ahoj, brit-speakers

[fox]

cooker.

does it include what we here in the states would call an oven (for baking), or is it only the part we call the stove (or stovetop)?

Comments

[thermidor.livejournal.com]

my brief impression was that cooker was equivalent to oven while "hob" was Britspeak for stovetop.

I could be completely wrong though...

[darthfox.livejournal.com]

i was pretty sure the cooker was the stovetop when i was in edinburgh; isn't a hob just a burner?

(and what's the difference between a stove[top] and a range?)

[datlowen.livejournal.com]

I think a "range" is a stovetop/oven combo. But I could well be wrong.

[thalia]

I think "range" is a stove/oven combo, and a "stove" is, well, the stove part of it. We have the stove portion on an island, and I can tell you that that's called a cooktop, since I've been looking at new ones for several months. In the stores, if you say stove, they assume you mean a stove/oven combo unit.

[datlowen.livejournal.com]

Why are you greeting them in Czech?

[darthfox.livejournal.com]

because you've been saying "ahoj" for years and i'm all impressionable and stuff.

[gloriana.livejournal.com]

A cooker is normally the entire thing: four burners, an oven and often a grill *above* the rings, at eye level (though this is dying out, it would certainly have been true ten plus years ago - I don't think I've ever seen this configuration on a US cooking device). Sometimes the grill is above the oven below the rings, but I don't think I've ever seen the US style of having the grill at the bottom of the oven.

Separate ovens and hobs have slowly become more fashionable, but there are still a lot of cookers (which are really quite basic things) sold as one unit.

[ex-ajhalluk585.livejournal.com]

and often a grill *above* the rings, at eye level (though this is dying out, it would certainly have been true ten plus years ago - I don't think I've ever seen this configuration on a US cooking device).

As Flanders and Swann pointed out, the eye-level grill was for convenience, so that without one having to bend down the hot fat could squirt straight into your eye.

The cooker is the whole thing, but are your people rather wealthy and do they live in the country? If so, give them an Aga. So far as I can tell from those who own them the things are piglets to manage and terrible to cook on, but oh! the social cachet!

Also, is it gas or electric? Very hard to get gas in modern flats (curtheth!) but a gas cooker is incomparable to cook on (as in the phrase "Now we're cooking with gas" to denote things going right after a period of frustration, misunderstanding or difficulty).

[zoethe.livejournal.com]

Hoorah for the Aga! I've never seen one, but I adore the idea - how silly is that.

[still living with the dream of getting to Eurp someday...]