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> The fridge will be placed on the complete opposite side of the room from the island with the stove in it. This is actually proper kitchen design (the island

by cr0sh 9y ago

> The fridge will be placed on the complete opposite side of the room from the island with the stove in it. This is actually proper kitchen design (the island being in the way would be a problem, though). It's called a "kitchen triangle" and the proper shape and size of it determines how efficient a kitchen is (the third vertex is the sink). A properly sized and shaped kitchen triangle can help turn cooking into a very efficient experience. One too large, or with an island in the way, or not correctly shaped (or not even a triangle) can make it a horrible place to cook in. I will grant, though, that in some cases the kitchen doesn't ever serve a practical purpose, but instead serves as an interior "conspicuous consumption" focal point. Easiest way to tell if this is the case is how well used the appliances are; if they look showroom shiny with nary a splatter, dent, scratch, etc on them - you are likely not looking at a working kitchen. Finally - all of this is moot if the person cooking is skilled enough. My wife has cooked highly commented meals for hundreds of people out of a kitchen smaller than some McMansion's walk-in pantry, using a stove that only had "on" and "off" (where "on" was set at 500 degrees F), and a work surface smaller than her cutting board (this was a "commercial" kitchen at one of here former employers who had a strange sense of what was the best things to spend money on - maintenance was not one of them).

redm 9y ago
Kitchens are undeniably more important today than in the past. Their increased and expanded uses have driven larger sizes. As you suggest, too larger of a triangle is inefficient. To deal with this, the concept of Kitchen Zones has been taking root as an alternative. A zone for preparation, cooking, cleanup, entertaining, etc. [1] [2] [1] https://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/16934736/list/kitchen-evolution-work-zones-replace-the-triangle https://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/16934736/list/kitchen-evolut... [2] http://lifehacker.com/optimize-your-kitchen-layout-with-work-zones-1692354456 http://lifehacker.com/optimize-your-kitchen-layout-with-work...
- madhadron 9y ago
  I hadn't run across zones before. I've always set up cooking areas for the flows of material. Ingredients come from storage, are prepped, put into holding, cooked, plated, served, and the dishes and remains returned afterwards. The kitchen triangle serves a wide range of flows for a single cook, thus its popularity. When you have multiple cooks, it changes. If you have a lot of different things being cooked, you want the brigade system with individuals' prep, holding, and cooking areas distinct and the flow across their space minimized. That includes little things like having squeeze bottles of water at their station so they don't have to access a sink to add liquid to something and all the dishes they need to plate what they're working on. If you have labor intensive assembly of a few things, you want assembly line, and then it's more important to have lots of contiguous, double deep counter space so you can stage materials for each step and slide things along. For a brigade system, you usually have an aisle wide enough for someone to carry a hot pan past you while you're working without having to worry about bumping into you if you don't suddenly lurch backwards. Oh, and somewhere to step out of the zone where you have to be on alert for things like that. I've seen that both with one sided prep areas with eight feet or so to the other wall so you can physically back out of the line, or a four foot aisle and walking down the line to the storage freezers (which people aren't going into constantly once everything is prepped) to step away. In either case, finished materials need to be staged to be removed from the kitchen, and a parallel path needs to bring dishes back without getting in path of the cooks. But back to the primary topic, most of the kitchens I've seen in houses simply are not functional. When we were house hunting a few years ago I would say half the kitchens were laid out where, due to other constraints of the house, they could not be remodeled into something that wasn't a pain to work in. It's fine to have to cook in some place that's a pain once in a while, but in your own home? Yeesh.
  - Splines 9y ago
    Getting OT, but if you want a hilarious game simulation of dealing with poor kitchen design with multiple cooks (with a strong heaping of the brigade system), check out the game "Overcooked".
    - cyclist89 9y ago
      Boyfriend and I just beat Overcooked yesterday (three stars on every single level!), so lots of the kitchen design mistakes are still fresh in my mind (worst level imo was the kitchen with floating icebergs separating it into 3, mostly ice-covered partitions). Awesome game though :)

by cr0sh 9y ago

redm 9y ago

Kitchens are undeniably more important today than in the past. Their increased and expanded uses have driven larger sizes. As you suggest, too larger of a triangle is inefficient. To deal with this, the concept of Kitchen Zones has been taking root as an alternative. A zone for preparation, cooking, cleanup, entertaining, etc. [1] [2] [1] https://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/16934736/list/kitchen-evolution-work-zones-replace-the-triangle https://www.houzz.com/ideabooks/16934736/list/kitchen-evolut... [2] http://lifehacker.com/optimize-your-kitchen-layout-with-work-zones-1692354456 http://lifehacker.com/optimize-your-kitchen-layout-with-work...

madhadron 9y ago
I hadn't run across zones before. I've always set up cooking areas for the flows of material. Ingredients come from storage, are prepped, put into holding, cooked, plated, served, and the dishes and remains returned afterwards. The kitchen triangle serves a wide range of flows for a single cook, thus its popularity. When you have multiple cooks, it changes. If you have a lot of different things being cooked, you want the brigade system with individuals' prep, holding, and cooking areas distinct and the flow across their space minimized. That includes little things like having squeeze bottles of water at their station so they don't have to access a sink to add liquid to something and all the dishes they need to plate what they're working on. If you have labor intensive assembly of a few things, you want assembly line, and then it's more important to have lots of contiguous, double deep counter space so you can stage materials for each step and slide things along. For a brigade system, you usually have an aisle wide enough for someone to carry a hot pan past you while you're working without having to worry about bumping into you if you don't suddenly lurch backwards. Oh, and somewhere to step out of the zone where you have to be on alert for things like that. I've seen that both with one sided prep areas with eight feet or so to the other wall so you can physically back out of the line, or a four foot aisle and walking down the line to the storage freezers (which people aren't going into constantly once everything is prepped) to step away. In either case, finished materials need to be staged to be removed from the kitchen, and a parallel path needs to bring dishes back without getting in path of the cooks. But back to the primary topic, most of the kitchens I've seen in houses simply are not functional. When we were house hunting a few years ago I would say half the kitchens were laid out where, due to other constraints of the house, they could not be remodeled into something that wasn't a pain to work in. It's fine to have to cook in some place that's a pain once in a while, but in your own home? Yeesh.
- Splines 9y ago
  Getting OT, but if you want a hilarious game simulation of dealing with poor kitchen design with multiple cooks (with a strong heaping of the brigade system), check out the game "Overcooked".
  - cyclist89 9y ago
    Boyfriend and I just beat Overcooked yesterday (three stars on every single level!), so lots of the kitchen design mistakes are still fresh in my mind (worst level imo was the kitchen with floating icebergs separating it into 3, mostly ice-covered partitions). Awesome game though :)