What do you do in your kitchen?

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that enjoys cooking.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

Mad Cook

Master Chef
Joined
Jun 9, 2013
Messages
5,118
Location
North West England
Recently had my kitchen remodelled. Chose my own layout, cooker and cupboards and fitter took me to the wholesalers to choose my work tops. In the course of the discussion about which were best versus what I wanted, the question was asked "Do you cook in your kitchen?" - well what else would I do there? I informed by the sales persons that a considerable number of their customers spent a fortune on show kitchens which they never cooked in (£30,000 was a figure mentioned!!). Am I odd in finding this very strange? My new kitchen cost less than £5000 (approx $7600) including plumbing and electrical work, which is quite low by UK standards but is well designed to my specifications and the build quality is excellent.

The kitchen (to quote a Brit television cook) is the heart of the home and I spend alot of time in there. In my last house the kitchen was the biggest room in the house and I did everything in there - cooked meals, baked, made preserves, did dressmaking, did various craft works and often sat in there to read or knit and listen to the radio.
 
Last edited:
Congrats on your new lovely kitchen!!

I thought of my sister in law when you mentioned the "show kitchens". She has one of those that only needs to be dusted as she's never cooked a meal in it...I don't get it either. I cook nearly every meal in mine, and often watch tv at the breakfast bar when I'm not cooking. In my previous house, I had a nice built in desk and I sure miss that, as that's where I had my laptop.
 
My kitchen is my workshop, artist's studio, etc. It's where I do what I enjoy doing.

The only way it would be considered a show kitchen would be when company is coming and I have to clean it up so it looks like the food we serve them is actually wholesome and edible.
 
My kitchen is my playroom ! I could never have a kitchen and not use it and I don't understand why people would want something like that.
 
"The only way it would be considered a show kitchen would be when company is coming and I have to clean it up so it looks like the food we serve them is actually wholesome and edible. "


That's my kitchen too. ;)

Don't let them see what they think they won't like. :rolleyes:

I've done lot's of kitchen remodels and there are plenty of folks who put things in there kitchen that they never use. :blink:

To each there own. :)
 
I have a feeling that the people who frequent this site cook in their kitchens. The home centers around the kitchen in my family. I just love my kitchen! I even cut out patterns for sewing on my kitchen counters. It has good lighting, so lots of things get done there. I cook something in the kitchen almost every day, unless we are vacationing or camping.

But...I do have friends who don't cook in their kitchens. One friend goes out or orders in every night and never cooks. Her kitchen is lovely, and I could see great meals coming out of it, but they never do. If she wants a home cooked meal, they come to our place. :ROFLMAO:

Another friend cooks some things in her kitchen, but won't fry bacon (yes I did say bacon) in her kitchen because it gets things too dirty! :LOL: She has certain things that she never fixes at home and only eats out because they are too messy in her kitchen to prepare. What's the fun in that? :huh:
 
SO works for a family that has too much money. They have a $10,000 Aga stove they never use.
 
Congratulations on your kitchen remodeling project.

My kitchen was rebuilt / modernized in 1968. The house itself was built in the 1930's. I have now lived here approx 20 years. The kitchen was one of the chief factors why I bought the house. I still love it. The kitchen is a very long (~18 foot) narrow galley style that opens up to an eating area at the far end. The eating area is larger, open and fully surrounded by windows on three sides that let in lots of natural light and it overlooks, visually extends itself yes seems to be part of the back yard and garden. There is a single window over the sink. The kitchen itself has more cupboards than a normal person needs. Me, being a collector, it is just about right. Almost. Pretty near. Not Quite. More or less. I slowed down going to estate sales in recent years. Everything is at your finger tips and there are counters on both sides of the galley, with plenty of open workspace.

The only things I have done are paint the very dark stained oak cupboards white, ( cost prohibitive to replace all of them). Re wall paper what little wall space there is, including the area between the counters and upper cupboards, above the cupboards and again, what little wall space there is in the eating area. New knobs on all the drawers and cupboard doors, practically took my life savings to replace them all :) New curtains Twice. The white cupboards are a bit much to keep Clean; the lightness really makes the room less dense and feel more open.

New appliances, replace the ca1968 Harvest Gold with white. I need a new dishwasher, just not today. New floor.
Replace the "smoked glass" chandelier in the eating area, new and more light fixtures for better lighting in the main area.

I changed out a double wide coat cloest which had bi-fold doors (why?) and put in double doors for a pantry and a 3rd narrow door for a broom closet. Perfect sized doors were found at an archetect antiques place. Put up antique hooks in the back hallway / entry for coats. Dusted my hands and said, well there's an easy and workable job well done. My BIL built the wall that separates the broom closet from the pantry and planed, retro fitted and installed the doors. While I found the hardware that I wanted. I got the easy end of the stick.

The things I had hired to have done-- new flooring, electrical/lighting/ and wallpaper were done in stages and were affordable.

If I were to design a kitchen, I don't believe this is what I would start out with on a drawing board. However, it's lenghth allows 2, and occassionally 3 or 4 people to work without bumping butts in an otherwise narrow envrionment. The total width of the room is approx 8 feet, with 4 feet open space for people to stand/ work/ move about.
 
I designed and layed out kitchens for a living until recently.Now I do offices and closets. I did a housing project that had really grand show kitchens in the $100,000.00+ neighborhood and right behind it was a $15,000. kitchen that was meant to be cooked in by the help.Cramped and underfunded. Crazy Huh! My little house has a bigger kitchen than those.
 
I designed and layed out kitchens for a living until recently.Now I do offices and closets. I did a housing project that had really grand show kitchens in the $100,000.00+ neighborhood and right behind it was a $15,000. kitchen that was meant to be cooked in by the help.Cramped and underfunded. Crazy Huh! My little house has a bigger kitchen than those.

I worked for a man that had a gigantic trophy house with a luxury kitchen that was never used. He also had a catering kitchen complete with special refrigerators for the floral arrangements.

I myself prefer a kitchen that is more like a conventional room with furniture, not one that has an abundance of fitted cupboards.

A cross between homely and homey! :ermm::ohmy::LOL:
 
SO works for a family that has too much money. They have a $10,000 Aga stove they never use.
Part of me would kill for an Aga but it would be completely impractical in the kitchen I have now.

Perhaps they don't use it because of the expense of running it? And you need to have an alternative cooking source (and hot water source if the Aga heats it) for the summer months or you'd roast as well as the contents of the oven! If you let the Aga get cold (for servicing or because of summer) it takes nearly a day to come up to full temperature again. I once rented a cottage for 15 months where the Aga was the only source of heat and cooking. The whole cottage, including upstairs, was kept lovely and cosy in winter but it was a nightmare in the summer. The other downside was that because of the heat from the Aga the 'fridge and the freezer cost an arm and a leg to run.
 
Part of me would kill for an Aga but it would be completely impractical in the kitchen I have now.

Perhaps they don't use it because of the expense of running it? And you need to have an alternative cooking source (and hot water source if the Aga heats it) for the summer months or you'd roast as well as the contents of the oven! If you let the Aga get cold (for servicing or because of summer) it takes nearly a day to come up to full temperature again. I once rented a cottage for 15 months where the Aga was the only source of heat and cooking. The whole cottage, including upstairs, was kept lovely and cosy in winter but it was a nightmare in the summer. The other downside was that because of the heat from the Aga the 'fridge and the freezer cost an arm and a leg to run.

Their Aga is not an 'on all the time' type. This is a conventional type with burners and oven that you turn on and off. It has six ovens so small you can't put a normal cookie sheet in them.
 
I worked for a man that had a gigantic trophy house with a luxury kitchen that was never used. He also had a catering kitchen complete with special refrigerators for the floral arrangements.

I myself prefer a kitchen that is more like a conventional room with furniture, not one that has an abundance of fitted cupboards.

A cross between homely and homey! :ermm::ohmy::LOL:
Me too. In the last house my kitchen was like that with a mixture of fitted cupboards and furniture. I had my great-grandmother's china cupboard in there and a huge linen press you could hide a couple of bodies in but when I moved house I had to let them go as the new house has nowhere for them to go.
 
Their Aga is not an 'on all the time' type. This is a conventional type with burners and oven that you turn on and off. It has six ovens so small you can't put a normal cookie sheet in them.
Ah. I thought you meant the heat storage type. My gas cooker has 7 burners and 4 ovens and I use it all the time.
 
I designed and layed out kitchens for a living until recently.Now I do offices and closets. I did a housing project that had really grand show kitchens in the $100,000.00+ neighborhood and right behind it was a $15,000. kitchen that was meant to be cooked in by the help.Cramped and underfunded. Crazy Huh! My little house has a bigger kitchen than those.
As they say here in the north of England "there's nowt so queer as folk" especially when they have more money than sense.
 
I am stuck with what I have. The only change I could make was to tile the backsplash of the stove and the small space above the sink. Two areas impossible to keep clean. The walls are painted a slight off flat white. I have a galley type kitchen. One of the largest in this building. I have seen some of the kitchens, and they have just one area of counter space that is only one small drawer wide. Almost no cabinets. When I am putting the clean dishes away, I grab up the eating utensils in my left hand and the cooking ones, spatulas, mixing spoons, in my right hand. I can turn sideways, open both drawers at the same time and put them away in one step.

In spite of having the best kitchen in the building, I hate it. When it recently was painted, I had to remove everything off the walls. I also had some things for show on top of the cabinets. Those have been packed away until I make a decision on what I want to do with them. I now consider them dust collectors. It is a room that is easy to keep clean. But no style at all. Just your generic kitchen with all the necessities. Though I would love to have a self cleaning oven. And maybe a dishwasher. :angel:
 
I do a lot of walking through, we use the back door to enter and exit the apartment. But I do manage to cook some really outstanding meals and neither one of us looks like we are starving. My dream kitchen would be have someplace to sit and hang out. The center of my home.
 
Back
Top Bottom