Marie-Antoine Careme is the first celebrity chef in modern culinary. He brought French cuisine from the Middle Age to the modern age. Unfortunately, the life of genius chef Careme was too short. He died in 1834 at the age of only 48. It was because he had been working too long in a poorly ventilated kitchen. At that time, cooks used coal fires in kitchens. Many cooks who inhaled harmful substances generated during the combustion process suffered from lung diseases or had short lives.

It wasn't until the 1940s that gas stoves began to be used in earnest in restaurant kitchens. Alexis Soyer, one of the legendary chefs following Careme, made headlines in 1941 when he introduced gas stove cooking equipment to the kitchen of the Reform Club of London. Soyer praised the safety of the gas fire. He said the gas fire yielded the same heat as a coal fire without generating harmful substances. But cooking is a science. Science advances. The dangers of gas stoves, which seemed safe by the standards of the 1940s, are now being revealed by scientists' research. According to a study published in December 2022, it is estimated that 12.7 percent of pediatric asthma in the U.S. is caused by the use of a gas stove for cooking at home. Even adults with asthma can experience worsening symptoms.

Healthy people may be less vulnerable but it is still good to have sufficient ventilation when cooking. If you close all the windows and cook in the cold winter, the concentration of harmful substances in the house goes up. It is safe to turn on the hood when turning on the gas stove. Use the gas stove only when absolutely necessary. You can boil water not on a gas stove but in an electric kettle. If you have to boil water on a gas stove inevitably, you need ventilation. This is because not only fine particles generated from food when frying or baking is a problem but also exposure to harmful substances produced from the gas stove itself must be reduced.

On Jan. 10, Richard Trumka Jr, a U.S. Consumer Product Safety commissioner, set off a controversy when he said the agency could ban gas stoves. Opponents raised voices that they could not throw away gas stoves already in use. However, concerns about gas stoves stem from their environmental impact. Unlike Soyer’s idea that a gas fire is safe, it produces various pollutants.

According to a 2022 study by Stanford University, the methane gas leaking from gas stoves in American homes was equivalent to the gas emissions from 500,000 cars a year. When you use a gas fire at home, nitrogen oxides are generated, just like when gasoline or diesel is burned in a car engine. Ventilation can reduce the impact of gas stoves on health but not on the earth. If possible, this is why you should consider alternatives such as electric cooktops when replacing an aging gas stove.

Jeong Jae-hoon is a food writer and pharmacist. He covers a variety of subjects, including trends in food, wellness and medications. This column was originally published in Korean in Joongang Ilbo on Jan. 16, 2023. – Ed.