In the Commercial Kitchen: Meet Vollrath, The Destructor

Better than Gozer.

And you thought it was Gozer.  Right.  Gozer’s got nothing on Vollrath.  Let me introduce you to him.  Vollrath is a brand name of commercial kitchen products, including steam tables, cookware and All Manner of Items for hot buffet service.  And Induction Burners.  At the restaurant, we named our induction burner Vollrath.  Because it came with a nametag that read Vollrath.  Initially, we feared him.  We were slow to learn his ways, his needs and his requirements, but once All was Made Clear, we adored Vollrath.

If you’re unfamiliar with Induction Cookery, in a nutshell, it uses big old magnets to excite ferrous molecules into heating up.  So, the burner itself doesn’t get hot, but the pan does.  It’s kind of freaky, but you can even put a towel under the pan on the burner and still cook.  What’s so cool about induction?  Well, it’s fast.  Really fast.  With Vollrath, we could bring 2-3 gallons of water to a boil in about 5 minutes.  Crazy, huh?  Also, it’s cool.  I don’t mean like Cool-Keen, although it is that.  I mean Temperature Cool.  Since the burner doesn’t heat up, there is no spillover heat.  No more spoon handles getting hot because the burner is bigger than the pan.  If your pan is only 6″ in diameter or if your pan is as big as the burner, it’s all the same–just the pan heats up.  This is a very Good Thing, especially in the pastry kitchen where we made a lot of delicate sauces.  If you’ve ever tried boiling sugar or making an Anglaise on a gas burner, you know how hard it is to control the heat so you don’t have Rabid Flames licking up the sides of your pans.  Inevitably, some sugar burns to the sides or you end up with a thick brown film of burned on Anglaise up the sides.  With induction, this doesn’t happen.  It’s Magical.

Vollrath needed a Special Outlet.  Because he was European and was unwilling to fully commit to our Brash American Ways.  Well, after we’d been open for a couple of weeks, a Bad Thing happened and Vollrath’s special outlet Died, killing poor Vollrath in the process.  We had to send him away for Fixing and were forced to share the big stupid hot gas stove with the Boys on the Hot Side.  Too many folks trying to work at one stove.  Not enough control over the heat (did I mention that Vollrath could be set between 1 and 100?).  Sugar burning up the sides of the pan.  We threw a party when Vollrath made his Victorious Return, let me tell you.  We used him for everything–from keeping a sauce warm to making dark caramel to blanching our pretzels to making bechamel to making pate a choux.  We used him on 5.  We used him on 48, on 69, on 100.

Now that Vollrath and I are Parted, I still miss him every day.  Making sabayon on Vollrath is foolproof.  Making sabayon on my dumb glass cooktop (DGC)  is Difficult.  At best.  Part of the plan for our Dream Kitchen is to have 2 wall ovens and no cook top.  We’d just have two, two-burner portable Vollraths that we could use and then put away, leaving us with a ton of counter space for prep.  Not practical until we’re in our dream house, because I doubt that subsequent buyers would be Keen on the idea of not having a stove.  Sillies.  Still, we can dream.  The Beloved even mentioned buying one or two of Vollrath’s cousins to use since Wally the Kitten burned his wee front pads on the DGC.  (Oh, I just now realized that my V is magically working again.  No more apostrophes, until another letter takes a short vacation, I guess.   Too bad.  With all my e’ens, I felt like a Romantic Poet).

Anyway, I just wanted to put in my plug for Induction Cookery.  If and when we buy a home model (a model who doesn’t mind fully committing to the US power grid), I’ll be sure to review it to see how it stacks up against the DGC and Vollrath.  That’s all.