The best way to equip a kitchen from scratch is to look at your cooking preferences and then determine what is important; which pieces of equipments best suit your practical needs rather than your aesthetic aspirations for the latest country kitchen designs. Once you have the first couple of pieces of the jigsaw fitting together, the myriad of decisions involved can often have a direct bearing on each other, and others will start to fall into place much easier.. Start with what is vitally important and always buy the best quality you can afford.
Whether, having weighed up the advantages of all your kitchen design ideas and options, you decide to have your kitchen redesigned or merely revamped, and once you have agreed on the layout, you will need to budget carefully for your new kitchen furniture and equipment. And while cabinets and work surfaces are obviously important, new appliances must be given priority as they can devour a large part of your available funds.
Appliances
The cooking zone is usually the most important area of the kitchen and your first big decision will be whether to combine cooking rings and oven or to separate the two appliances. Most cooks prefer a gas stove which offers fast and flexible heat: the rings may be combined with wok burners, which is practical if you enjoy cooking Chinese food. Deep-fryers or barbecue grills are other options to consider, but are only worthwhile if you are going to use them regularly. Integrating a stove into a central island unit is becoming increasingly popular as there is space on three sides to prepare food and often seating too, underlining the cooking-eating connection. If gas is not available, opt for halogen, the most responsive of the electric options.
Conversely, it is electricity that offers the best choice in oven-cooking methods. You can buy either single or double built-in ovens and a large household may require the latter, although a single oven and separate microwave might give you greater scope. A microwave is invaluable, both for defrosting, and for providing instant meals for reluctant cooks. When looking at ovens, ensure that the grill is efficient: one with a dual circuit is best so that half the grill area can be used on occasion rather than the entire roof of the oven.
An eye-level grill is convenient; so too a self-cleaning facility; and good interior lighting, of course, in order to be able to check on your food's progress at a glance. You can also buy multi-function ovens, which combine a fan-assisted heat function - best for roasting meat - with a radiant heat function, which is better for baking successful pastry and cakes.
You may want to situate all the various cooking functions together and many top-of-the-line stoves today are custom-made, offering you a choice of ovens, a mixture of gas and electric rings, chargrllls, griddles and hot plates. Big commercial stoves designed for professional catering kitchens are worth considering too, particularly if you are planning an unfitted kitchen, as they are freestanding. They produce more heat than most domestic stoves so they require good air circulation in the kitchen - and preferably a dueled extractor hood that covers the entire top.
If gleaming industrial steel is not your style, there are colorful enamel stoves on the market, fired by gas, electricity, oil or solid fuel that may be more appropriate.
Particularly in keeping for a traditional or country look, this type of stove comes into its own where there is no main gas supply, as it often generates enough heat to warm a kitchen and can usually be adapted to run a water-heating function too. Made in cast iron and designed so that heat comes from all sides of the oven, they have a reputation for turning out good bread and juicy joints of meat.
Before you set your heart on a big brute of a stove make sure that installing it will not present insurmountable problems - either because of its sheer size or to weight. And an industrial stove may not be a wise choice if you have children because the doors can get dangerously hot. Domestic models are often fitted with stay-cool systems to keep doors at a low temperature when the oven is hot.
Even If you have a dishwasher, it Is worth having a double or even triple sink as well - to let you wash up, rinse and prepare food all at the same time. Large kitchens with a central island may even have space for an extra small sink specifically for food preparation. A waste-disposal unit will require a second sink, fitted with curved waste pipes to avoid blockages and a reasonable water pressure to flush away rubbish. Good-quality mixer taps will control both the temperature and flow of the water, but it is worth remembering, as you survey what is available, that simple taps of streamlined design are the easiest to keep clean, particularly if the local water produces chalky deposits, and that taps with no washers or ceramic discs will avoid a lime-scale build-up if the water is hard.
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