Overheat protection / alarm for stovetop cooking?

[Smithy]

I've been trying to dream up an alarm or a safety switch for stovetop cooking when a cook is busy. I have managed to ruin more than one batch of "boiled" eggs, and at least one stew pot, from distracted cooking in which the water boils out of the pot and wrecks the eggs, or the stew overheats and chars until the pot overheats too. In my household it's an embarrassing inconvenience. In other circumstances it might be a safety issue.

The logic is fairly simple, I think: a probe measures the interior bottom temperature for the pot, or an infrared sensor measures the bottom exterior temperature of the pot. Either way, it can't go much about 212F unless it's boiled dry. (This would, of course, not work for a saute pan.) If the temperature rises above a certain point, an alarm sounds or a breaker turns off the stove. The infrared sensor could also be used to alarm a burner coil that was left on after the pot was taken off.

I'm pretty sure I could kluge something like this together, given time, but it would look like a kluge. Has any clever company already invented and marketed such a device? Does anyone know of it?

[Darienne]

There is a device on the market now called the Stove Guard. You can set it for a number of minutes and then it will shut off...however it will shut off the entire stove and oven. It can work by time and by sensor.

It is a very good safety device for the senior mind, forgetful people, institutions, etc. You can buy one for regular electric and glass top stoves and they are working on one for gas ranges. Made in Saskatchewan. http://stoveguard.ca/

My DH, while wonderful in so many ways, has the mind of the proverbial sieve and it has saved our bacon, both literally and figuratively many times already.

[ray goud]

There already exists such a "device" which does not look "kluge"-y, depending on your viewpoint: a personal chef!

Ray

[Smithy]

EGullet comes through again: The Stove Guard is precisely the kind of device needed! If the plug arrangement works, and if my mother's landlords agree with the installation, we're in business. Thanks, Darienne!

Any other similar devices out there, in case I can't get the plugs to match up?

Ray Goud, when I'm visiting I *am* the personal chef. However, the purpose here is to allow a senior citizen to continue her independence and cooking privileges in an assisted living facility....

[Darienne]

If I can get up on my 'Stove Guard' soapbox for a minute. It is amazing the lack of advertising or credit, of any kind, that this product is receiving. True to its tremendous credit, Consumer Reports did a write up in the last year or so...that's how we found it. (No, I don't work for either company) Many older persons could remain in their houses with such a device. I have passed on the word to a number of admin folks in our senior sector...no idea of any results. If I were younger and still wanting to be in business, I would take on a distributor for certain.

Also to their credit, the Americans are typically picking up on this item much faster than the Canadians.

Must warn you that it DOES have some drawbacks which have been discussed here in an earlier topic. Although you can set the timer part of the unit to up to 99 minutes (if I recall correctly...we have never used that aspect of it), you can also disarm the unit for long term cooking, like roasts...or just plain old cooking on the stove top when you are in and out of the room. Ed is not allowed to do that unless he tells me.

So, if you disarm it...as someone pointed out in the earlier thread...what's to make you rearm it? Good question. Answer: NOTHING. So it still needs someone with a 'memory'.

Good luck.