Point Of No Return

Actually, I think I passed that point a while back, but today was the big, final demolition of the project. I tore out the remainder of the old counters and cabinets. We now are sinkless and woefully lacking in horizontal surfaces. I'm already feeling the inconvenience of having no kitchen plumbing. Tomorrow I will try to rig up the new sink and some sort of makeshift counter to tide us over. Wifey decided she didn't want anything protruding up from the counter, so we are going with a wall mount faucet. According to her, icky stuff gets under all those fittings. I had to do some minor re piping since we had a deck mount faucet previously. After this project is done, I will be putting an outdoor sink and counter on the patio, that backs up to the kitchen. I ran hot and cold stubs through the wall and will also run a waste line tomorrow. The vacuum breaker for the dishwasher will go on the outside sink so the inside counter will be smooth and easy to wipe down

Old Sour Puss

Wifey and I were at the produce market last week and we noticed that pickling cucumbers were on sale. I thought, why not try to make some kosher dills? How hard could it be? So, after some web surfing I came up with a recipe that looked easy and didn't require a bunch of oddball stuff. I made up a brine solution with salt, vinegar, various spices and, of course, some dill. The whole deal took about an hour. Afterwards, they have to sit for 4 days, or so, until they are ready. Yesterday I felt it was time to give one the ol' taste test. I think they are the best pickles that I have ever tasted. Nice and sour, but not too much. Nice dill flavor and, since I added some hot peppers to the brine, they have a little kick to them. Not much, but enough to let you know that there's something special going on. I will not be buying store bought pickles again. These are too easy and too good to give Vlasic any more of my dough

Entering Into The Black Hole

If you have a corner cabinet in your kitchen, then you know what a waste of space they are. Things get shoved back into the dark recess and are lost until you move or die. There are bifold doors and Lazy Susan contraptions that address the problem, to a degree. The Lazy Susan offers nothing in the way of utilizing the available space and stuff falls off of them and is swallowed up by the darkness. Our existing cabinet is even worse, since the access door is very narrow and you can't even see the back without a flashlight and a mirror. I finished this cabinet today. In the normal position, when you open the (future) door, there are two shelves that pull out. When fully extended, the assembly slides to the right, exposing a second set of shelves that are hiding in the, former, unreachable area. The skinny cabinet, that will be left, next to the under sink area will be used as an appliance garage for the toaster and coffee maker. I also added a slot for a breadboard. For those having trouble following this, the cabinet goes to the right of the range, where the dishwasher is now.

A Bad Case Of The Cramps

After I installed the temporary dining counter a few months ago, it became obvious that it intruded too far into the family room. It just felt and looked cramped. So, with hammer in hand, I ripped out the drywall and moved the steel support assembly over, into the kitchen two feet. We lost some cabinet space, but there is still plenty for our needs. The kitchen area was quite large to begin with and now, it seems small but it is, probably, still larger than the average home has. Though it doesn't look like it in the photos, there is about eighteen inches of space between the three drawers in the old cabinet and the edge of the counter. The drawers will be moved over to the left and the dishwasher will go in their place. The permanent counter will be eight inches narrower than the wooden one and, maybe, eight inches longer. Things are moving along quite well now. I think we have our final configuration nailed down. Two more cabinets to build and we'll be ready for counter tops. What will it be? Granite? Tile? Formica? Marble? Stay tuned.

Things Are Looking Up

I finished the, final, upper cabinet today. Not without the usual grief. I had used an existing grout line, in the tile, as my reference point. When I measured for the cabinet I wasn't paying attention and measured to the wrong grout line, so it came out 6 inches too long. I was lucky and was able to cut it down without screwing things up. I didn't even scratch the finish. Took me a few hours, but it was not as traumatic as it could have been. Note the raised panel end. There is one, just like it on the other end as well as the previously installed corner cabinet. It looks so much nicer than a flat panel

Exhausting Work

I've been busy, working on this cabinet, the past few days. It would have been done sooner, but I screwed up a couple of pieces and had to do them over. No big deal and little material was wasted. I wanted to eliminate the black hole that most corner cabinets, like our old one, have. I got rid of the wall between the main cabinet assembly and the little wrap around portion on the left. Now we can see into the corner. The end of the short section will get a raised panel cover, that matches the, upcoming doors rather than a plain, flat panel. The exhaust hood still needs to be connected to the roof vent. I'll try out my tin knocking skills tomorrow. I do have lots of duct tape.

Spicing Things Up A Bit

One of my favorite episodes of The Simpsons is the one where Homer builds Marge a spice rack. It is less than he had hoped for. While I'm waiting for the new range and hood to be delivered, I built a spice rack to go inside of the pantry. In typical "Bigger is Better" theory, this is what I came up with. We buy a lot of spices in the big jars from Costco, so the little racks that we built in junior high wood shop ain't gonna cut it. This one is four feet high and almost eighteen inches wide. Plenty of room for those big ol' containers of basil, oregano, chili powder and the other essentials of the fine gourmet cooking that takes place, here at The Fongderosa. Hop Sing cooks up a mean bowl of red.