Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with kitchen

Crystal substance near gas pipes

SRMorris — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 12:36:13 -0800

Can anyone help us identify this substance and whether we should be concerned for our health. Our kitchen fitter has recently hooked up our dual fuel cooker last Friday and we've only noticed this in the last few minutes. My fiancee and I are obviously concerned but can't ask until the fitter comes back tomorrow. In the meantime, is this something we should worry about?

The wall behind has been plastered 2 weeks ago and is an internal wall so no issues about the UK frost causing this. The substance has no smell and is crystalline in nature.

We've got to stop loafing around...

cior — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 13:05:22 -0800

What are the best supplies for baking bread at home from scratch? My husband loves baking, but hasn't produced much more than muffins in recent years. I've organized a 1-1 bread baking lesson for him, but would love to go further to procure a collection of solid bread baking supplies for him to work with and use.

I haven't the faintest clue and left to my own devices I'd likely buy a mish-mash of random things that might not prove useful in practice.

Things to know:

He's a hobbyist, but tends to take his hobbies seriously.
Professional supplies are OK, with the understanding that we have an at-home, non-commercial kitchen to work with.
Aside from cookie pans and cake tins, we do not have much in the way of baking-specific tools in our kitchen.
He loves Italian, French and sourdough.
Specific products/brands are encouraged, I don't want to leave much to chance.

Is my crockpot defective?

rebent — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 13:07:18 -0800

Is it ok that the lid to my new crock pot does not seal tightly? this is my first crock pot. Here is a picture of the lid[1, 2]. The lid does not fit very well, in my opinion. Is it defective, or is it supposed to be like this?

Looking to remove a logo from a metal know

boombot — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 19:27:19 -0800

What is the best way to remove the "Le Creuset" logo from this metal replacement knob I purchased to elevate the oven-safe temp of a Tramontina dutch oven?

Where to buy a specific clock.

Mitheral — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:03:18 -0800

Where can I get a kitchen clock similar to this one. Difficulty: Plug in electric not battery operated. By similar I mean:

relatively plain.
8-10 inches in diameter.
Relatively thick as pictured.
As previously mentioned it must be plug in electric not battery operated which is the problem with the pictured clock.
Up to 40 dollars.

I'd prefer a Canadian source, brick and mortar or online, but I'm willing to pull from the states as long as shipping isn't more than the clock (IE: No FedEX/UPS only shipping options).

If only they smelled like yams...

cavalier — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 06:21:31 -0800

We've returned from an uneventful Thanksgiving trip to the family nest to find nearly all of our baggage reeking of what can best be described as "Old Turkey." What in the world can we do to rid these bags of this awful smell? I don't get it. It was a normal enough Turkey day. No Turkeys were flash fried or immolated or puree'd. Turkey was baked, meals were had, squabbling ensued, your usual enough day. The house did not smell particularly of anything more than a home cookd meal.

Yet here we are. (sniff) -- eyuck! It's like, if the bags were left right next to the stove top, and we boiled the Turkey, this is what I'd expect the bags to smell like.

Fine fine, enough of the detail. I tried boiling some lemons and letting the bags hang out by the stove, but apparently that is more a fish oil thing.

One more wrinkle -- the baby stroller got "Turkey Musk" too. I'm hoping for a solution that doesn't involve just spraying perfume on the bags/stroller, if possible.

Housemate doesn't clean up after himself. Help.

dunkadunc — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 22:58:24 -0800

My housemate doesn't clean up, like ever. How can I do to make things work, or at least more bearable? I've been sharing an apartment since the beginning of September with an old acquaintance, and everything's been going well enough. EXCEPT:
My housemate doesn't help out with the cleaning. Every day I come home to even more mess, and it's starting to really bug me.

Some background here: My housemate and I are both 23, male, and college seniors. We went to high school together but lost touch after graduation. I was looking for a housemate for an apartment I found this August, and a mutual friend said Housemate (whose mom died last year) was looking for a place as well. We signed a lease, moved in and started school, so far so good.
The first hint I got that Housemate wasn't very good at cleaning was about a week in when he asked me what "rinsing" dishes meant. Since then, he's remained pleasant, but the amount of housework he's done has gone from little to almost none.

The main problems:
-His dishes stay dirty in the sink either until I wash them or there are no more clean ones, whereupon he washes a dirty one, uses it, and puts it back in the sink. The same thing goes for pots and pans. I can count the number of times he's washed all the dishes in the sink on one hand, and even then they've come out covered in brown curry grease and needed to be washed again.

-When asked to wash his dirty pots and pans that were filling up the sink, Housemate was surprised that I would want them to be cleaned even if I wasn't immediately going to use them. Housemate said that he would wash them before he needed them again "only as a favor". He cooks about four gallons of curry every two weeks.

-Although he was willing to split the cost of a $50 vacuum cleaner, the only time he's picked up a broom was when he broke a glass. He's been leaving brown greasy globs of curry on all the kitchen surfaces and covers the floor in oil when he cooks. All these problems with cleaning up have carried over to the bathroom as well.

Apart from all this, he's been a decent housemate, asking if I want to watch cartoons or split a pizza or whatnot, or coming out to parties with me.
I've talked to him about washing dishes and cleaning up around the apartment, and he's always said "sure"- the problem is it doesn't end up happening. He tends to drink beers and watch cartoons when he's done with schoolwork and doesn't have anything to do, so it seems like a combination of procrastination and just not knowing how to run a household: his mom used to do all the housekeeping.

What can I do to encourage him to do his share of housework, or failing that, what can I do to minimize the amount of mess I have to deal with? Ideally, we would clean up after ourselves, and if someone else missed something then the other would clean it, no problem.
I don't want to be that passive-aggressive guy, but something's got to change, since I'd like to be able to have guests over without feeling embarrassed. I'd be tempted to only clean up after myself, but I'm afraid the apartment would be taken over by maggots.

Broken Trash Compactor - How to Remove and Alternatives to Replacing?

GregX3 — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 13:10:31 -0800

I need to remove this broken trash compactor. Does anyone know how to get it out? (and bonus points if you can think of an inexpensive way to fill that space and have it look nice.) I really don't want to replace something I'd never use.

Not-so-Fantastic Plastic

Miko — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 07:19:55 -0800

Can you help my household kick the plastic habit? I've been reading all sorts of creepy things about plastics lately, and really want to stop using them as much as possible, especially for food storage and heating.

I've been using Pyrex refrigerator dishes for leftovers for a long time, and have a bunch of old-school Thermoses that still work well. I've become aware of round metal "tiffin" containers, but haven't bought any yet. We store a lot of grains, beans, and spices in canning jars in the cupboards.

Beyond that, I'm still searching for solutions. Things like: when I want to pop a bowl of dough or something in the fridge with an airtight cover, what can I use? Are there reusable sandwich bags or food wrap of some material other than plastic? What about sandwich-shaped containers? What can go into the freezer and provide a real seal - as for frozen pizza dough, leftovers, etc?

A lot of cosmetic products come in plastics, too. Any ways of getting around that?

Thanks all.

How to install tile on oily surface?

leafwoman — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 16:07:00 -0800

Need help with talavera tile installation on oil impregnated plywood. We have a backsplash behind our cooktop made of 3/4 inch mahogany plywood. It has been in place for twenty years (don't ask.) We want to tile it with Mexican Talavera tile (terra cotta handmade irregular "flat pillow" shaped tile.)

The problem is that the twenty years of use has left a surface that is soaked in olive oil, chicken fat, etc. and is obviously "oily."

Do we treat the surface with acetone to degrease it? Do we use some marvelous adhesive that sticks to olive oil? Are we flat out of luck?

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Use a freestanding grill in an outdoor kitchen island?

monkeybutt — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 09:10:08 -0800

Use a freestanding grill in an outdoor kitchen island? We are in the process of designing an outdoor kitchen area on a budget. Readymade drop-in stainless grills are a fortune....thousands of dollars. Now I fully realize that these things are *designed* to be used within an enclosure and have the appropriate insulation around their bases to prevent problems (read: fires).....

However, if one were so inclined (and careful) would it be possible to repurpose a freestanding grill as a built-in? My thinking would involve creating a shelf out of firebrick, which would sit on a foundation of cinderblocks. The surround of the gril would be likewise framed in firebrick and given an appropriate amount of space from the sides/back to prevent any buildup of heat (this would be tested beforehand with the operating grill). The remainder of the island will be covered in 1" ceramic tile.

Does anybody have any experience or technical insights on such an endeavour? For sure there are other considerations: the underside of the freestanding grill might include some features that require open air returns to feed the burners, etc etc.... But I'm thinking i could save a couple thousand dollars on this if i could engineer an island that was both safe and pretty.

Thoughts?

Kitchen remodel help needed

modernist1 — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:52:15 -0800

I am doing a kitchen remodel and need to pick out cabinet hardware. I have looked at pulls from Ikea that cost $10/pair and look identical to ones from higher-end manufacturers that sell for $20-$40 each. That is a huge difference in price. I am wondering, could anyone tell me if it is worth the difference? What is the reason for the huge price difference? Do the ones from Ikea look terrble after a few years? I am spending a lot of money on this kitchen remodel and don't want to skimp on this if it makes a difference -- but I also don't want to throw away hundreds of dollars on hardware if the pulls from Ikea will be just as good.

Contractor in Madison, WI

echo target — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:56:05 -0800

Looking for a contractor in Madison, WI to get an estimate on a kitchen remodel. I'm looking at an older house in Madison that's very nice but for a small kitchen. I'd like to get a ballpark figure on how much it would be to knock out a wall, build a breakfast bar, and move the sink.

This would be our first house, and I'm not sure where to begin. I'm hoping that the contractor can walk through with us and give us a figure that we can use to see if we can afford the place.

Can you recommend any particular contractors to hire, or to avoid?

Once he works out how to open the fridge door we're doomed

alex.dudley — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 12:42:05 -0800

Kitchen trash cans that can withstand a crafty and dextrous cat? One of our indoor-only ex-shelter cats is on a special diet due to digestive issues (most likely caused by garbage-eating while he was living on the streets). He is also unfortunately intelligent.

He insists that he is starving (he's not), and is very resourceful about getting into any food he can - opening cupboards and boxes and even once managing to chew through the thick metallic-seeming plastic bags dry cat food comes in.

His latest target is the kitchen trash can.

Our first trash can was a swing-top 20 gallon plastic bin. He would knock it over and then go to town. I lowered the center of gravity by putting stuff at the bottom under the bag so he couldn't knock it over, but then he discovered that he could make a standing leap from the floor into the trash can, gorge on leftovers, and than make a standing leap back out. Our current can is a step-on pedal-bin, which he can't knock over but has somehow managed to get into. I'm considering setting up a camera.

We don't have much money for trial-and-error with new trash cans, and every time he gets into the trash it ruins whatever health progress we'd made on the special diet.

Please, give me the best smart-cat-proof trash cans you have found, especially those that can stand up to a genius cat whose free midnight snacks have stopped and his gullible sidekick.

P.S. We live in an apartment and can't fix anything to the walls, and there's no door on the kitchen so we can't shut them out.

Help a Canadian find a new breadmaker

Proginoskes — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 09:36:21 -0800

What's the best breadmaker available in Canada? My breadmaker of three years recently broke down and needs replacement. The bread it made was usually very dry and overly crusty and I'd like something a bit better. I've done some research and found that many of the better models aren't available in Canada.

What's up with my gas stove?

zembla3 — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:07:43 -0800

What's the deal with my gas stove? When I turn on the left rear burner, it seems to ignite normally, but the right rear burner also sparks. The right rear burner continues make a clicking noise and spark, but doesn't ignite, and noise/sparking doesn't stop when I adjust the flame on the left burner. What's going on? Is this dangerous? When I turn on the right rear burner, everything seems perfectly normal. The front burners seem fine too. I turned all the burners off and I don't smell any gas or hear hissing, but I'm a bit nervous. This is the make/model of the stove.

Please help me store my oats.

The corpse in the library — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:43:24 -0800

Please help me find the perfect oatmeal container. My mother-in-law has an oatmeal container I covet, and I'm trying to find one for myself. I want it to:

- be clear
- be sturdy
- have a secure lid that's easy to open
- be around 4 quarts (bigger is okay)
- have a nook on the outside for holding a scoop, and the scoop should be 1/4 cup or larger
- be available in the USA, preferably on-line, or else in a store in the Seattle area

I don't want to put the scoop inside the container, I want it to be attached to the outside. Yeah, I know, I'm being very picky, but I cook a lot of oatmeal. The container my MIL has is about 30 years old and has no useful information. I like these, but they don't have the scoop receptacle. We go through oats quickly and don't need to worry about them getting rancid.

Suggestions?

I will crush you. BTW, can you give me some tips on how best to do that?

madmethods — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 15:55:47 -0800

Should I buy a monstrously powerful ice-crushing carrot-liquifying nut-pulverizing fruit-vaporizing circuit-breaker-throwing uber-blender? Why? And which one? I have a decent blender (KitchenAid). I've been using it a lot lately, making smoothies and soups and such, including things with ice, veggies, greens, nuts, etc. It does an okay job. Texture and processing speed seem to leave room for improvement.

There is another tier of blenders out there, things like BlendTec and Vita-Mix, that reputedly can reduce anything to a smooth and creamy consistency in seconds. So should I upgrade? If you have one of these things, what does it deliver that my merely-decent blender doesn't? Smoother texture (no graininess from veggies and nuts)? Anything else? Convince me to switch!

If I do upgrade, which brand and model should I get? Is it just BlendTec and Vita-Mix out there, or are there others? Is one noticeably quieter than the other? Or better/worse otherwise? Particular model to get? Where to buy?

For sale: Jenn-Air High Speed Food Rotter

CommonSense — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 08:45:01 -0800

Why are things suddenly starting to go bad/sour/rotten in my fridge much sooner than they used to? In the last couple of weeks, I've noticed that time seems to be running faster inside my refrigerator. Last night, I discovered that a bottle of V-8 (the low-sodium variet, if it matters) that I bought about 10 days ago looked kind of distended, and when I unscrewed the lid, a lot of air burst out -- fermentation of some sort, I figured. Still, only (about) 10 days after purchase? I've bought V-8 before, and I've been able to open it, use some, store it in the fridge -- rinse and repeat -- for something like two months without a hint of it "turning," let alone fermenting!

Another mysterious thing: There's this carton of "O Organic" 2% milk (Safeway store brand, also known as Von's, Genuardi's, etc. depending where you live) that has an expiration date sometime in mid-September. I'm always amazed at how far out their expiration dates are, and they tend to be accurate. Just this morning, I noticed it's smelling a little. Already. I bought it with the V-8, about 10 days ago, on the same shopping trip.

A little "thing" of yogurt, also from the same shopping trip, with an expiration date some time in early September, looked "fat" also -- the foil lid was rounded instead of flat, as if filled with air. Fermentation of some sort also.

A couple of weeks ago, I noticed that some not-yet-at-expiration-date cream cheese was starting to show spots of discoloration/mold prematurely as well.

What the hell's going on? All of a sudden, things are going bad sooner, and as a single person who goes through food slowly, this is especially inconvenient.

A few bits of info, if it helps: I have a bit of a fruit fly problem in the kitchen, so I relocated a small bowl of fruit (previously on the counter) into the kitchen about a week ago to keep it away from those little buggers. Also, the icemaker on the freezer side has gotten really fussy lately -- it just plain stopped making ice about two weeks ago, but for some reason, toying with the little water pipe thing on the inside, and pulling the fridge out from the wall a couple of feet, made it work again. Also, at one point last week, there was a mildly foul/rotting smell in the fridge for about half a day, but it went away soon after I threw out a half-tomato in a Ziploc bag that had begun to go bad.

Is there some kind of . . . "contagion" effect? That is, if one or two things start to go bad in a fridge, then even if you remove them and throw them out, do . . . THINGS linger in the air of the fridge, attacking other things, even prematurely? I don't get it. It's like there's some kind of food-rotting ghost in the damn thing, and it's irritating me . . .

Should I get a Marmoleum kitchen floor?

Bardolph — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 15:13:59 -0800

Flooring-filter: Talk to me about linoleum in general, and Marmoleum brand linoleum in particular. Is it nice? Is it DIY-able? What should I know before choosing it for our kitchen? So we're looking to replace our current, ugly, vinyl kitchen floor with something non-vinyl. Our original idea was ceramic tile ($2/sqft), but our contractor is claiming we'll have to replace our Luan subfloor with concrete backing board in order to stabilize the tile, bringing the final total to ~$13/sqft installed (!). At those prices, we've been considering alternatives, and Marmoleum in particular has looked interesting. We love the environmental friendliness, its warmth and softness underfoot. The material itself is pretty expensive, though ($6/sqft), so in order to make it competitive with tile we'd have to be able to keep our existing subfloor and DIY the installation.

I'm worried, though, because while I really really want to love Marmoleum, both the installation and the material itself get perplexingly mixed reviews on sites like this one. There seems to be some concern, for instance, that it bubbles up when installed by anyone but a super-gifted and experienced professional, and that regardless of installation the material is hard to clean and not very durable.

If you've got a lino floor yourself, or know of anyone who does, I'd love to hear some more reliable perspectives on this. In particular, is linoleum or Marmoleum attractive/comfortable/durable? Does it work with DIY installation? And is there anything else (alternative brands, caveats, tips and tricks) I should know before I make this choice?

If it helps, our decisionmaking criteria are (1) durability/livability, (2) cost, and (3) aesthetics, in that order. Thanks!

Clean pipes vs. leaky sink

swrittenb — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 10:41:37 -0800

What did I botch when reconnecting the pipes under my kitchen sink, causing them to start leaking? Picture included below, with the leak indicated. So, I pulled out the trusty auger to unclog a slow draining sink, and retrieved a bunch of gunk from the pipes. TMI? Anyway, I cleaned out a bunch of crud that had accumulated along the pipes as well, and reattached the pieces. In this picture, you can see the culprit - it's a p-trap that should just screw on to the next bit. Unfortunately now, there's a small leak right in the inside U. Have I not tightened it enough, or is it too tight? Is it not aligned properly? Is there a washer missing in there (don't think this is the case, but IANAP)?

Please help! My wife is angry that I'm doing dishes in the laundry sink downstairs! :(

Bringin' home the seltzer

sio42 — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 07:52:48 -0800

DIY Seltzer: We love seltzer/sparkling water at my house. We buy lots of it from the store. This seems wasteful. I've seen other questions asking about CO2 etc, but I'm interested in knowing what your experience has been with certain vendors/equipment. I've heard of soda stream usa and soda club. Please tell me about others if they exist.

Have you used them? Have you instead made your own contraption? Do you use glass or plastic bottles? Big or small?

How did you flavor them if you just like the berry/citrus flavors? We're not interested in it tasting like coke or sprite.

Did you save money by DIY or was it just making you feel better about less trash?

Thanks!

Kitchen madness

puckish — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 14:21:27 -0800

Two left feet and some bright kitchen gift ideas.... My best friend loves to cook. We lived together for a year with a shared kitchen. I am a terrific klutz, and on more than one occasion, broke stuff. Nothing big -- a few chipped glasses, a salt shaker -- and on one occasion, a French Press (which I promptly replaced, and apologized profusely for). I KNOW -- it sucks. I KNOW -- I should be more careful. I KNOW -- this is why we don't have nice stuff! But I still feel bad about it, and want to make amends. Anyway, she's now living in an apartment with her significant other, and I'd like to get her something (small, not very expensive, but thoughtful), to add to the kitchen --- partly as an apology for the damage I wreaked upon it, but also as a "hey! welcome to your new space!" kind of thing. But....what? A glassware set would be nice -- or maybe a few wine glasses? I'd like it to be personal -- and potentially sturdy -- and something cool that she'll actually use every now and then.

Anyway -- I'm stuck on glassware, but that seems potentially lame. She's already got a million gadgets (including glassware, flatware, etc), so I'm kind of at a loss a to what she would "need." Any ideas? What says, "Break me, I love you!" to you?

Where can I get a safety cover for the garbage disposal (i.e., whirling propeller that might chop off my fingers)?

ms.codex — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 21:53:58 -0800

Safety cover for the garbage disposal (i.e., whirling propeller that might chop off my fingers). Clueless new tenant here. I've recently moved into an apartment with a garbage disposal. It's down a ways in the drain of the sink, but nevertheless reachable. There is no screw-top cover as I've seen with other garbage disposals. Today I turned on the switch and was absent-mindedly pushing down apple cores when I realized with a jolt that I was only an inch from losing my fingers. How can I completely close off the possibility that someone will get hurt with this thing? Is there a way to permit the disposal to turn on only when it's securely covered?

Electric-start Gas Oven Unable to Reach 250+ F degrees (121 C)

erin_trying — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 11:11:53 -0800

Electric-start gas oven unable to reach over 250 F (121 C) degrees--any way to fix or time to replace? I have an electric-start gas oven from the 1970s whose identifying marks have disappeared or been painted over. For nearly three weeks now it has been unable to get hot enough. It turns on. It goes as high as, about 250 F (121 C) degrees, but it will not get any hotter--except once or twice a week on whim it will get up to 400+ F (204 C) degrees, but there is nothing indicating why it decides to work then. The attached stove top, also electric-start gas, has worked fine the entire time.

Any clues on why this is happening? What can I do to fix it? I recently needed to have my fridge (also from the 1970s) replaced, so I feel a bit bad going "Oh! And a new oven too, please."

Possible factors of its demise:
I bake a lot (by which I mean about 10,000 cookies a year + other stuff) and the previous tenant of three years did not cook/bake at all. Even though I've only been here a few months I can't imagine it liked running a marathon with no training.

It has been absurdly humid where I live, moreso than normal this summer (my TV broke because of it!).