BY PETER BROOK
More than just a cooker, our Aga—known in the family as ‘Aggie’—is a cast-iron monument to the reliable comforts of home. It is the 90-year-old engine room of our kitchen, and the undisputed heavyweight champion of multi-tasking, often combining cooking with warming up young, wet lambs; drying anything from washing to damp hounds; keeping those same hounds warm and cosy at night; and, of course, ensuring there is a kettle ready to go at all times. If Aggie were human, she would be the personification of ‘Grandma’, the character in the Daily Express cartoon strip created by Giles. This is ‘her’ story.
Newly married, we moved to a very rural county which came without a kitchen of any description, but did have what the estate agent’s particulars described as an ‘elderly’ Aga. The Aga was marked with ‘cannot be tested or used’ by the surveyor, as it had at some time been ‘boxed in’ with plasterboard. Plans were made to have it removed in pieces, but to do that we had to get to it to establish what was needed for renovation. Breaking through revealed that ‘Aggie’, as she is called, had in fact been used after being boxed in, and as a result the inside of the plasterboard was ‘artistically’—but in fact rather worryingly—charred from floor to ceiling as the hot gases had sought a way out.
At this point, we called in the local Aga specialist, who became excited when he realised just how old our ‘Aggie’ was. Research, assisted by our neighbours and the discovery of an old receipt, revealed that ‘Aggie’ was installed in March 1934 and had been in constant use up until about two years before we moved in. Reinstatement consisted of nothing more than a really good clean over several days, combined with the efforts of a good chimney sweep and his trusty camera, before a certificate was issued confirming everything was safe.
Our Aggie has an ‘Elephant’s foot’—no, it meant nothing to me either—but it enabled the engineer, a self-confessed ‘Aga nerd’, to date her reasonably precisely, as it was a modification that was short-lived. His comment on the odd-shaped air intake was then followed by the cryptic, “I see you have dogs, so it might be a problem.” With a bit of research, in the days when the WWW contained fact as opposed to opinion, and a few phone calls, we discovered that the ‘Elephant’s Foot’ was an early air intake which was positioned just where any comfort-loving dog would lie overnight; but in their quest for a warm berth, a large dog would also block any airflow into the Aga. The result was the frequent need to relight it in the morning.
If weather conditions are such that a relight is required, this can only be achieved once the snoozing hounds have been woken up and forced outside for a much-needed ‘walk’—an activity which has occasionally left the unmistakable scent combination of damp dog and singed fur as an early morning aroma in the kitchen.
Devotees of ‘green living’ will, I am sure, be delighted to know that even after decades of use, Aggie delivers all our needs for radiant heat and the resulting bonhomie for both hound and human on around 15–20 ovals of smokeless coal per day—the slight variation depending on wind speed and direction, and thus cooking times ‘may vary’.
The Aga’s story began in the innovative laboratory of Dr. Gustaf Dalén, a Nobel-Prize-winning Swedish physicist. After being blinded in an industrial accident in 1912, Dalén resolved to create a domestic stove that was safe, efficient and, above all, reliable. His design—a cast-iron, heat-storage engineering marvel that could run continuously—perfectly solved the problems of the temperamental and inefficient ranges that were available at the time.
Introduced to the British market in 1929, the Aga found its natural habitat instantly. Here was a device built for the challenges of the British climate and the demands of large, sprawling country kitchens. Manufactured at Coalbrookdale in Shropshire, the Aga became a perfect marriage of industrial heritage and rural utility.
As our home had once been the local GP’s surgery and dispensary, we discovered that our particular Aga had been an essential tool in delivering potions and lotions to the local population, as the GP or the dispenser would use the Aga to formulate or dilute various remedies. We even had a ‘cat flap’ next to the Aga that had been installed to enable medicine to be prepared at any time of day or night and then handed to the recipient without either doctor or patient actually coming into contact with each other—a sort of early remote triage and dispensing process long before the ravages of COVID.
While the Aga’s undoubted champions are ordinary country folk who rely on its 24/7 heat—particularly during the late autumn and winter months—several famous culinary figures have confirmed its status as a kitchen ‘must-have’ for everyone from those living in urban apartments to owners of houseboats and barges, where its weight adds to the ballast needs of waterborne vessels. Mary Berry, the grande dame of British baking and author of numerous books, makes no secret of the fact that she relies on her Aga for the consistent, radiant heat that is essential for flawless sponges and pies, as have Delia Smith and Jamie Oliver, both of whom have championed the traditional, heat-retention virtues of the Aga—though I suspect that they have the more easily tameable oil, gas or perhaps the ‘new’ electric variants.
The Aga holds a special, almost mythological place in the literature and culture of the British countryside, and perhaps because of this, in novels depicting rural life, the presence of the cooker has become a recognised shorthand for a particular lifestyle: the “Aga Saga.”
Our own continuing Aga Saga is not particularly noteworthy, but thanks to Aggie, after a cold day in the fields, the kitchen often becomes the only habitable room. It’s where, even at 90 years old, ‘Aggie’ still ensures flasks can be refilled, sandwiches and sausages prepared for hungry mouths, and the chill is finally driven from the bone—whilst also slow-cooking a game casserole and fruit crumble for later that day.
From its role as a monumental boot-dryer to delivering endless cakes or roast dinners, our Aggie is more than a cooker. It is the steady, cast-iron heartbeat of our home. It embodies tradition, demands resilience and delivers the one thing truly prized after a wet, cold and otherwise miserable day: unwavering, generous warmth.
Peter Brook has authored several books related to Baily’s Hunting Directory, including Baily’s Hunting Directory Activity Boo, Baily’s Pre-Directory Hunt Listing and Great Days Two: Mr Harwicke’s harriers.