Kitchen Essential

Waste disposal units

Critics of waste disposal units say they are noisy; that cutlery can be mangled; and that extra food particles in sewers could lead to an increase in the number of rats breeding. If they are badly fitted or supplied with a weak motor they can be more trouble than they are worth. Unclogging blocked drains and untangling string caught around the blades is a major chore. But they are ideal to get rid of scraps of food and smelly waste bins both hygienically and quickly, necessary in many households, especially in flats.

There are two types of disposers. With batch feed disposers, a batch of rubbish is put into the chamber and the plug and cold tap switched on. The grinding chamber is totally enclosed during the grinding operation. Continuous feed disposers allow waste to be processed continuously with cold, flowing water, without switching it off to reload. To ensure the food is safely pushed down into the grinding chamber, a wooden spoon may be used. The grinders and impellers at the base of the chamber pulverise the food waste into a fine slurry which is then washed away into the drainage system.

Although coping with most food waste, from experience, electrically-powered disposers do not deal very well with artichoke leaves, banana skins, other soft, stringy vegetables or large meat bones. Chop bones need a lot of noisy grinding before they disappear. Sink waste disposers, of course, will not deal with bottles, tins, paper or plastic which will only gum up the works, ruin the grinders and block the pipes. A ¹/2-hp motor will cope better with waste than a smaller model, and an outer casing will insulate the sound more effectively.

If you plan to install a waste disposer into an existing stainless steel sink, tools are available to cut a 90 mm waste hole. A new sink should have a waste of 90 mm. Always check before you buy in case the unit can’t be fitted for some reason, such as not being on mains drainage.

Kitchen units

Units are first and foremost a matter of personal taste. Kitchen unit manufacturers tend to copy each other’s designs and use virtually the same interior fitments and fittings to produce fairly similar end products. The occasional manufacturer will use, say, an exclusive dust seal around the doors, or ventilate the larder unit, which may or may not appeal to you.

What is important to someone about to invest in a new kitchen is that the manufacturer, shop or studio has a good reputation. Then should anything go wrong (and it happens even in the best regulated transformations) the problem will be rectified without too many hassles. Beware of the here-today-gone-tomorrow salesman who promises you a dream kitchen which turns intoa nightmare once he’s taken your money, leaving you no kitchen and no forwarding address!

Ovens and hobs

A kitchen can still function without fitted units, but without a cooker it loses all meaning. Gas or. electric? Free-standing, split-level or built-under? Fan, solid fuel, ceramic, microwave, British or Continental? The choice is bewildering.

According to the Electricity Council, the British as a nation grill and bake more frequently and roast meat more often and more slowly than do Continental cooks. Most British housewives therefore find the Continental oven with integral grill inconvenient.

The position of oven controls can be either eye level or waist height. Grills can also be at these levels. Your choice will depend on your height, and your eyesight. Though some of our survey respondents felt it really didn’t matter as long as the grill cooked efficiently. Unless carefullyplanned within the layout, a split-level cooker can take up too much space in a small room. But the advantages of no bending, ease of cleaning, and extra storage in housing units far outweigh this criticism.

Built-under ovens are a streamlined alternative, but have the disadvantage of the grill inside the oven. It is necessary to bend to remove food from the oven.

With both these combinations you are able to mix your fuels, gas hob with electric oven, or vice versa.

Fan cooking needs some clarification. Fan ovens are more economical as they need no preheating and cooking temperatures are slightly lower. Heat is evenly spread throughout the oven. Cooking time and shrinkage of food are both reduced. Less splashing during cooking means less cleaning.

A fan-assisted oven circulates the heat evenly around the oven (generally British made), whilst other types direct heat through ducts in individual shelves (Continental method). The gas industry has produced its own version of a gas- fired fan oven, and have advanced a stage further. This fan/gas/microwave combination cooker, also has a self-clean programme. It is certainly a breakthrough in combining technologies and energies.

If your choice is split level, the hob need not be the same make or even the same fuel as the oven. A hob can have two, four, or six plates or burners. It can also incorporate a long, narrow hot plate, a deep fryer, a charcoal grill, or a bain marie. It too can be mixed fuels: two gas, two electric plates or ceramic. Electric plates aren’t as instantly responsive as gas, but they are easier to clean. Instantly controllable electric hobs are now becoming available with the use of tungsten halogen filaments. But if you do choose gas you can obtain hermetically sealed burners and a choice of different colours to match sinks.

Pan supports can be a big problem when they chip or stain or even disintegrate. Stainless steel pan supports always mark and this cannot be removed. Make sure that pan supports hold your smallest pan without it tilting onto the burner.

Automatic and spark ignitions on gas hobs sometimes fail after a while and frequently fail if handled incorrectly. Thermostatic ‘pan-sensors’ are available on some gas and electric models and are useful for control of either high or low temperature cooking.

Ceramic hobs consist of a smooth sheet of ceramic glass that is non porous and durable beneath which are two or four radiant heating elements. On the surface of the ceramic glass there are circular patterned areas to indicate the size and positioning of the heating elements beneath the glass. The colours are either white, mottled, brown or black. The darker the surface the easier it is to clean. Some hobs have extra safety features — usually a large neon warning light on the control panel which glows for 20 to 30 minutes after the element has been used to warn that the surface may still be hot.

The depth of most hobs has in the past been too great to allow a drawer or pull-out table or appliance to fit underneath. But many manufacturers are now able to produce a shallow 30 mm deep hob which makes for far greater flexibility.

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