Cooking 101: What Is a Recirculating Cooker Hood?

Last Updated on January 10, 2023

Tired of bad smells and steam after you cook? Then you need a recirculation system to extract air from the room. A suitable solution is a recirculating cooker hood that speeds up the air-cleaning process and requires no effort on your part. What is a recirculating cooker hood? Discover how this fan system works and what models to consider.

Recirculating Cooker Hoods

Cooker hoods push air from a cooker through filters to get rid of any cooking odours that would ordinarily go back into your kitchen and home. Most recirculating hoods come with a grease filter, too, that works to remove grease from your kitchen as well as smoke and smells. A recirculating hood is a budget-friendly option for a recirculating extractor while also doing the same job. However, you’ll want to consider the filters that you purchase because a cooker hood requires regular replacements, which might not be the best investment for those searching for a quick fix or if you intend on redesigning your kitchen at some point.

Ducted or Recirculating Hood?

Air Movement

There’s a simple difference between ducted and recirculating hoods: it’s how air moves. The air in a ducted hood is extracted through a pipe that connects to an outdoor vent. When considering a ducted hood, bear in mind that the extraction rate is much higher since the air isn’t released back into the kitchen but travels outdoors. With more bends in the pipes, it can extract only a limited amount of air from your kitchen. But, with fewer bends, this provides an improved airflow through the entire system. The efficiency of this type of hood depends on the size and brand.

On the other hand, a recirculating hood extracts the air from your kitchen through a filtration system that’s built into the hood. This means it can also remove grease and odours at the same time. Additionally, the filter in a cooker hood is designed with carbon to remove kitchen odours and purify the air at the same time, resulting in a smokeless kitchen that’s safe.

External Wall

When deciding between these two hoods, you might want to consider where your kitchen is in position to an outside wall. For a ducted hood, you’ll need the kitchen to be connected to an outside wall to connect pipes in order to release air. So apartments are probably out of the question. This restriction usually makes a cooker hood a much more popular choice since your kitchen needn’t be attached to an external wall for this option.

Hygiene

It’s likely that hygiene is your top priority for choosing a kitchen extraction system. If so, a ducted extraction is your best option because this type of extraction system removes all fumes and odours from your home and sends it outside. And there’s no need to change filters. As a result, your home will smell less when you’re cooking a pungent dish, and you won’t have to worry about maintenance. However, a ducted hood is more of an investment, and it’ll require more costs, particularly if you’re considering a large model for your home.

Benefits of Recirculating Cooker Hood

Not too sure if this extractor system is worth paying someone to install it in your kitchen? Let’s take a look at the benefits of owning an extraction hood.

Recirculate Unwanted Air Particles

Perhaps the biggest benefit is that they make your kitchen smell clean and odour-free. While you might enjoy eating pungent food, the smell remains in kitchens for days if you don’t extract the air. Fortunately, this type of hood extracts the odours from your home and traps them in the filters to leave you with a fresher smelling room.

Efficiency

While you might assume that you could just open a window while you’re cooking, this isn’t as effective at removing unwanted air particles. This is because heat rises, so while you might open your window, there’s no complete guarantee that the air particles will travel towards the window, which can still leave your home riddled with smoke, grease and smells. On the other hand, kitchen extractor hoods attract air particles to catch more than an open window would.

Speed

Best of all, kitchen cooker hoods make this process happen quickly, so you needn’t have the cooker hood on for hours at a time. You can even adjust the extraction rate to filter out more grease and bad smells in your home. As a result, the cooker hood will remove the evidence of curry, fried foods, and other smelly ingredients.

Integrated Lights

Not only is a cooker hood efficient and functional, but they include bulbs to improve visibility in kitchens where natural sunlight would otherwise be a problem. And it means you needn’t invest in additional lamps. A cooker hood can also become the main feature of your kitchen, helping to make it look stylish.

Reduce Cleaning Time

We all want to spend more time on things that make us happy, and a cooker hood can help you spend less time in the kitchen and more time with family. In particular, the extraction system removes grease from your kitchen, so you needn’t spend as long cleaning up afterwards. Plus, after years of cooking in kitchens, you’ll need to set aside a day for deep-cleaning surfaces, but visor hoods help to avoid wasted time spent cleaning.

Removes Condensation

Have you noticed spots of mould in your home? This could be due to a build-up of heat and condensation when you’re cooking. Thanks to the extraction system, cooker hoods remove steam and keep humidity levels low to prevent mould from forming in the first place. This happens by extracting heat, which would otherwise add to the moisture levels in the air.

Choosing the Right Extraction Hood for You

Below are some useful factors to bear in mind to consider when looking for the right cooker hood cover for you.

Extraction Rate

This factor is something that people don’t consider when choosing a cooker hood. However, the extraction rate has a huge impact on its effectiveness in kitchens. For example, if your cooker hood has a high extraction rate, it might require a long time to remove bad smells and may even leave many behind. However, a rate appropriate for your kitchen size will result in more effective filtration and a cleaner home after use. You can calculate the right rate for your kitchen using this formula: length x width x height = rate.

Grease Filters and Charcoal Filters

We previously spoke that cooker hoods come equipped with filters; grease and charcoal filters are only found on this type of kitchen extraction system. In particular, charcoal filters are responsible for removing smell and smoke from kitchens and only require being changed every nine to 12 months.

On the other hand, grease filters may need to be changed every two months, so it might be a good idea to have a pack of this type of filter at the ready instead of having to run out and purchase them every couple of months.

Type of Lighting

We mentioned earlier that many cooker hoods come with built-in lighting, which is a great light source for cooking or even just creating a cosy ambience in your kitchen. You’ll typically find that the lights use either incandescent, LED or halogen bulbs. We recommend making your choice based on energy consumption as opposed to overall brightness.

Moreover, you might also want to consider how easy it is to remove the bulbs and replace them with a new one because, ideally, you don’t want to have to get a screwdriver out every time just for maintenance.

Noise

Cooker hoods can be noisy, which often puts people off of installing one. The general noise levels range from 35—60dB. This volume typically depends on the rate of airflow and the controls that the cooker offers. The more powerful the extraction is, the louder the volume becomes. Take into consideration the noise level of cooker hoods before making your purchase. For some people, the noise level doesn’t matter so much. But if you live in a communal building and often cook late at night, you might prefer a cooker hood with a lower volume. This might also be the case if you have a timid dog, for example.

Built-in or Integrated

Finally, the style of your cooker hood plays an important role in your thoughts on the design. For example, integrated cooker hoods are installed above the cooker and require you to pull out the door to activate it. This requires permanent installation, but it does provide a sleeker finish.

On the other hand, a built-in stainless-steel cooker hood is the best option for larger kitchens because they’re built into the chimney or outdoor tubes and provide greater extraction power.

Remove Bad Smells From Your Kitchen

What is a recirculating cooker hood? It is what will help you have an odour-free kitchen. Additionally, we hope that our tips on what to look for in a cooker hood will guide you to find the right one for your needs.

Now that you know how to efficiently and effectively remove smells after cooking, we’d love to hear about the smelliest recipes you can now cook since you’ve got a cooker hood. Let us know in the comments.