Pick Up The Fork

A Serious Eater's Guide to Buenos Aires and Beyond

How To Turn On An Oven in Argentina

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Follow these ten easy steps to turn on your oven in Argentina:

  1. Light a match.
  2. Stick your hand into the gas chamber while simultaneously holding down the dial on the top of the stove.
  3. Close your eyes otherwise they will be burned by toxic gases.
  4. Re-do steps 1-3 because the inflamed match is about to inflame your finger.
  5. See step 4.
  6. Triumph! Success! Once the oven is lit… oh wait, fuck, no.. it’s not. See step 4 again.
  7. OK, now you see a little flame, remember to hold down the dial for 5 minutes and wait for the flame to stick.
  8. 5 minutes up! Ready to baaake.. DAMMIT. Nope. False alarm. Flame didn’t stick. Try again
  9. Repeat 1-8 because you take your hand off the dial prematurely.
  10. KABOOM.

*Disclaimer: Your oven will have two temperatures: off or full blast hell-like demon flames.

Be careful not to scorch off your eyebrows. Once I had an incident leaving me with the Uncle Leo.

uncle leo

Author: ForkYou

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Comments

Comments

  1. Comprate un Magiclic!!

    Don’t know if they have those anymore, but they were great when I used to live there. Also, as an added bonus, that is exactly why you cannot buy a commercial stove for your house in NYC, they come with no pilot ignition.

  2. I have another trick. Just think on gas oven physics. There´s a security valve that opens when temperature raises high enough. In order to raise temperature up, after the little flame (¨piloto¨) is lit, close the oven door while holding pressed the knob. This fact makes the inner temperature goes higher at a higher rate than when the door is open, so, safety valve gets locked sooner.

    Enjoy your meal!

  3. I laughed so hard with this post!!! It’s so true!! For me it means war when I have to use it! and sometimes I give up!! The first time I was going to use it, I was having a pizza party at my apartment, and at the end we had to order the pizza cause the oven didn’t turn on! The next day I was so mad that I was determined to turn it on, the sleeve of my pyjama got burned with the explosion!!!
    The disclaimer is brilliant! hahahahaha

  4. Archaic. Old. There is a cut off valve so gas does not escape when there is no flame to burn it. In theory, if the flame goes out for any reason the gas cuts off so you don’t end up bright red and dead on the kitchen floor. :) With old stoves (like mine) this valve has the oven equivalent of memory loss. So it turns the gas off when you want it on. Which is why it is necessary to hold the knob in while you hold a lit match to the gas, trying to bypass the wonky cut off valve.

  5. haahah, you have to hold the knob because the oven has some kind of arcaic security valve, to avoid gas loss, over the time this valve looses its sensibility forcin you to hold that f*cking knob longer. sry for my english, im from arg.

  6. My grandmother had one of those ovens and, beside it, on the wall hung one of those giant-economy-sized boxes of matches. Luckily, my Chilean oven is electric, but the stovetop is another story.

  7. Fun post. I live in Santiago de Chile and have similar appliance issues.
    I don’t have to hold in the knob (that trick’s for the calefont (water heater)), but my oven has flame on the left and right sides, but the little hole to insert the match is only in the middle… so I take the longest match I can find, hold it in there til the flame is about to burn my fingers, then drop it in and then step back and listen for the whoosh when the first side lights, then cringe while waiting for the second, louder whoosh. I CAN regulate the temperature, but only by feel (like on a gas stove)–no temperature markings on a Chilean oven!

  8. South American appliances are truly a challenge to light without setting yourself on fire, ovens, water heaters, heaters…now in Santiago I have an electric oven and I’m so looking forward to not having to mess with it all day long on Thanksgiving just to keep my turkey cooking!!!

    • I’m from the distant past, the year 2008! In this era, all ovens’ electric igniters break after two months. It looks like this isn’t a problem with time machines but with the quality of Argentine ovens :(

  11. I was just thinking about writing a post about this same thing, because I learned an amazing trick! At Step 7, rather than waiting the 5 minutes (a conservative estimate, for my oven) I got really impatient and started vigorously smashing and wiggling the knob. While still pressing it in, I basically pushed it in circles, hard. And voila, it remained lit. This has worked for me every time. I’m sure it may not be a universal trick, nor will it make you appear particularly mature, but I’ve been pretty damn pleased with the results.

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