I wasn't too surprised because we had had a cooker crisis a few years ago - at Christmas. The repair man then seemed surprised that a cooker as old as ours was still functioning at all. He mended it for us but - as he went out the door - told us very firmly - not to call him the next time it broke. It would then - he said - be fit for nothing else but the scrap heap.
Well that was quite a few years ago, so it has done very well.
I remember him looking inside the main oven and exclaiming in horror and saying in a very accusatory sort of way
"You don't open roast do you?"
I had to think very hard about this. What did he mean? I felt attacked and very foolish and tentatively asked him what he meant.
He explained - as if to a total idiot - that open roasting meant roasting in an uncovered receptacle.
Well I don't know about you - but to me - roasting involves putting a chunk of meat in a roasting dish and bunging it in the oven - for 20 minutes per lb plus 20 minutes. The roast potatoes get put in around it about 45 minutes before the end.
Infallible - works a treat - as done by my mother and probably her mother before that.
I wouldn't dream of putting it in a covered container. That would not be proper roasting - it would be braising or something weird like that - a different process altogether.
I proceeded to tell this to said repair man.
He looked duly amazed and then told me that NO-ONE open roasted now and that I was most unusual.
He then said something extra-ordinary -
"Cookers nowadays are not designed for open roasting.
If you open roast in a modern oven you will destroy it"
I think his explanation also involved a description of the fatty fumes getting into the fan where they cant be cleaned. Certainly my cooker billows fumes whenever it is in action.
But no more - the main element was dead.
Someone pointed out to me that my cooker was multi-function and it could also cook conventionally and that perhaps the conventional elements top and bottom still worked.
This was an exciting find. I had no idea that it was multi-functional whatever that meant. I had no idea that it could be a conventional oven as well as a fan oven. I had no idea that the element for the fan was situated in the back wall and the elements for the conventional cooker in the floor and roof.
So - I tried it
The kitchen immediately filled with horrific choking fumes. I reckoned it was all the years of fat that had accumulated on the never-used conventional elements. So I gave it 2 hours - with all the windows open - to burn themselves clean. But there was no improvement
On Christmas Eve, in desperation, I got down on hands and knees and inspected it.
It looked as if the oven floor was trying to peel off a layer. With nothing to lose I carefully lifted up the peeling off bit.
It occurred to me that what I was looking at was some sort of oven liner thing, made out of black synthetic something, possibly put there years ago. Lying directly over the lower conventional element - this was the cause of the fumes. It was removed and binned and the problem was solved.
The Christmas meal was open roasted in a fumeless kitchen.
However - with Christmas out of the way - I must now investigate and ultimately buy a new cooker.
If I wanted to buy a new computer or tablet, the internet overflows with reviews going into the most minute detail on every available product
For cookers - there is nothing
The lack of anything has driven me to take out a subscription to Which magazine. Even that is pretty useless.
Because I don't have gas in my kitchen, I sadly have to have an electric hob.
Do I really want an induction hob and have to throw away all my existing pans which would be rendered useless?
I want to find out more about ceramic hobs and the rings that lurk beneath them.
Are they fast halogen?
Are they those dreadful ones that keep turning themselves off, whilst pretending to keep the pan at a steady temperature?
I want to know the wattage of the oven - how powerful it is?
Why is there this lack of information - it is very basic stuff
Sadly the answer is - I think -
That very few people cook anymore
Very few people do the sort of real cooking from basics done by previous generations - the sort where open roasting is normal.
Most younger people use their cooker - if they use it all - to reheat ready made meals - in covered containers - while they play with their tablet!
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