where am I?
Help! My food is dry and overcooked
Answer
Dear Claire
Chops and steaks should be contact grilled on a ridged pan on the Aga boiling plate. The round cast iron Aga one is my favourite and I use it a lot. Heat it clean and dry on the boiling plate for four minutes to absorb the full amount of heat ready for cooking. Brush the ridges with a little fat from the side of the meat and then place the meat on the ridges. Grill for just a few minutes each side as the process is very quick. Once you have mastered the technique you might like to go on to transfer the pan to the floor of the roasting oven to finish cooking once your have added the meat. This keeps the top plate nice and free from splashes. Apart from meaty type fish such as fresh swordfish and tuna which also work well using this technique, fish is generally best grilled using the oven method below.
For grilling bacon etc., place on the grill rack in the high position in a full or half size Aga meat tin and place on the very highest set of runners, so the food is almost touching the roof of the oven. Unless you have been making prolonged use of the simmering plate beforehand you should be able to grill perfectly here.
For cakes requiring a moderate temperature generally cook these on the grid shelf on the floor of the roasting oven with the cold plain shelf typically on the second set of runners at the same time as you put the food in to cook. Aga runners are numbered from top to bottom.
I hope the above is of some help. I am assuming that you are running your Aga with the mercury of the heat indicator on or just above the black line, and that the cooker was installed on its current fuel from new, by qualified Aga-trained engineers. If your Aga is reconditioned or has been converted from one fuel to another, typically solid fuel to gas or oil, heat distribution within the cooker may be different, with oven temperatures at variance to an Aga from new. It is for this reason that Aga-Rayburn do not recommend reconditioning or conversions.
Happy Cooking
Best Wishes
Richard Maggs
THE AGA COOKERY DOCTOR
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Hi Richard, I cannot grill bacon, steak or chops in the Aga to anyone`s satisfaction. The meat is always overdone in the main instead of tender with the fat nice and crispy. It`s as if the top of the oven is not hot enough. Can you help? Secondly, a lot of my desserts overcook on the outside before being cooked properly on the inside. I do not have a cake baker, but always use the cold shelf and position both it and the pudding as directed in the recipe. Very often the cooking time required is considerably longer than the recipe dictates. Please advise. Claire Bell.