Last weekend my boyfriend and I went appliance shopping. Specifically, we were looking for a new oven and over the range microwave. We scoped it out the week before, with the help of my parents when they were visiting, and did some additional research online. We were informed when the particular items we were looking at were going to be discounted even further (Sunday evening) so when the time came around, we headed out.
We decided not to spend a fortune and settled for something without all the bells and whistles. It's still nice, it's just not fancy. It does everything we need it to do, and it has a few upgrades from the old one.
- The heating element on the bottom is hidden rather than exposed.
- It is self-cleaning (to be fair the old oven was self-cleaning as well, it just didn't work).
- Dual burner on the front right. It can be switched to be either 6 in. or 9 in.
Like I said, not fancy. We aren't spectacular cooks so decided we'd rather save our money and not get all the extras that we wouldn't use or would use so rarely they wouldn't be worth it. In all honesty I could have been easily convinced to buy a much fancier, higher-end one, but my boyfriend wasn't making any sort of attempt at convincing me to upgrade.
It was delivered Wednesday afternoon. Tuesday night I received an automated call saying it would be delivered the next day between 1:15p and 3:15p. So I ran home from work and arrived just after 1:00. The delivery men pulled up at 1:18p. Now, I don't know what your experience has been like, but whenever I get a window like that, they either come at the very end of the window, or they blow by the window completely and come hours later. Anyway, they came, they laughed at the old oven, they installed the new one, and hauled the old one away. Seriously, I wish I had taken a picture of the old oven before it went so you could have gotten a hearty chuckle as well. A joke was made about it likely being older than I am. It probably wasn't much of an exaggeration. It was a leftover from the previous owners which I amended to the contract and technically paid $1 for, so I am just pleased it lasted this long and I was able to put off buying a new one this long.
I am sure you are dying to know what we cooked as the inaugural meal in the new oven. Right? Well, I'll tell you. We made london broil, marinated the night before, and cooked up some veggies on the stove top. We read the manual (yes, I have a boyfriend that actually reads directions) and were excited about using the brand new oven. We read what we were supposed to do and everything was going great. We were broiling away. And then we were really broiling away. And then we started to notice a lot of smoke. And then....
*beeep beeep beep*
*short pause*
*beeep beeep beeep*
Shit. We set the smoke alarm off. We opened all windows in the vicinity and tried to direct the smoke away from the alarm (I was waving the black and gray knit hat I made, since it was handy). I sent a text message to my sister who knew we were cooking: Lots of smoke! Alarm is going off! She texted me back a little bit later asking what the status was, but I didn't see it. So then quite a while after that I get another message, "hello?" I finally replied at that point, but since I hadn't replied earlier she had been worried that we burned the house down. Luckily, that was not the case. And, as it turns out, the london broil turned out better than it ever had before. Cooked to perfection, despite a little drama.
I am happy to report that last night we made pizzas in the new oven and there were no smoke issues. Or any other issues for that matter. Our little make-your-own pizzas came out tasting great.
There is still one little problem with the oven though. Now my kitchen counters look even crappier and more out-dated than they did with the old antique oven.
That is one shiny, white stove!
Our newish stove sets off the smoke alarm, but that's because it's not self-cleaning. And I just haven't gotten around to scraping off the blackened pizza cheese from the bottom.
Congrats on your new purchase!
Ha. I am too lazy for a non self-cleaning oven.
After many, many hours of work, we now have a shiny, white microwave installed above the stove :) I would have actually preferred black, but that would totally clash with the rest of my kitchen.
We've set off the alarm too. But the new stove looks great! And the counters aren't that bad next to it. At least they're white and match.
But this means that you get to redo your counter tops now. Do you see how home improvement just kicks off one project after another? It starts with a brand new stove and before you know it you have remodeled every bathroom and replaced the floors in your home.
Thank you, Debbie :) Now that we got the new microwave in, I think the oven looks even better (if that makes any sense). You are right, it could be worse in terms of the colors clashing. They are workable, for now.
Christina, we'll probably hold off a while on the counters (they are expensive!) but I totally see how one small thing just snowballs into an entire remodel! Now I've learned :)