JennotJenn

By all means ask him! Too bad for the real estate agent. Even if it takes up an extra 20 minutes of your time, it's that much more you'll know about the house, and that much more knowledge you can take into a conversation with someone giving you an estimate on an installation. Screw the real estate agent and milk that guy for all he's worth. Talk it to death, is my advice. Have you considered rubber flooring? We put that in our kitchen and I love it. Here's a link to Artigo, we chose the Plansystem ND-NAT. If that kind of flooring interests you, you can most likely find a local distributor or someone who makes a similar product. We also considered stone and mosaic, and all the rest, but as you said the prices are just sky high. I started thinking about a kitchen my father installed in the basement of the house he built (a second kitchen), which he floored with stud rubber flooring. I chose something completely different in style but stuck with the rubber flooring. We like it a lot. My husband and I just IMed each other with that very sentiment: "Screw the real estate agent." She's driving us batty. Sort of a cross between Judge Judy and Roseanne Roasannadanna. We've got two months till closing and she's pushing us like we've got 2 weeks. I know it's a busy time of year, but she needs to take some deep breaths. We are going to ask the inspector that stuff. I'm actually quite a talker myself And now I'm looking at BlueStar ranges. We have to go w/a slide in anyway, which is going to be more expensive with most models...the BlueStar is in line with what we would be paying for the Profile (around $400 more), and I've heard good things. Have to see if there's a local dealer, though...otherwise repairs could be an issue. If we could move the configuration of the range, we could go with one of the new Bosch models, but they're only freestanding models and this has to fit into the island. Actually, what's in there now is a drop-in. I'm hoping I can convert the space to a slide in. If not, I'm going to be pretty screwed.

Without getting into some expensive tearing out and replacing of cabinets, wall oven isn't going to work. Which is fine, really...not spending money on custom cabinets is more important than having a cooktop and a separate wall oven. I am sorta thinking about dual fuel now, though, which would serve the purpose I was going for all along...gas cooktop, electric oven. Though, seriously, I think a gas oven wouldn't be too much of a problem. Consumer Reports gave the all-gas GE Profile excellent ratings in both the cooktop portion and oven portion of that range. Really leaning towards that product. Now I'm off to gardenweb, which mnebergall posted, to check out talk on range hoods. I think my dealie is that I've got the roof vent and the fan, but not the chimney and the hood. Despite warnings by our real estate agent not to speak to the home inspector (she says he's a "talker", and she is not a patient woman), I'm going to ask him to check that out while he's in the attic. I realized that once I take down the God-awful chandelier that's crapping up the dining nook, a slim chimney wouldn't look so bad after all. The idea of a chandelier and a chimney hanging down in the same room was messing up my vision. And I've told husband that 1) he doesn't have a choice, and 2) if he'll give in on this point, his clothes will never smell like caramalized onions again (a problem in our poorly ventilated apartment). I'm thinking that's worth a grand or two right there.

Ok, I'm just going to have to go with an island hood, I think, and my husband is just going to have to get over it (he's...thrifty...). I could do a downdraft, too, I guess, which he likes better because it's cheaper. I've heard they don't work as well, though. Any ideas about that? It's not that we can't afford to do this right, but my husband takes some convincing if something costs over $100.

Yeah, I wish I could sneak in there and find out how hard that fan sucks. My grandma has an insanely strong attic fan (too strong, but God it will suck everything out of the room)), that has a vent that looks like the one in the kitchen. Of course, we have a bathroom fan that has a vent that looks like the one in the kitchen. I'm hoping that the one in the kitchen will be somewhere between the power of the attic fan and the bathroom fan. That would work out ok, I think. At least there's already a vent out the roof, so we wouldn't have to do much work there. The home inspection is on Wednesday. I'll see if I can make the inspector check, or at least sneak in there and turn the fan on myself. Wonder if I could just add a stronger fan and still not have a hood to direct the fumes/steam/whatever.

That's called a peninsula. Good luck with the renovation. I think wood is a good choice, I which I had done wood instead of tile on the floor. We lived in a fairly posh apartment when we first moved into town, and the kitchen was tile. I learned very quickly that I did not want tile when I did my own kitchen---makes my legs and back hurt if I stand too long, and since I do both a lot of baking and a lot of cooking, I'm always standing for too long. I think cork would be cool, but that it might lead to some head scratching on the part of any potential future buyers. Besides, hardwood matches the rest of the house. Thanks for telling me what that feature was. If I'd paid a little more attention in geography when I was a kid, I could have figured it out Now I know how to describe it to anyone who asks. I'm still waiting for a tiebreaker opinion on whether or not I'll need a hood of some sort. I've decided to look hard at solid-surface veneer for countertops. It looks the same and performs about the same as full-on solid surface, but is a 1/3rd cheaper on average. I am not careful in the kitchen. I'm lazy, absentminded and clumsy as hell, and am always setting something on the counter that I shouldn't, or dropping things, pr scratching the surface with my bread knife (oh, no need to drag out the wooden board) and so on. Laminate is cheap, but may not be the best thing for me because of the aforementioned charcacter flaws, though it's still coming in as a solid 2nd choice. I do have a little area off to the side of the fridge that has a small, one door cabinet and an about 1'x1' counter, and I'm thinking about turning that into butcher block, for cutting breads. I do quite a bit of bread baking, and it would be nice to be able to get rid of my unwieldy (cheap) wooden cutting board. Besides, it's a small space and therefore, upkeep wouldn't be horrible. Rock of any sort is out. I can't do the upkeep and it's too pricey. I'm looking at the GE Profile series for the range. Not too expensive, reliable, a good performer, and it has terrific oven capacity. I'd love to be able to do a cooktop and a separate oven, but the space just doesn't allow for it. The reasonable price will also allow extra cash for running a gas line, any installation fees and any additional venting that I may need. Consumer Reports has some good dishwasher ratings...if we need one, I'm looking at the GE as well.

It's not exactly an island. The kitchen is L shaped, with cabinets covering the long leg of the L. The space above the short leg is open, and is where the range is. Here, no appliances are assumed to convey. You can take the fridge, range, washer/dryer, whatever. The house we looked at before this one, neither the range nor the fridge conveyed.

Ok, this is all great information. Yay! $2000-$2500 isn't out of my price range (heh, no pun intended), especially knowing that it won't cost too terribly much to run a gas line. And it's so good to know that we won't really need a hood. That was a fairly major concern. We'll check out the cost of flooring install. Dude, David Sedaris's brother has a hardwood flooring business in our town. It's even a division of "Silly P" enterprises. I should totally see what "The Rooster" charges for an install. Since it's such a small area, it may be possible. I'd rather save the money and get awesome appliances though

Thanks. I actually went to Consumer Reports from there, which, as a testament to what kind of week this has been, completely slipped my mind as a good source of information.

I know several other kitchen renovations have been covered here, but I have some specific questions that I can't find the answer to elsewhere. We've just bought (well, we have a contract on) our first house. It was built in 1953. 1200 square feet. Kitchen, including eating space (there is no dining room, though we could turn the small bedroom into one) is 16.5x9. Not tiny, but not huge either. We want to spend under $7000 total, including appliances. Oh, we only really need a range, but depending on the condition of the dishwasher, we'll need one of those, too. The fridge appears to be in good condition. I agreed to buy this house on one condition: that we could redo the kitchen upon closing. Immediatly. It's very mid-late 80's, with the cheap looking "oak" cabinets, white/pink/blue wallpaper, oak trim, and vinyl floor. There will not be any major work. No tearing down walls, no new/ripping out cabinets, no reconfiguration, etc. We will have to have countertops installed eventually, and that (other than appliances) will be our major expense. Basically, it's a small first house, and we don't want to put too much money into it for fear that we won't be able to get it out when we sell it, but I want to be able to enjoy my kitchen for the 5 years or so I'll be in it. Appliances are a big deal, something I don't find spending more on, since we can take those with us when we move. We do plan on ripping up the vinyl, which will be likely be replaced by hardwood. The wallpaper will be removed. I'm going to put wainscoting in the dining nook. I'm going to paint the walls and cabinets and build in a couple of floor to ceiling shelves around the windows in said nook. If we run into major problems (rotten wood underneath the floor, something like that), we'll hire help, but barring that, we're DIY. Now, on to stuff I'm not even sure I know how to ask: the ventilation is unlike anything I've ever encountered in a kitchen. It's vented through the roof, but the fan is like a bathroom vent fan...set into the ceiling, no vent hood or anything. Is this normal? Is this going to cause problems? The range is at a place where a hood would be difficult to put in...it's in an island type place (but not really an island). It would have to suspend from the ceiling, and because the kitchen is pretty small, I'm afraid it would dominate the room. I guess that's the main problem for now. I don't know what range I'm going to go with, but it's going to need to be around 30'' to fit in existing space. Seriously, I'm pretty baffled about what to go with, even after reading all these threads. I want something pretty high quality, but I don't want to spend a ton. I can handle around $2000. Any ideas? I'm afraid most of the brands I would be interested in would be priced out of my range, but I'm open to suggestion. I'm thinking about a Miele dishwasher (hate, hate, hate noise), but was wondering if anyone had experience with less expensive dishwashers that were almost as quiet as (or as quiet as) the Miele. Oh, also, the house is heated by gas, but the appliances are electric. Anyone have any experiences with having the house converted to gas in the range area? Since we already have a hook up, I don't think it will be a problem, but I'd like to know if anyone knows for sure. Sorry if all this has been covered before or if my writing style makes no sense.

So make yogurt! I'm going through at least 1/2 gallon a week that way - all by myself. And the yogurt is great - even though I'm still just using store-bought plain old homogenized milk. Just starting to look around for local organic possibilities, now that my yogurt culture is getting pretty reliable.... We don't eat enough yogurt either However, if I could get into cheesemaking...

Wow. And Maple View is pretty good, but I will readily admit to liking my milk homogenized. MV prices have not gone up yet...cream still at $1.99 a pint. I don't think we drink enough milk to justify joining a CSA (a quart every week/two weeks), unfortunatly. I wish we could because I have a thing for crazy fresh eggs. Oh, I'm still getting Plugra for @ $3.50/lb at Guglhupf bakery, compared to over $4.00 for regular butter in the grocery store. Anyone living in the Triangle area should check it out. Their turnover on the Plugra is high, too, so it always tastes really good, clean and fresh. And we're going to have a goat and a laying chicken one day, mark my words. We just bought a house in Durham and are about to fulfill our dream of having a compost heap, organic garden and mushroom pit. Back to your regularly scheduled thread...

Thanks for this course. My mom has MS and doesn't like to cook anyway. However, she is beginning to see the importance of eating healthfully in helping maintain a higher degree of functioning and a higher quality of life. These sorts of tips and techniques will be wonderful for me to pass on. Her biggest problems are in the form of vertigo, overall fatigue and extreme numbness in her hips and legs, especially if she stands for very long. This is her biggest problem in the kitchen, hands down. What techniques, other than sitting while doing prepwork, would be helpful? It would be great if she could redo the floor with something forgiving like cork, but it's not really a possibility. It would also be great if my dad would cook instead of making her do it, but that's less likely than getting a new floor.

I am in my 40's and I love a jar of chilled apricots, peaches, or plums every now and then. I once saw a chef on TV using jarred baby fruit as a base for a sauce. Why not? If Gerber still made their orange flavor, I would be eating baby food right now. I loved that stuff, but I think they discontinued that flavor in the mid-80's. I can still remember the taste and texture of it as clearly as if I had eaten some this morning. I'm not sure if that or saurkraut is my first food memory. Oh yeah, I should add saurkraut to weird things I ate as a kid. I still love it, but I guess it's a bit odd for a baby to like it.

It's more of an organic question when it comes to meat, eggs and dairy (kosher is ok, too). I was a veg for several years, and still get squiggly about meat sometimes. I guess I need the mental sugar-coat... Fish, though, I'm generally cool with, as long as I know point of origin. And freshness doesn't seem like a problem at Costco. Maybe if I do the cook-in, I'll do fish. I'm going to call them up and see if they offer a free membership trial. And if not, my parents are visiting in a couple of weeks, so I'll hijack mom's card. Back in the old days at Sam's, you had a picture ID and they checked it at the door and you were allowed one guest---that's why I assumed I would have to go w/her.

Anyone know if it's possible to get a trial membership to any of these places? I guess I could take my mom's Costco card for a spin, but the thought of being trapped in Costco with my mom is too awful to contemplate. We wouldn't eat their meats (I'm weird about meat, ok...), but things like TP (do they carry major brands of TP? I remember Sam's only carrying Red Army Surplus, but that was years and years ago), paper towels, and gargantuan jugs of Advil would be good to buy in bulk. Not food related, but I want to check out their power tools/hand tools, too. I just don't want to pay to see if I like the joint, right?

There is (was...dunno if it's still there) a diner (Dottie's Diner) in Winston-Salem that shared a sign with a casket showroom. One or the other was advertising "Drive through Service." Oh, and we have Wang Chinese restaurant here in Raleigh. They drive their deliveries around in cars with a big sign on top that naturally says, "Wang" I feel like Beavis and/or Butthead when I laugh at it, but I can't stop myself. Oh, and as far as OBX is concerned, I refuse to eat at Dirty Dick's or Awful Arthur's. Seriously, they just sound gross.

Dirt, but only because I was curious to see if red dirt tasted different from brown dirt (it does very much, btw...red clay has a ton of iron). Blue crayons. Only blue. I was a paper/paper towel eater, too. I also had an extreme fondness for hard boiled eggs. Remember Edith Massey's character in Pink Flamingos? Yeah. I was the Egg Lady. One the eating whole onions theme: I have a Great-Aunt who has a rather twisted sense of humor. She's evil, but in a way that isn't so evil that you think she's a bad person...just a little twisted. She used to do things like shock my mom's toes with mild electrical currents, that sort of thing. Oh. and did I mention that she looks just like the Wicked Witch of the West? Anyway, when she was in her 20s, she babysat this kid who was about 3 or so at the time. Who allowed this woman around kids I do not know. When he would act up, she would stick him in a laundry basket. He was terrified of the laundry basket. Apparantly, all this kid could or would say was "apple apple bite-bite." Kid loved apples. It drove my aunt crazy, so one day she handed him a red onion and told him it was an apple. He never asked her for an apple again. I know he still lives in my hometown. I should find out his name and give him a call, see if Wanda scarred him for good.

I just froze 1/2 a batch of vanilla bean pastry cream from The Pie and Pastry Bible. Hopefully it will be ok. The book says it will keep, frozen, up to a month, but that it thins once it's defrosted, and therefore won't hold it's shape very well. For use in something like a large tart, she suggests whisking in 1 tsp dissolved gelatin for every 1 cup of pastry cream. Everything I've made from every one of her books has worked perfectly, so hopefully this one will too. It's worth trying if all you're going to do is toss the leftover pastry cream anyway.

Whoa... it has been a long couple of weeks...I know nothing I've said in the past month has made sense, now I know nothing I've written in the past month has made sense either.

OK, I don't know that I want to be known as the piercing expert around here, but I can tell you that it will probably not. Hole too small and at an odd angle for any pressurized squirting of liquid, which would be required if you hoped to get anything through the hole. However, I'm guessing you could squirt some liquid through a labrae (the piercing on the chin below the bottom lip). Cue everyone screaming in horror. And DH's oral hygene is much better than mine anyway, with or without a piercing (a bit of a fanatic), but if you've got a tounge piercing and half a brain, you swish with Listerine at least once daily (prevents infection, speeds healing). And ew. Tounge thing not sexy. Especially when it's my mom doing it. And no cracks from NeroW about how it's sexy especially if my mom's doing it.

Eh, the tounge piercing isn't a problem with eating once the inital swelling (3-4 days) goes down, according to my once very heavily pierced husband. I never remember him complaining about hot drinks and he drinks coffee/espresso/hot tea in large amounts. As for food getting caught under, it's not a problem really, but if you do, you just take it out and clean it. No worse than getting food caught in your teeth. But the tounge-fork thing? Creepy. My mom does it and it makes me and my sister want to scream. It just sends really bad cold chills down my spine when I see her do that. She doesn't so much use it as a catch all for what may drop, but as a fork-support. *Shudder* Not as bad as that Mike's Hard Lime commerical with the tounge, though. Do they really think that ad is going to help sell product? Gah.

Well, bummer. It looks like Heath and I can't make it. I'm not feeling so hot. [Whine] I've had the same dizzying sinus headache for three days...I hate Spring [/Whine]. Anyway, Heath is being sweet despite my incessant whining, and is going to keep me company and make me lots of hot tea, so he won't be coming either. I'm totally bummed because I love The Towers.. You guys are going to like it a lot, I'm sure. Eat tons and report back! Catch y'all next time.

Dunno if this is apochryphal/urban legend stuff, but I remember hearing that the first cake mixes (B Crocker?) contained powdered egg, so all you had to do was add water, mix & bake. They didn't sell well, "women back then" (which I guess is much further back than Good Seasons) needed to feel like they were doing SOMETHING. So Gen Foods removed the dried egg, added "add egg" to the instructions, & the death knell sounded for cakes-from-scratch. Dressing on the side? I'm with the "generally too much" crowd. Tho these days you will find me asking simply for the oil & vinegar, since I have no way to determine the salt content of any other dressing when I'm dining out. No, I think that's true. I was just about to post same. I order on the side in most places. Local steakhouses seem to be the worst offenders. Oh, and the offense? Too much dressing. Dude, I ordered a salad, not freakin' coleslaw. Something like a Cesar salad is different, but how many places make a good, real Cesar anymore?

Jen(not Jenn)+1 We'll be there.

I'm in Raleigh, getting ready to move to Durham (only 20 miles apart, but a world away). Originally from Winston-Salem, home of Krispy Kreme and Joe Camel. Mmmmmmmm...camel... Yeah, I totally have the best mother-in-law in the universe. She makes great fried okra, never bugs me about when we're going to have kids, gives me sage advice and can drink any man under the table. My sister's MIL used to be a drag racer at a dirt track in Roxboro (my MIL is much cooler, though). I have no idea how to tell a ripe fig from an unripe one. Obviously ;). Actually, I'm good at telling when one is underipe (generally still hard), but the distinction between ripe and overripe usually escapes me. I always end up with one that's past it's prime, in that space between bland and vaguely alcoholic. The drink didn't taste exactly like a pom, but I'm guessing that has something to do with the quality of my juice. I bought the 100% fruit juice cranberry blend from Target (I was already there), and it's heavier on the apple juice than my regular 100% blend, which tastes mostly like cranberries. It was still tasty, though.