Cooking Wine in a Gas Oven?
I've got my first gas stove / oven. I'm wondering about cooking wine in the stove. Is it safe at all? I like putting a piece of meat in a all stainless steel pan, brown it a bit on the stove then throw it in the oven to finish off. For certain cuts I'd add something like burgundy wine and some vegetables as well. I'm just not sure about doing this in a gas stove and couldn't seem to find any existing questions or articles on the topic (Searched for "Cooking wine in gas stove" and similar).
Best Answer
I assume you are talking about the risk that the alcohol vapor from the wine mixes with the air and ignites.
Let's do some maths. I'll do my calculations with some pretty round numbers, but in the end you'll see that it doesn't matter.
Assume an average gas oven with a volume of 150l. According to Wikipedia, the absolute minimum mix of ethanol to air for ignition is 3%, so that's 4.5l of pure ethanol vapor. Water expands at a rate of 1700 when it turns into steam. Assuming ethanol is in the same ballpark and add some entropy for higher temperatures, we'll assume a factor of 2000. That means we'll need 4.5l / 2000 = 2.25ml of pure ethanol. In a typical bottle of red wine there is 12% ethanol, so for a 750ml bottle, that is 90ml.
As you can see, we have about 40 times the ethanol we need to make a nice boom.
Now to answering your question:
I would deem it probably safe to cook red wine in the gas oven. The burners are usually not in direct contact with the air inside the oven, and both the burners and oven is ventilated, so the ethanol would probably escape even before it could meet the required saturation. And even if the vapor was allowed to build up inside the oven and not get in contact with the gas flames, the self ignition temperature for ethanol is 363°C, far hotter than it'll get in there.
The most convincing argument that it's safe is the millions of times chefs around the world have cooked with wine in a gas oven :)
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Quick Answer about "Cooking Wine in a Gas Oven?"
I would deem it probably safe to cook red wine in the gas oven. The burners are usually not in direct contact with the air inside the oven, and both the burners and oven is ventilated, so the ethanol would probably escape even before it could meet the required saturation.Can you cook wine in the oven?
Wine can help cook and simmer foods.Add wine to dishes you're cooking in a skillet on the stove, in a slow cooker, or in the oven. Simmered along with the food, it adds flavor and moisture to whatever dish you're making.Can I cook with alcohol in the oven?
The longer you cook, the more alcohol cooks out, but you have to cook food for about 3 hours to fully erase all traces of alcohol. A study from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Nutrient Data lab confirmed this and added that food baked or simmered in alcohol for 15 minutes still retains 40 percent of the alcohol.How do you cook on a gas oven?
Because gas ovens tend to have more ambient moisture in the air, it can take longer \u2014 sometimes a lot longer \u2014 for foods to brown on top. If you'd like to speed along the browning process, move the tray to the top of the oven or place a second baking sheet directly above the food.HOW TO LIGHT \u0026 BAKE WITH GAS OVEN||THE DO'S \u0026 DONT'S||HACKS \u0026 HEAT CONTROL|| DELICIOUS TALES
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