Lessons learned

I have often mentioned that there are things I'd have done differently if I could do my home renovation over again. Well now that we are building a new house, I have the opportunity to do so. Here are some thoughts. I'll keep this post to the kitchen for now. I expect this will be a multi-part series!

Kitchen things I'd do again:

• Big, ginormous, single bowl sink. Those two-bowl sinks are utterly useless. I love my enormous 32" wide, 10" deep sink. You can hide all your dirty dishes until AFTER the dinner party. And you can soak stuff. I hated my little sink where half my saute pan would stick up and out of the sink. Like I said, it was USELESS.
• Big center island. I love a big workspace.
• Prep sink + clean-up sink. Two sinks are essential. But consider placement (see below).
  
• Double oven. Love it for entertaining a crowd.
• Warming drawer. Ditto - great for entertaining.
  
• Easily accessible garbage. I have one garbage pull-out by each sink. One has recycling + garbage and one is just garbage. We fill both.
  
• Massive firepower at the cooktop. I have 22k BTU output on two of my burners which I find really useful for bringing big pots to boil or to do anything with a wok. No wimpy cooktops for me.
  
• Dishdrawers. I love my Fisher Paykel dishdrawers. True, they are noisier than others but I love the convenience and ergonomics of the drawers. F&P now has a "tall" drawer which sounds really good to me. I particularly like them for glassware and for ease of loading and unloading.
  
• Tapmaster. I can operate my sinks hands-free. It's very convenient when your hands are covered in raw chicken goo.
• Glass-front cabinet doors. Brightens everything and prevents guests from wondering where the heck the water glasses are.
• Drawers, drawers and more drawers! Can't get enough of them. With full-extension glides and the soft-close feature. Doors on lower cabinets are a way builders get by on a budget because they are cheap. And mostly useless. The worst thing ever in my opinion? Pull out drawers *behind* cabinet doors. Too many steps.
  
• A walk-in pantry. Honestly, it's just about my favorite thing in my kitchen.
  

Kitchen things I might rethink or do differently this time around:

• Stainless steel everywhere. Fingerprints much? EVERYWHERE! People with children, think long and hard about this. There are some nice new finishes with coatings that make this less of an issue. But kids have a way of imprinting their whole hand right in the middle of the stainless fridge door immediately after you've wiped it. Drives me bonkers.
  
• Black counters. I like dark, simple, "quiet" stone but black is not a good idea. Shows dust and, in my case, everything else. Beware the honed black granite. Dumb, dumb, dumb of me.
• Zero-radius corners in your sink. Fancy stainless steel sinks have these sharp corners. The rounded corners are easier to clean. The sharp corners get kinda funky.
• A desk space. I have a 27" wide "drop-zone" as you enter my kitchen. That small space is where all the junk goes, including mail. It's entirely too small. Next kitchen will have a very large space for mail, coupons, phone, etc.
• A recharging station. I don't have one but I need one.
• More space for cutting boards and vertical storage of cookie sheets, cupcake tins, etc. I have one 12" lower cabinet and I need at least double that space.
  
• Garbage disposals. I have one at each sink but I think I may only need one at the clean-up sink. I'm going to try to compost my prep sink remnants. I may not install a disposal at all this time and see how it goes. Seems very non-green to me to have these.
• Prep sink placement. In my current kitchen I thought I wanted to space my sinks out so I put my prep sink in the island. But the cooktop is on the wall diagonally behind the prep area. So when I cook, I am always chopping on the island, then I have to turn around and transport the chopped stuff nearly 4' to the cooking zone. Not efficient at all.
• On a similar note - a potfiller over your cooktop is pretty sweet if you can swing it. I may not get a potfiller exactly, but I think I will put the prep sink in very close proximity to the cooking zone. That way you get both water and a drain near where you cook. I am always skimming gunk off a pot of something or other and then hoping it doesn't drip on the way to the sink. Between that and the drippy produce from my cutting board, it's messy.
• Microwave placement. Mine is a tad too high for me and definitely too high for the kids. I am pretty sure I am going to mount just below counter-height this time. Or just at counter height. I think I am going to put the microwave on a shelf and ditch the built-in kit. The kit costs almost as much as the appliance!
• While I love cooking with gas, I am considering an induction cooktop. Induction is incredibly efficient and very sleek looking. Also very easy to clean and very safe for kids. I was thinking that I would couple this with a single wok burner so I can get the romance of the flame (and the "wok hee" thing going on with my stir-fry) but it's not the most cost-effective solution since many wok burners cost more than a whole cooktop. I might put the wok burner outside though so I don't need to put a wind tunnel-like ventilation system into this new kitchen. Also, the gas cooking makes the kitchen really warm up on already-warm summer days. With induction, more heat is going into the pan and less into the room. Still torn about this because I really covet a griddle and that's only happening with gas.
  
• Ventilation. I have a supposedly kick-ass Vent-a-Hood today and for some reason it sucks at sucking. It's a big blower and it ain't quiet. I know it's pulling grease out because I see all kinds of gunk when I clean it. But I can have it running full speed and the room still fills with smoke when I'm wokking. Although a downdraft is kind of stupid as I am fighting physics, I have been thinking of it for the next kitchen only because of the aesthetics. I need to think this one through more.
• Plugs and my island. Not enough and not well-placed. Maybe plugmold next time. I've seen people run it just under the lip of their countertops or right under their upper cabinets. I think Sheila Lukins (one of the Silver Palate cookbook ladies) recommended it somewhere.
  
• Two dishwashers. I love my drawers but I am thinking that having one other dishwasher that is of the "standard" variety would be good.
• 30" deep kitchen counters. Normal counters are 24" deep. The wall where I have my sink is 30" deep and it's so much more useful than the conventional depth. First off, my sink is really large and the extra depth helps with that. But it also helps give workable space even if you have small appliances on the counter. The extra little bit really helps. You don't need special cabinets. They are all "regular" depth. I just had them set forward a bit.
  
• Refrigeration. I have a 48" GE Monogram side-by-side today. It has super cold spots and occasionally food freezes in the fridge in a cold spot. I think this is where the dual compressor thing would be handy that Sub-zero has. Only I don't have that kind of budget. A fridge should not cost as much as an automobile unless it keeps your food cold and gets you to and from work everyday. Generally I need a lot of refrigeration space with 3 growing boys and only enough time to do one big shopping trip per week. I think I may do two 36" refrigerators. Two of everything seems to be the theme here. Thank goodness I have a large kitchen. But I don't want to spend a fortune on both purchasing and then running too many compressors. While I like the built-in look, I may abandon it for cost reasons. And no more side-by-sides. The freezer configuaration is lame.

When we began our last remodel our kids were very young. Right after we were done with the house, the boys both hit elementary school. And after school sports. And activities. Kids have an insane amount of junk! Just the number of shoes we have in front of every door in our house is crazy. This time around, we are doing a generously sized mudroom right off the garage entrance to the house. It's going to have a bench seat for the putting on and taking off of shoes. Also a large closet for jackets, coats and the like. I have "lockers" planned to hold sporting gear and backpacks. This will keep the clutter from accumulating on the center island of the kitchen. I love my center island but hate how everything lands there. Thus the grown-up drop zone/desk area and kid drop zone/mudroom. It's my hope that this gives everything a place. At least for a little while. For anyone thinking of remodeling with young kids - talk to me about life after the little ones start school. The traffic patterns all change!

More thoughts to come....