If you’ve ever stood in a busy commercial kitchen at lunch service, watching chefs dart between sauté pans, stock pots, and simmering sauces, you know how much reliability and consistency count. As someone who’s spent the last 12 years selling and supporting commercial induction hobs, one question I get asked more than any other is: “Can I actually make stews on these things?” Stews, after all, are a whole different beast from the flash-of-heat stir-fries or fast boils you might associate with induction—they need long, slow, even heat, the kind that keeps meat tender, melts vegetables down, and builds deep, layered flavors without burning the bottom of the pot. For a long time, I even wondered the same thing myself, back when induction was still a niche tool in a few upscale kitchens and most chefs swore by gas or electric ranges for long-cooked dishes. Today, induction’s come a long way, and after working with hundreds of cafes, caterers, and full-service restaurants to test their setups, I can say with confidence: yes, a commercial induction hob absolutely can be used for making stews—and in many ways, it’s actually better for the job than the alternatives. Commercial Induction Hob
Let’s start with how commercial induction actually works, because that’s the foundation of why it’s so good (and occasionally tricky) for stews. Unlike gas, which heats the air around a pot, or even traditional electric coil elements that heat up and radiate heat indirectly, induction works by creating a magnetic field that excites the iron or steel molecules in your cookware itself. The result is that the heat only appears in the pot, not on the hob surface or the air around it. For stews, that’s a huge win: you’re not wasting energy heating the kitchen (a massive bonus in summer, when commercial kitchens can easily hit 100 degrees Fahrenheit) and every bit of power goes straight into warming your stew. But magnetic fields only work with ferrous metal, so that means you can’t use copper, aluminum, or glass cookware unless it has a compatible magnetic base—something I always make a point to mention to customers who come to me asking about induction for stew projects.
The biggest complaint I used to hear about induction for slow cooking was that it couldn’t hold a low, steady heat for hours. I get that—when you make a beef bourguignon or a lamb shank stew, you don’t want the heat spiking and dropping every few minutes. Back in the early 2010s, entry-level commercial induction hobs had a hard time with that; their power controls were coarse, so you’d either get a rolling boil or a heat so low it barely kept the liquid warm. But modern commercial models? They’re built with precision power settings that let you dial in heat as low as 100 watts, which is exactly what you need for a gentle, simmering stew. That’s not a guess—last year, I worked with a small French bistro in downtown Chicago that switched from gas to our medium-duty induction hobs for all their long-cooked dishes, including a daily boeuf à la mode. Their sous chef, Pierre, told me that for the first time, he didn’t have to babysit the pot for two and a half hours, adjusting the gas knob every 15 minutes to keep it from boiling over or drying out. The induction hob held a perfect, rippling simmer the entire time, with zero hot spots on the bottom of his 20-quart cast-iron Dutch oven.
Hot spots are another critical point for stews. When you cook a stew, the flavor comes from layers: searing the meat to build a Maillard crust, sweating onions and garlic until they’re translucent, then letting all those flavors meld together over low heat. If your heat is uneven, you’ll end up with bits of onion burning on the bottom of the pot while the rest of the stew stays cool, and that bitter burnt taste can ruin an entire batch. Gas ranges, especially older ones, often have hot spots around the edges of the burner, and electric coil elements have the same issue. Induction? Because the heat is generated evenly across the entire base of the compatible pot, hot spots are practically non-existent. That’s been a game-changer for the catering company I worked with last summer, which does large-scale stews for weddings and corporate events. They were using two 40-quart stock pots on their old electric range, and roughly one in four batches had burnt bits at the bottom. After switching to our heavy-duty induction hobs, that number dropped to zero. The chef, Maria, told me she could fill two 40-quart pots with beef and root vegetables, turn the hob to 1500 watts, and walk away for three hours without checking on them. No stirring every 20 minutes, no burnt stew—just consistent, even cooking.
Let’s talk about energy efficiency too, because that’s a big selling point for commercial kitchens. Gas ranges lose roughly 40-50% of their heat to the surrounding air and the exhaust system, right? Induction hobs are 80-90% efficient, because they’re only heating the pot. For a kitchen that’s making 5-6 batches of stew a week, that adds up to real money. I had a customer, a family-owned Italian restaurant in Boston, who ran their numbers after switching to induction for stews and sauces. They were spending $280 a month on gas for their large stock pot burner; after six months on induction, that dropped to $110 a month. That’s an extra $2,000 a year they could put toward ingredients, staff, or improving their dining room. Plus, since induction hobs don’t emit open flame or hold heat on the surface after you turn them off, they’re safer for busy commercial kitchens. No more chef’s aprons brushing against a hot gas burner, no more leaving a stew simmering and forgetting to turn it off (I’ve heard too many horror stories of gas ranges burning up a kitchen’s entire lunch service because someone walked away from a stew pot).
Now, I’d be lying if I said there aren’t a few things you have to get right if you want to use commercial induction hobs for stews. First, your cookware matters. It has to be made of ferrous metal (cast iron, stainless steel with a magnetic base, enameled cast iron works perfectly) and the base has to be flat and match the size of the hob you’re using. If you have a 12-inch Dutch oven, you don’t want to put it on a 6-inch hob—you’ll get uneven heating, and the hob might not recognize the pot, so it won’t turn on. I always recommend that customers match the hob size to their largest stew pot, or get hobs with flexible size detection, which most modern commercial models have. Second, you don’t want to oversize the hob for small stews. If you’re making a 4-quart stew, a 3000-watt induction hob is more than enough, and you’ll get better low heat control than if you use a 5000-watt hob designed for large stock pots. Third, for really large batches—like 50-gallon stews for a festival or a catered event—you might need multiple hobs, but even then, induction is more reliable than trying to run that many gas lines or electric coils at once.
I also want to address a common myth: induction is only good for small, fast dishes. That’s just not true for commercial grade units. At our company, we test every induction hob we sell by running a 20-quart stew pot on the low simmer setting for four hours straight, just to make sure it doesn’t drop heat or have any power fluctuations. We’ve even had a university cafeteria that uses our heavy-duty induction hobs for their daily beef stew, which serves 200 students. Their assistant director told me last semester that the stew has been more consistent since they switched, and they’ve cut their annual energy bill for kitchen equipment by almost 15%.
If you’re still on the fence about making the switch, let me leave you with a real example from a customer who was skeptical at first. Last year, a senior chef at a hotel in Seattle reached out to me, saying he’d spent 25 years making stews on gas, and he “refused to let some new fangled hob mess up his signature osso buco.” He came to our showroom with his own Dutch oven, tested making half a batch of stew on our medium-duty induction hob, and went back to his hotel that night. A week later, he called to place an order for four hobs for his kitchen. His exact words: “It simmered better than my gas stove, no burnt bottom, and my line cooks stopped complaining about the kitchen being so hot. I should have done this years ago.”
Commercial Hot Water Dispenser At the end of the day, making stews is all about control—control of heat, control of consistency, control of flavor. A commercial induction hob gives you all that and more. It’s efficient, safe, reliable, and delivers even heat that’s perfect for slow-cooked, layered stews. If you’re a restaurant owner, caterer, or kitchen manager looking to upgrade your cooking equipment and make better stews without the hassle, we can help you find the right setup for your space and your menu. If you’re ready to talk through your needs, get a quote, or answer any other questions about how induction works for stews and other long-cooked dishes, feel free to reach out to us to connect for procurement discussions.
References
- U.S. Department of Energy. (2022). Energy Efficiency in Commercial Kitchen Equipment. Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy.
- National Restaurant Association. (2021). Commercial Kitchen Equipment Trends and Performance Standards.
- Food Service Technology Center. (2020). Comparative Analysis of Induction vs. Gas Cooking for Slow-Cooked Dishes.
- International Association of Culinary Professionals. (2019). Best Practices for Induction Cookware and Cooking Methods.
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