Saving When Using Your Stove and Oven

Today, I want to give you some tips on saving energy when using your stove top and oven.

I have a gas stove but these tips will save you energy even if you have an electric stove.

When using your stove top, choose pans that fit the burners. You don’t want to put a small pan on a large burner or a large pan on a small burner and waste all that extra energy.

Get in the habit of using covers when you cook. Your food will cook faster especially if you are heating anything with water in it. If you are cooking something like spaghetti or hard boiled eggs, only use as much water as is necessary to cover these things. Filling the pot when unnecessary will waste  energy.

Don’t use your stove top to heat just water. Use your microwave; it uses a lot less energy.

Use the proper heat setting. Most things cook just fine on medium heat. 

Keep your stove top clean. When you allow food to blacken and burn on, it reduces the efficiency of the burner.

Buy good quality pans. A warped pan can reduce the energy by 50%. A flat pan uses all of the energy.

Plan ahead and defrost all of your food that is going into a pan or the oven. It will take less time to cook. Choose easy meals that don’t take a lot of cook time. 

Get in the habit of turning off your stove top burner a few minutes before your food is done. The burner heat will finish cooking your food. Do the same when baking or roasting in your oven.

When you cook, prepare extra food for another meal. Heat that 2nd meal up in the microwave, not on the stove top. When cooking pasta, make extra to keep in the fridge. Use it to make a pasta salad or another dish that can easily be cooked in the microwave. Be sure to coat it with olive oil so that you can easily dish out what you need to use. 

When using your oven, bake or roast more than one item. Do not use foil on your racks, so that you can stagger your pans and get good airflow. I have done four things at a time in my oven many times.

I only use my oven for roasting when I am doing a large piece of meat like a turkey or the 10 lb. ham I heated up last night for a few dinners this week. I also roast large chickens or legs of lamb that won’t fit in the toaster oven. Small pieces of meat like chops or chicken thighs or breasts bake very well in my toaster oven. Cook your steaks outside on the grill. That tastes the best! I have even done them out there in the middle of a snowstorm.

Keep your oven clean by wiping it out after it has cooled down. This will allow you to not use the self clean so often. The self clean feature is an energy hog. A clean oven is also an efficient oven.


If you have a convection oven like I do, use it. It saves 25% of the cook time which saves a lot of energy.


Preheat your oven when it is necessary, after you have your dish made. Don’t preheat it and then let it sit while you are preparing your food.


Using glass and Pyrex pans in your oven lets you use a lower temperature to cook.


While you are using the oven don’t peek. Every time you peek, you lose about 25 degrees of temperature.

And finally, the best way to save the energy of your stove top and oven, is to ask yourself this question when you are about to cook something. Can I cook it cheaper in the toaster oven, microwave, air fryer, pressure cooker, crock pot, electric skillet or any other energy saving small appliance that you might own?

How do you save energy when using your stove top or oven?