Kitchen must haves and mistakes

[ladywithnomanors]

I’m in the process of buying a house and will be having new kitchen. I’m worried about making any expensive mistakes and don’t want to regret layout, appliances etc.
For example I put oak counter tops in my last house and while I loved the look of them , I won’t be getting them this time as they mark too easily and have to be maintained. Also I found the position of my oven partially blocked a door when in my previous kitchen.
What do people regret having? And anything they didn’t have they wished they did ?
TIA

Completely agree about the Qooker - best thing in the kitchen. Agree about the square sink - big mistake as it stains and is difficult to clean.

Things I love:
Instant boil tap (Grohe)
Water softener (technically not located in the kitchen, but does affect the dishwasher / washing machine).
Pull out bin (although they are ridiculously expensive for what they are).
Ice make in the fridge / freezer.

Things I hate:
Induction hob. Stick with gas. If you do go induction, the saucepans make a huge difference. I have invested in Ninja pans and they have made it bearable but not enjoyable.

Things I would probably do differently but aren't the end of the world:
Integrated appliances are way smaller. Dishwasher especially. Looks nice, but can't fit anywhere near as much in it. I would probably have one of the drawer type dishwashers next. Can't think who makes them.
Ditto fridge freezer.

have a black sink and i love it - had a belfast sink previously god i hated that could never keep it clean, Black sink hardley shows any tea stains etc

Another who hates the induction hob. Wish I'd stayed with gas.

Love:

• Instant boil tap. We have a Quettle (would highly recommend). It was much cheaper than a Quooker and one of the only ones on the market that dispenses water that's 100 degrees ie actually boiling. Makes the cups of tea taste the same as when made with a kettle.
• "Breakfast cupboard" where all clutter can be hidden. We have toaster, coffee maker, grinder, mugs and glasses, squashes, breakfast cereals in there. Open it up and everything is in one place.
• No wall cupboards. Either runs of floor to ceiling cupboards or runs of just base units.
• oven and microwave built into a floor to ceiling cabinet so oven is at chest height
• Different lighting options including task lighting and softer lighting. I use the softer lighting (some pretty downlights) at night and in the morning when full on lights are too much for my half asleep eyes lol

Hated:

• Wooden worktops
• Corner cupboards. Would always try and avoid a 90 degree angle on unit runs
• Microwave on the side
• Toaster and coffee machine visible - constant crumbs and coffee stains
• Shiny unit fronts. Chrome handles
• The colour red. For some reason I just hate it in a kitchen!

A double drawer dishwasher(s). They work as individual units but take up the space of a normal dishwasher.

No more waiting to fill the dishwasher (or getting things back out to hand wash). Brilliant for when you have friends/family round as you can load the mains/starter stuff in one and get it going and still have the other ready for pudding/glassware and knowingly the first will have finished in an hour if you need another load.

Fab for a smaller family especially.

Would never go back to a normal single dishwasher again.

We have moved to a house with a kitchen that needs replacing. Hopefully we can afford to do this next year

My must haves are:
Drawers! Loads of them.
Induction hob and eye level ovens. We have inherited a gas hob/electric oven range cooker and I hate it. An induction hob is much faster, easier to cook with, doesn't overheat the room and is a dream to clean
Pull out bins.
As many sockets as I can fit in!

I’ve got two fancy neff hide and slide ovens that we very rarely use as everything is done in the air fryer, so I wouldn’t bother with that again!

I would recommend getting usb/usb ports in all your sockets… game changer!

I redid my kitchen late in 2024 and was about to add my comments but thought I’d see what I’d change from previous threads.

In fact when I looked at these I was surprised that a year down the line I wouldn’t change anything in my comments on these two threads:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5409229-can-i-see-your-kitchen?
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/property/5259698-easy-to-clean-kitchen-ideas?

You might find the threads generally useful.

Looking across all three threads a couple of things strike me:

• I couldn’t have a gas hob (which I’d always used) but honestly my AEG induction is so close I would now choose it in another kitchen
• I still much prefer freestanding appliances (except for the ovens)
• Quooker type taps still seem to be divisive - they were never a runner for me due to lack of temperature control
• I live in an extremely hard water area and have no problems with water marks on my granite worktops (which are dark)
• My ludicrously oversized fridge is also dark - I don’t find marks a problem and love it more than I expected
• I reduced the number of ovens (I had two double ovens) and now have one single oven and one multifunction oven/microwave/grill/musical instrument. That was the right choice for me now that the DC have their own homes.

Not built in but honestly if my kitchen was bombed and I could save one item it would be my Sage coffee machine.

I made quite a few decisions after reading threads like this and listening to my own builder regarding build options. It must have helped as I have no regrets and I’d still make the same choices.

I do a lot of baking so a pop up socket on the kitchen island was great for plugging in blenders , mixers . USB port included too. Waste disposal unit . Deep drawers , tall shelf cupboards. Eyeline oven so no bending . I am short so tried to ensure I could adjust shelves to suit me . Hard water area so no water dispenser on fridge as it just scaled . Ice maker . Deep cupboards to put air fryer toaster slow cooker in.

Drawers. Over cupboards. Every day of the week. Hate scrabbling about in the back of a cupboard

Dont do all in built as it’s a pain when hou have to replace things

Things I'm really glad we did when we did our kitchen:
Pan drawer and plates drawer next to dishwasher - this was accidental but is so handy when emptying the dishwasher.
Pull out larder cupboard
Two single ovens, main one is slide and hide, top one is multifunction oven/grill/microwave
Loads of plug sockets.
Space for a good coffee machine
Top cupboards which go up to the ceiling or boxed in at the top to avoid that awful gap which attracts grease and dust
No tiles. No grout! I've got glass all the way along the wall behind the hob and work surface and the granite worktop extends to upstands and on the window sills.

I didn't have space for a double sink or drainer, but don't really miss it.

I love my deep butler’s sink

Fisher and Paykel make dish drawers.

Before opting for glass splashbacks check your walls are completely true. Ours turned out not to be, luckily we had opted for small tiles but our fitter commented it was just as well, we have a quartz upstand and he had enough difficulty with that. Might be fine if the glass people come out to measure up like the quartz worktop people do.

We love our small (metro) tiles, they are white with dove grey grout and still immaculate 5 years on, no issues with grease at all. But we don't fry much.

I've recently had a new kitchen. The things I love that weren't in my last kitchen are:
Pull out bin
Drawers under the sink (so easy to find items)
Pull out cupboards
I went for a peninsular rather than island

Advice from a friend was to have at least one large sink.

What I learnt is that my Howdens' kitchen 'designer' was basically a salesperson. I knew what I wanted and pretty much designed the kitchen myself. However both I and my kitchen fitter had assumed he would make accurate measurements, so I would know what size cupboards would fit. Despite coming to my house several times, his measurements were very out, which caused a lot of unnecessary stress as well as additional expense.

I cannot relate to an instant boil tap🤷‍♀️A kettle is so much safer! Pull out cupboards for everything just makes life easier.
Waist height oven will save your back.

Don’t have handles with bits that stick out on the end - pockets get stuck on them all
the time (well mine do as I’m short!)

Do have narrow pull out cupboards where you have small gaps. The one next to the washing machine is great for detergent, dishwasher tablets etc.

Also a wok burner if you have a gas hob. It gets loads of use. I love cooking on gas hobs and would never go electric / induction.

And don’t get a Neff circulaire oven - far too complicated, not worth the cost.

I hate our wide drawers - they're so impractical. No matter where someone is standing in the kitchen, they're bound to be blocking you from opening one.

Love our wooden worktops though. Every year they darken a bit and look better.

I'd also say: avoid MDF if you can, it's awful

Must haves would be

• quartz worktops, ours have lasted really well.
• big drawers rather than cupboards.much better for getting things in and out.

-Dualitt toaster, it's still going strong, because it's mechanical, if the elements blow, they can be replaced.

• a big bin for soft plastic recycling.

I wish I had proper bins fitted under the sink rather than a mish mash of bins and containers.
Also wish we had a bigger freezer

Wish I had a cupboard for charging phones etc - ventilated so it stays cool. We thought about it when designing our kitchen but decided not to. It would reduce clutter and cables.

We have a Quooker with the cube that does chilled and fizzy water, which we really like and use more than the boiling water. I regret not getting the Quooker flexible tap though.

Our kitchen designer/fitter seemed surprised by how many drawers we wanted because they are expensive. But I agree with the many people who have said go for lots of drawers.

If you have space, go for two dishwashers too. We have one in the kitchen and a second in the utility room.