By: Jenifer Chrisman 

If you live in an older home or apartment, there is every chance you don’t have a range hood (exhaust fan) over your stovetop. While this isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it can cause of couple of issues.

First, hot air from the stove top has no immediate outlet and slowly spreads through the house. While this is great in winter, it can raise your power bill in the summer, especially if you cook a lot. An easy, although only partial, solution is to have a fan (or two) running nearby to help cool the air and distribute it more swiftly.

The second issue was one I ran into more recently. Although I have been an avid cook for many years, it has only been in the last couple of years that I have really ranged out on cooking Asian cuisine. As anyone who cooks a good deal of Asian food knows, if it is a stir fry, the meat and veggies are cooked fast at a high temperature to maintain their color, texture and crunch.

While I am all for trying new cooking styles, this one posed and immediate and far more annoying problem than the heat. By the time I was finished cooking my very first batch of Jeyuk Bokkeum (Korean spicy pork), my entire house was filled with smoke.

Sadly, it didn’t occur to me until I made my third stir fry that there had to be a solution, other than installing a range hood. The most obvious answer that came to me was actually the correct one. My favorite go-to cooking oil has always been olive oil. And, since I have been cooking a lot of Asian meals, sesame takes a close second. However, after a bit of research, neither are good options for high heat cooking.

After considerably more research, I determined avocado oil, which has a smoke point of 520˚ Fahrenheit, is the clear winner. Safflower, depending on its quality, could be a good backup option.

This, in turn, led me to wondering just how hot the stovetop gets and what temperature true high heat is. The information was easy to obtain for a gas stove, but, sadly, far more difficult in regard to electric. The best I could find was on medium.com, which offered a general range for low (200-300˚), medium (300-400˚) and high (400-500˚) heat. As they explain it, temperature is dependent upon each individual stovetop, and they strongly recommend careful experimentation to determine what settings to use when cooking various types of dishes.

Despite the change to avocado oil, there is still some smoke, especially when batch cooking is necessary. But I can tell you from multiple experiences, it is nothing compared to my first few times cooking at high heat with the wrong smoke point oil. Now I only have to open a window for about ten minutes, fans running, rather than the two to three hours it took to clear the air before I made the switch.

For a more comprehensive list, view or download the Cooking Oil Smoke Point Chart.pdf, which also includes calories per tablespoon of each of the oils listed.

Stovetop Temperature Source:

Medium heat on the stove. When it comes to cooking on an electric… | by vicky joshi | Medium