My oven is so big that I reckon I could almost fit inside it if I took out all the shelves. And no, I haven’t actually tried it. But as impressive as it is, for eight months after I moved in to my house, I didn’t use it.
Was it my natural inclination to avoid cooking? Nope.
Was I overwhelmed by its size, or number of knobs? Nope.
I did try to use it – and some of it worked. The five gas burners on the stove worked almost perfectly. The auto-electric starter worked on three out of five. But take a match to the other two and all five burners operated beautifully. According to the plumber, who came to connect a new gas cylinder to power the burners, there was probably a ‘short in the electrics somewhere’. No big deal. Being a proud pyromaniac, I’m happy to use a match to light the ‘non-starters’.
Then I tried toasting bread under the grill. Epic fail. The best I could do was warm the bread slightly, but there wasn’t a hint of brown to be seen. Conclusion – while the gas stove worked, the electric oven didn’t.
Most people, confronted with this evidence, would call an electrician or some kind of oven technician. Not me though. I have a ‘thing’ about ringing people I don’t know. Case in point, I put off contacting the plumber for two months about connecting the spare gas cylinder, and only called him when the first cylinder had actually run out of gas. Basically, the problem was that I didn’t know what the problem was, and I could imagine, with excruciating clarity, how the phone call would go …
Electrician: Hello, how can I help?
Me: My oven doesn’t work … well, it kind of works, but it sort of doesn’t.
Silence as the electrician contemplates where this comes in on his list of Top 10 stupid customer responses.
Electrician: What kind of oven is it?
This was the secondary problem. I didn’t purchase the oven and there was no manual, nor is the model number helpfully inscribed anywhere on the appliance. Furthermore, when I searched on the manufacturer’s website, I couldn’t find an exact match.
Me: Not totally sure. Best I can tell it’s a Euromaid GE90S.
Electrician: And what makes you think it’s … not working properly?
Me: Well, there seems to be a short in the auto-electric starter for two of the gas burners, and I can’t make toast.
Rocketing up someone’s Top 10 list of stupid customer responses is not my idea of time well spent. So, until I can dignify an electrician’s preliminary questions with more intelligent answers, I procrastinate.
In the meantime though, I’ve offered to make roast pork with crackling for my father’s birthday. No doubt he wondered how this miraculous feat was going to be achieved – he knew about the toast episode – but he smiled and nodded and graciously accepted. Now there is nothing quite as motivating as a deadline, so I had to get to work. To be ready for the ‘And what makes you think the oven’s not working properly’ question, I needed data.
Approaching the task methodically, if not scientifically, I decided to test each of the oven settings in turn. I employed my trusty oven thermometer to compare the actual oven temperature to that on the dial. I also decided to photograph my evidence before recording it in a spreadsheet later for analysis.
Imagine my surprise when I got a temperature reading of 200°C! I took a photo, and when I looked at it closely, I started to wish I’d looked at the dials more closely long before this …
Logically, the numbers should have been under the thermometer symbol and that’s what my ‘looking more closely’ revealed … There was never anything wrong with the oven. I just couldn’t get the combination of setting and temperature right because some spud-trumpet had switched the dial plates!
It took me about ninety seconds to switch them over. Now I can use my oven. It’s an embarrassing oversight, I admit – and one that deprived me of roast pork, and chocolate brownies, for eight months – but I am really glad I never called an electrician. Procrastination may not pay very well, but it certainly can save you money … and sometimes, your reputation.