Abstract: A cooking appliance with a cooktop including at least one gas burner includes a control for sequentially delivering gas and igniting the gas to burner ports. The control comprises a valve with a responsive element for controlling gas flow to the burner ports, an ignition module for generating a drive signal to an ignitor, an electronic controller interfacing with the ignition module and coupled to a driver for actuating a responsive element in the valve. The driver that causes displacement of the responsive element includes a pick up actuator enabling the responsive element to initiate a status that opens the passageway. The valve also includes a holding actuator that enables the responsive element to maintain the status of the passageway as open when flame is detected at the burner.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for controlling a cooking apparatus operates a plurality of cooking energy sources with a control including switches that reduce the input manipulations required by a user in order to operate one or more of the cooking energy sources to complete a cooking operation. The control responds to a first selection of a particular food type from a predetermined catalog of food category listings, responds to a second selection for setting a time duration corresponding to an instructional cooking period or recipe, and operates in response to the first and second selectors for generating operating parameters for at least one first cooking source for a predetermined time and for at least one second cooking source for a second predetermined time over a time period of less than and bearing a predetermined relationship to the instructional cooking period.