it comes to a problem-oven.

Luckily, there are ways around it. It’s not always easy, but where there’s a will there’s a way!

Read on for our fool-proof guide on how to bake without an oven and earn yourself a Paul Hollywood handshake the hard way!

Why bake without an oven?

If your oven is broken, the best course of action is, of course, to get it fixed as soon as possible. Life without an oven can be a real pain so it’s well worth attempting to fix it before you resort to alternatives.

It could be as simple as replacing an oven knob or fixing door hinge, so be sure to do some detective work and give your cooker a once over. You may be able to get it back up and running a lot easier than you think.

How to bake when oven is broken

If, despite your best efforts, you find that your oven is out well and truly of commission, baking probably seems like an impossible task. However, that’s not always the case.

While it can be difficult and is far from ideal, there are ways to bake without an oven.

From cakes and cookies to bread and brownies, you might be surprised at just what you can achieve with non-oven baking. Here are a few tops tips on how to bake without oven power.

Microwave

If you happen to own a microwave – which most 21st-century British homes do – there’s a veritable world of microwavable flavourables quite literally at your fingertips, particularly if your microwave has a convection mode.

The simple mug cake is the perfect example of microbake mastery and notoriously easy to boot; however, the list doesn’t stop there. In fact, you can bake a huge variety of goodies in the microwave, from bread and pizza to cake and brownies.

If you’re thinking of exploring the world of microwave baking, a silicone Bundt pan is well worth purchasing. Metal pans are obviously not suitable for microwave use, while the hole in the middle of the Bundt pan allows it to cook through to the centre.

Stove

An expected feature of any decent kitchen, the humble stove top is the typical partner in crime for the oven: the Bonnie to its Clyde, the Rodney to its Del Boy, the…Kevin Hart to its Dwayne Johnson? You get the idea.

Like any good double act, when one falters, the other picks up the slack. The stove is the perfect support system should your oven take a tumble; however, there is more than one way to bake using the stove top.

Here are the three most popular methods of baking with a stove.

Skillet

The almighty skillet is a multifaceted piece of hardware that can lend its cast-iron credentials to a variety of baked delights. Ideal for baking cookies and brownies, this method is also ideal for muffins, Welsh cakes and scones.

Steaming

A classic method of yesteryear, steaming is a great way to bake without an oven, most famously used for making Christmas Puddings. While this can ideally (and most easily) be achieved using a steamed pudding mould, the same effect can be created using a bowl sealed with foil via the traditional wrap and tie method.

Dutch Oven

One of the most versatile options for non-oven baking, the Dutch oven is essentially a cast-iron cooking pot made of heavy-duty metal. While it can be used for a variety of purposes – from stews and casseroles to curries and meat roasting – Dutch ovens are also perfect for baking bread and even capable of baking cakes.

Slow Cooker

Often overlooked and under-utilised, slow cookers are great outside the box kitchen appliances when it comes to baking.

While they are commonly used for casseroles, stews and the like, slow cookers are also great for baking a wide variety of breads and delicious desserts: from cakes, puddings and pies to brownies, cookies and crumbles.

Provided you line the slow cooker first or place your ingredients in a silicone pan (or a metal cake/loaf tin), baking with a slow cooker can be a breeze.

Pressure Cooker

Much like the slow cooker, a pressure cooker is also capable of baking a variety of dishes yet is, more often than not, criminally overlooked.

Whether you’re looking to bake bread, desserts or anything else you may fancy getting your bake on with, chances are that you can get it done in a pressure cooker. In fact, you can even use it to make cheesecake and, what’s more, it often cooks better than conventional oven methods.

Best of all, pressure cookers don’t hang about when it comes to cooking times and you could have the finished dish in your hand within 30 minutes. If you follow the instructions to the letter and do everything by the book, you could have delicious baked goodness is no time!

Problems of baking without an oven

While it is clearly possible to bake without an oven, it’s by no means a long-term solution. We’re sure Mary Berry would agree that there really is no substitute for the oven when it comes to creating a baking masterpiece.

Daily cooking without an oven can be a frustrating experience that limits your culinary options. What’s more, over-reliance on pan-frying and microwaves can quickly have a negative effect on your diet and a notable impact on your waistband.

Get back to baking with Cooker Spare Parts

While baking without an oven can be a cool little novelty and a fun way to test your kitchen skills, it’s no replacement for the real thing.

If you’re without your oven due to an appliance malfunction or a faulty part, the best solution for your overall baking experience is to simply get your oven repaired. It may even be a lot easier to fix than you think!

If you can get to the bottom of your oven issue and find out what’s putting your baking dreams on ice, you may be able to fix it by simply replacing the problem part with a spare from Cooker Spare Parts.

To ensure your cooking habits don’t go off the boil, give us a call today on 02920 452 510. Alternatively, keep your oven running hot by hitting the button below.

Get Help Now

Has your Stoves oven recently packed in? We know it can be a complete nightmare when your oven suddenly ceases to work but as a registered supplier of Stoves spare parts, we can help you repair your Stoves oven in no time!

Diagnose the problem

So, how do we tackle the problem? Well first, you need to know which part of your Stoves oven has broken and sometimes it's not as simple as 'the light won't turn on'. Let's walk through a simple and safe way to diagnose an unknown problem with your oven step by step:

• Start by unplugging your oven & turning off the gas supply (we don't want any nasty surprises).

• If your Stoves oven is freestanding, carefully move it into the centre of your kitchen so you can access all the different parts.

• Begin to inspect the oven, paying close attention to areas that are easily missed such as, the hinges, the gasket, the heating element etc. Are there any noticeable signs of damage?

I've found the problem! Now what? 

Once you successfully locate the part in your Stoves oven that needs to be replaced, it's time to think about your options. You could:

• Try and fix the problem yourself.
• Organise a visit from an engineer.

Whether you want to tackle the problem yourself or call a professional to fix it, you'll find ordering the new part you need incredibly easy through Cooker Spare Parts! We sell a range of Stoves Cooker Spares including:

• Control Knobs
• Oven Elements
• Gas Hob Spares
• Spark Plugs & Electrodes

& much more! The best way to find the exact spare you need is to have your Stoves oven's model number ready before you browse our site. The model number is likely to be located on the back, side, or inside the door of your stoves cooker, and once you've found it we can show you all the parts that are suitable for your Stoves cooker!

To shop our entire range of Stoves spares, click the button below. If you have any problems finding the part you need to repair your Stoves oven, don't hesitate to get in touch with a member of our team who will be more than happy to help you!

Call us on 02920 452 510, our lines are open Monday-Friday, 9am-5.30pm.

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