Oven for Christmas! - which one?

[Feltwell]

yes, it's true that beauty and function are not equally balanced generally.

At last, I have an excuse for being "cosmetically challenged" but useful!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Ahh, thankyou for all the lovely, funny comments above - wish it was you lot coming instead of my family!

Also it occured to me I missed lots of names off the list, so if yours isn't there don't think I haven't appreciated all the help and advice over this year, coz I have - just that you probably have a proper job and don't get the time for all the incessant wittering of all us high-posting layabouts.

Abi - will PM about this "Christmas in a glass", it sounds divine!

 

[Gervase]

That mud oven looks far too Gucci. You need a more basic one like this:

Perfect for bananas and iguana tails!

 

[JoceAndChris]

:lol: That really doesn't look too tricky to knock up, wouldn't have cost £500 and necessitated smashing up half the kitchen.

Do the soldiers come with it? I like a nice soldier.

 

[Gervase]

You wouldn't want one of those in your drawing room. After two weeks in the jungle without washing, the smell is a little ripe!

 

[jocelyn plummer]

They are also very unpredictable in normal domestic situations :wink:

 

[JoceAndChris]

:lol:

Sorry to revive this but I have GOT to say a few things about my new oven, chiefly cheese on toast, crispy bacon sandwiches, perfect roast potatoes, melt-in-the-mouth beef! Oh, I love it, it's not prosaic at all, it's AMAZING!!

How, why, the previous owner lived without an electric oven, a shower, a dishwasher, lights, a chainsaw, an electric hedgetrimmer attachment for chainsaw, a 4 x4, and on and on with the wonderful gadgets of the 21st C I just can't fathom. And I hated the previous layout - a cooker in one room, the pans and worksurfaces in another, and the dining room in a completely different part of the house! I've been running between the three rooms for 18 months!

Also, I'm extremely pleased with Wickes. It might look like sh*te, but we were able just to smash out one wall of units, purchase a new unit to fit in the built-in electric oven, and then purchase new units to fit around it - all matching nearly exactly (especially once painted and with new handles) the 8-year old units that were there. It's like having a new kitchen for £550.

 

[Nigel Watts]

I am sure you have done exactly the right thing. Kitchens have to work well. If they can look good too that's a bonus but its less important.

 

[Moo]

How true.
Some of the best cooks I've known operated in kitchens that would have made the aesthetically sensitive swoon with horror.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Ah, thank you for your support. But please don't think practicality defines my kitchen! You know what I'm like - here are some Christmassy shots of my (still) highly impractical kitchen- just painted the bench today (and yes Gareth we know the stone needs lime render, it's on the Things To Do list!) Pretty things before useful things nine times out of ten!

 

[Schoolmarm]

That bench looks a thousand times better!

Pics of the oven?

 

[Gareth Hughes]

I don't know. Women! you give them the vote and they run straight back to the kitchen! :shock:

 

[Nigel Watts]

Joce it all looks so perfect. Are we going to be allowed to see your tree? My mother has a cup and saucer in the same pheasant design

 

[JoceAndChris]

I don't know. Women! you give them the vote and they run straight back to the kitchen! :shock:

I'm afraid I'm with Forster on this one (and much else besides) "The woman who can't influence her husband to vote the way she wants ought to be ashamed of herself." And also with whoever penned this little ditty about the founders of my Oxford college:

"Miss Buss and Miss Beale,
Cupid's darts do not feel.

How different from us,
Miss Beale and Miss Buss."

There is no nobler place for women than the home, no finer purpose than to create a haven for those you love. And oh, how willingly those Oxford girls are now throwing off their pens and businesses, their barrister's robes,for the sweet joys of motherhood!

Joce it all looks so perfect. Are we going to be allowed to see your tree? My mother has a cup and saucer in the same pheasant design

It's Alfred Meakin, I found a set for a tenner recently - lovely. (though I'm currently obsessed with Susie Watson, who understands so well how to create a quintessence of English cottageness http://www.susiewatsondesigns.co.uk/)

That bench looks a thousand times better!

Pics of the oven?

Thankyou! To follow!

 

[JoceAndChris]

Still haven't had time to fit in the new unit where the blue grain bin is.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

the blue grain bin

Is that posh Lincolnshire talk for "rubbish bin"??!! 8)

 

[JoceAndChris]

No, it's where the chicken feed lives. It's near the microwave because they like it warmed through in the mornings with raisins on top. I'm struggling to find attractive grain storage bins.

 

[Feltwell]

Be careful with those gloss laminate worktops - they're a bu@@er for showing scratches. Because they're perfectly smooth, scratches catch the light far more than a textured worktop.

 

[JoceAndChris]

Very true. We inherited those, I guess they're around 8 years old now and completely covered in scratches that can be seen even in the gloom of my subterranean kitchen! What would you replace them with?

I'd really like a completely new Chalon kitchen , not a refigured Wickes one - but Chris tells me not to hold my breath! And in terms of what the house needs, cheaply sorting the kitchen feels like the right thing to do. Next year I'll do something with this section of the kitchen where the copper used to be: so hard to know how to balance the whole conservation/I need more cupboard space issue:

 

[LadyArowana]

Joce, the scratches don't show in the pictures, it all looks like a lovely setting for a country Christmas celebration. Chalon have something nice for your chicken feed too. I chose Corian worktops, but was not facing any conservation issues, anything approaching an original feature was already long gone.