Is Your Oven Stuck on 350 Degrees? It's Not Broken, It's in Sabbath Mode.

When Brenda Glasscock’s top-of-the-line GE oven recently powered down instead of heating up, she worried her newest appliance was torched. “Call GE and say: I broke the oven,” the 75-year-old told her husband. Technical support turned into a lesson in digital-age dogma.

In her effort to bake brownies, Ms. Glasscock, of Athens, Ga., discovered that she inadvertently turned on “Sabbath Mode,” a feature designed to freeze an oven’s settings so observant Jews can abide by religious law restricting electricity on holidays. The Glasscocks tried to skirt that doctrine by flipping the circuit breaker—a trick Sabbath mode is designed to override. They later turned to the Talmud of appliances, the manual, and pressed bake and broil buttons simultaneously for three seconds to revive the oven.

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Sabbath mode, a decades-old concept, is now available in about 85% of built-in ranges and nearly two-thirds of wall ovens, according to TraQline, a market-research firm that tracks the industry. Each passing year, manufacturers expand the availability to appliances from refrigerators to dishwashers, so they now make up almost a third of all machines. In ovens, Sabbath mode disables the light and display, and allows people to set the temperature to warm food without shutting off. In refrigerators, the mode disables the lights and auto-defrost, as well as the water and ice systems. The setting is increasingly leaving cooks unfamiliar with it in a stew of confusion.

Jewish law, known as halakha, forbids work on the Sabbath. From sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, observant Jews refrain from cooking and starting or extinguishing fires—an ancient prohibition that rabbinic authorities extended to anything electrical. Many non-Jews don’t realize the mode exists. Triggering it varies by make and model. On many of GE Appliances’ ovens, it starts when bake and broil pads are pressed simultaneously, followed by pushing the delay start pad. That combination turns the temperature to the pre-ordained warming level of 350 degrees and puts a backward “C” on the display.

GE Appliances said all its cooking products are designed to operate safely in Sabbath Mode. The company said the ovens’ safety design automatically turns off the oven if it detects the temperature is too high and that regulatory testing verifies the safety of leaving ovens and ranges on in Sabbath mode for multiple days. People who accidentally activate it chalk it up to fidgety fingers or absentminded baking. Because the oven stops beeping and its display goes haywire, they immediately think the appliance is broken.

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https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-your-oven-stuck-on-350-degrees-its-not-broken-its-in-sabbath-mode-11629401988 (subscription)