What is the most energy efficient way to cook meat on an electric stove? I have a reduced sense of taste and smell; so when I cook, things like preparation times, cost of ingredients, energy efficiency, healthiness and to a small extent novelty of the dish play a slightly more important role than taste or even texture (for taste I usually just add some bitter Marmite or some extra hot Chakalaka).  There is one taste that I do not like and that is the greasy taste.

Thus I sometimes find myself cooking some cheap cut of meat to put on bread.  So I am asking how do I make my cooking more energy efficient? Here are the constraints: it should not be mince (unless that answer can be easily tacked on), the precooking preparation time should be most 10 minutes (the actual cooking time does not matter), it should use a minimal amount of oil (if at all), the meat should be well done and I am cooking in a stainless steel pot on an electric stove.

Should I cook the meat quickly or slowly (higher temperatures lose more heat per second, but cook the meat faster)?  Should I cook it in water or fry it (for cooking in water, more heat is transferred to the meat, but energy is lost due to evaporation and it takes energy to heat the water)?  The only thing that I am certain of is that I must cook with the lid on.

I am also interested in the science behind it.
As @Jefromi says, there is no simple answer. Also depends on your definition of "cooked".


For water vs oil,  most likely oil is more energy efficient. Frying a 16 oz steak takes only ~5/10  minutes, whereas boiling 16 oz of meat in water will take at least double that time, even if you use exact same pan and exact same stove. If you cut the meat more strategically, you can save some energy, which brings me to 2nd point.
The shape of the meat will have a big influence. For example, a 1 inch thick tenderloin will take considerably more energy to "cook" compared to 4 tenderloin steaks of quarter inch, assuming you can lay all 4 steaks in a pan together.


There is a saying that in ancient China, stove fuel was hard to come by, thats why they always used to cut the meat as thin as possible so that the dish finishes cooking fast with minimum stove-time. Don't know if its historically accurate, though :)