What do you wish you had in your kitchen?

[Pebblespony]

Planning a kitchen in a new build. Is there anything you wish had been put in your kitchen? We have a lot of space to play around with. I cook a lot so maybe a walk in larder thing?

2 dishwashers (with the cutlery drawer) and 2 sinks (one to be a double sink). A full sized fridge and a fridge freezer.

Waste disposal units are very ecologically unsound. Terrible things.

I have large pull out drawers and love them. Our bosch dishwasher has the pull out cutlery rack and it is awesome.

Silestone quartz worktop owner here. Ours is great. Go for a light colour, not a dark one (especially if you live in a hard water area), the marks will drive you mad. Ours is white and still looks as new, just give it a wipe with a damp microfibre cloth. Very practical.

I’d add to the list:

At least double the number of sockets you think you’ll need. Think about where you’ll plug in your phone etc.

Big tall cupboard in the utility room for mops, hoover, brushes.

Think about putting your washing machine and tumble dryer upstairs (unless mucky horse stuff is more than half your washing).

Double sink in utility room, and really hard wearing materials so you can wash everything down.

Drawers everywhere...drawer freezer, drawer double dishwasher, pan drawers, plate drawers,can you tell I’m obsessed? I’d love one of those Ikea drawer spice racks too.

Good luck!

IKEA wooden bench that has 3 bins under the lid

Do you have a link for this?

I'm planning a kitchen now so this is great!

We will be having:

-Large gas hob & separate eye level double oven. We currently have a Britannia range which I like but won't work in the new layout. There are equal pros and cons to both set ups IMO.

-Large larder cupboard with lots of pull out drawers. and racks on the back of the doors for small stuff. I did consider a walk in pantry but it would have been titchy and I realised a well organised larder cupboard with drawers is much more user friendly and space efficient.

• Hot water tap - one that goes fully boiling

• Double door fridge with freezer drawers and ice and water. We have this already and I love it so.

• Built in bin in cupboard

• Hidden drawers under the sink to save scrabbling around. In fact drawers everywhere.

• Pull out unit next to hob to house oil, salt, frequently used spices etc and oven glove/aprons

• underfloor heating. But the utility room will have a heated towel rail for drying wet coats etc

• Separate titchy utility room for laundry. We will lose 1.6m x 2m of kitchen for it but it's so worth it. Sounds like you have space for a lovely big one OP!

Talk to me about dishwashers with cutlery trays. Why are they better than the basket? Doesn't it make it harder to unload the dishwasher as you can't just lift out the basket and take it to the cutlery drawer?

Our dishwasher has the cutlery drawer next to it, and level. Cutlery is put in the dishwasher tidily - all the knives together. (We “dine” in the kitchen so family members clear their own plates etc). When clean one hand picks up the knives and drops into knife cutlery space. Everything is clean because spoons don’t try and mate in during the cycle. Nor does a fork stick through and stop the rotating thing from rotating.
Worth checking your big plates etc will still fit though as the top cutlery layer means less room below.

Hi Minipie
Yes you have to carry the cutlery from the dishwasher to the drawer rather than carrying the cutlery holder but I don't mind this as the benefits for us out weight this very slight inconvenience.
We find that the cutlery is cleaned better on a tray and that you can fit more cutlery in as well as being able to fit more plates etc in on the bottom shelf.

I think it's down to personal preference really but it is a feature of our dish washer that I really like and I wouldn't go back to a cutlery holder on the bottom shelf of a dish washer.

For those who are doing their kitchens up I'm not sure about your budgets or time scales but I would highly recommend Benchmarx (who have a great design team and are really helpful - at least the branch we used) and if you don't need it immediately they have a Big Bang sale each year around the end of September beginning of October which is worth keeping an eye out for.

We redid out kitchen a year ago and I love it. Highly recommend:

big 5 burner range
2 ovens. If I had the space I would also have a warming drawer
Walk in larder - I have one with counter tops, big pantry cupboard, shelves, and under counter cupboard - and pocket doors that close. I can store all my stuff out of sight
Filing cabinet drawer for house admin stuff
really good vent
pull out drawers everywhere.
built in rubbish/recycling bins

I mildly regret putting in a vertical spice pull out cupboard. I should have put in a horizontal one - much easier to see the spices
I also mildly regret putting in narrow cupboards for frying pans - I don't use them.

I mildly regret putting in taps that operate when you wave at them. Would prefer old fashioned one.

That’s interesting about the regrets pallisers!

We’ve literally just signed off on our new kitchen on Tuesday and are having it installed in October. I’m reading this thread and am desperately hoping I haven't made any wrong choices! Would have loved two fridge freezers, but instead opted for more worktop space and have put the second fridge freezer in the big utility/larder. Things we’ve gone for that I insisted on this time around because of lessons i’ve learned over the years were:

• floor to ceiling pull out larder cupboard so I can see everything in one go
• dedicated spice storage (my current spice cupboard is a disgrace)
• dedicated pull out for canned goods right by the hob
• flexible space 80cm induction hob (will never go back to gas—the induction heats up and responds just as quickly, is lots safer with children, and is soooo much easier to keep clean, and the flexible space is amazingly handy)
• two separate sinks—one for hiding/washing up dirty dishes, one for the draining rack to live so it doesn’t have to take up space on the worktop)
• L-shaped island seating, so as not to have everyone all in a row facing me like i’m their waitress behind the bar 😬
• dedicated drawers for the children to store their pencils/paper/general junk that they always bring into the kitchen anyway
• dedicated plug out of sight for our device charging station (which also functions as a paperwork organizer)
• 120 cm width wall cabinets (vs 60cm) that open up instead of sideways—width so i don’t have to split all of our glassware across cabinets, opening up because you can have all open at once for unloading the dishwasher and never be in danger of smacking your head
• stacked ovens, one of which also has a microwave function
• deep and wide pan drawers with organizers in the shallow top tray
• cutlery tray in the dishwasher (love the one I have now, never going back)
• light marble quartz worktops (I hate hate hate my shiny black granite as it always looks dirty)

Oh I forgot, also 120cm of built in bin drawers and black composite sinks instead of white or stainless (I have one now for the first time in our current house and it is honestly invincible and the easiest thing ever to keep clean—way easier than stainless!)

Space.

A hidden bin and a better designed island unit.

I have two sinks too and I love it. The original sink/dishwasher was too far from the oven/range for safety so I put another one in by the range and it is so handy. I also recommend having a double size sink without any division - so you can fit a full roasting pan in there if needed.

Another recommendation is build your cupboards up to the ceiling or add crown moulding from cupboards to ceiling - means you don't ahve to worry about cleaning the tops of cupboards

A Lemans corner storage rack that rotates out of the cupboard so you can easily reach stuff right in the back corner.

One of those electronic opening mechanisms where you just tap the cupboard door and it glides open by itself.

Wireless charger built into the worktop so you just put your phone down in the right spot and it charges.

Blackboard wall to write shopping lists on.

Oh, and a breakfast cupboard. One of those that contains coffee machine, kettle and toaster, cereal, cups and bowls, with a little work surface inside the cupboard to make your breakfast on!

Probably a lone voice here in that I dislike cutlery trays. I am a stuff everything in dishwasher stacker and really miss the height that is lost having the tray.

The tray is not itself deep enough to take big cooking utensils, eg ladle or pasta server, these used to fit in my cutlery basket. The arm on the underside of the upper shelf only just misses my old Denby dinner plates below yet I cannot place a straight beer pint glass on the upper shelf let alone the naice stemmed wine glasses that used to fit in my old DW. None of my mixing bowls and colanders, and only the milk pan-sized saucepans fit on the upper shelf.

And yes carrying the basket to the cutlery drawer was great. And even my jam pan fitted in my old DW with the basket removed.

That was long

TLDNR I am aggrieved by my cutlery tray dishwashers.

We had really shallow wide drawers in a rented house once and I LOVED them. I have loads of spice jars and they could lie flat in them perfect fit. I could find the one I wanted in super quick time.

We have sockets with usbs now, v useful.

Enough powerpoints.
I had my kitchen down 12 years ago and I thought I had enough but sadly not. (8 in the kitchen, one isn't used , beside the FF)
2 in the utility
4 in dining area.

I'd love an island , doesn't need to have hob or sink. Saw a nice Butchers Block in Costco with storage but too big for my kitchen

I have a huge sink , love it

I'd like a window in the Ultility to put one of those hanging racks over for a breeze. If not one of those ceiling hangers.

2 dishwashers sounds brilliant

Accessible bins and recycle bins

Our pantry is in the understairs, much easier to put food straight there than carry it all the way through to the kitchen

My Lottery Winner Kitchen would have tall white doors that slide aside to reveal all my appliances (that I love but cannot buy because I have no room) with automatic lights.

A Kitchenaid Artisan mixer (just because)

Those of you who have suggested warming drawers....we are midst kitchen planning but we are on a hugely tight budget as doing a massive extension as well. We are having 2 side by side ovens. Would you suggest we get a tall unit that could house a warming drawer in each in the future as it's likely we won't be able to afford to add them at present. We would obvs then have to sort the electrics at the same time. Can we get a filler part to cover the gap in the meantime would you think? Don't want to get to a years time and think - wish I'd done that.

I would bobkate. I cook a lot and often do big groups at christmas/thanksgiving etc. I have 2 ovens and use one as a warmer a lot of the time but would love a proper dedicated one -just couldn't fit it in. Would love to have 2 hot ovens going and then a warming drawer for food that is done.

my friend uses her warming drawer to keep her tea hot - just pops the teapot in.

Aidan Turner splayed over my work surfaces

Aga. Boiling water tap. Walk in larder.

Here's what I don't like about my current kitchen (we didn't fit it), if that helps:

Pull out spice drawers (vertical). Manky, difficult to clean, in fact virtually impossible. Much prefer shallow drawer spice organisation.

Dishdrawers. Fucking hate the things. Can't fit much in, the arm is forever getting stuck, they don't clean that well.

The range cooker. I've never had one before so no idea if this is common or just the fitting of ours but I have to try my hardest not to think about all the stuff that has fallen down the very narrow gap at the back/down the sides.

White sink. I let OH talk me into one of these in our last house and I hated it there, I hate the one here too. Difficult to keep clean and has chipped.

Wall cabinets. We have no work surface that doesn't have wall cabinets above it. It feels oppressive to me, but this is exacerbated by the layout and light in our kitchen. In the last house we had no wall cabinets (we designed the kitchen) and I loved our huge expanse of work surface.

Tall cupboards for vacuum/ironing board.
Definitely plan your zones.
Have electrical sockets put behind drawers you can charge devices out of the way.
Integrated bin
Tea towel drawer
Think where your kettle etc will go to have sockets put In good places.