I really like the way my baking area functions. It's right next to the prep sink and dw and it uses 2 cabinets--a tall cabinet with pull outs and a base cabinet with drawers and lower portion with tray dividers. While baking I leave out the counter height pull out in the tall cabinet. It holds flour and sugar, baking soda & powder, vanilla, etc. Everything is handy while I need it and easy to put away.

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zelmar: i don't know if i ever told you, but i love your baking center! looks beautiful but also very functional. great space.
we're in production now, probably installing next month but here's a drawing of mine. it's an armoire with permanent marble slab inside and mixers, food processors and other small baking appliances will all live inside. planning a plug mold in the back. LCD will also live here.

What beautiful baking centers. Thanks for posting

Zelmar can you tell me the width of the counter from your prep sink over to your tall baking cabinet?

Rhome what is the width of the counter in your baking are that you have your stand mixer on? Thanks

Rhome what type of surface is your baking counter? Is it marble?

Oh - I just posted this in the thread about Baking Area Height. This is not mine - but I thought it looked like a good idea

My baking counter is 47" wide. We didn't have a marble budget, so our counter is Pionite laminate. :-)

Mine is not done yet. The room is 8' x 16'

Here is the other side. The bookcases are temporary.

The hardware came yesterday! As soon as the cabs are painted, no more blue tape. :)

I bake in my newly renovated Butler's Pantry. I roll out dough on the marble counters! Kitchen aid mixer and Cuisinart are hidden away in gray painted cabinet appliance garages. Its lovely and we are so pleased with it. Here is the link, scroll down for pics.

Here is a link that might be useful: Butler's Baking Pantry

bump

cotehele,

Noticed both of your kitchenaid mixers. Do you use both of them?

datura, yes, I use both of them. The smaller one is an old Hobart-made KA mixer I've had for at least 25 years. It is good for lighter mixing and smaller batches of bread/rolls/pizza/pasta. The 6 qt. is for larger batch yeast baking. When I am doing a lot of baking, I alternate mixers letting one cool down while the other one is mixing. It is very efficient for pasta, too. The roller goes on one mixer and the cutting attachment is on the other.

I have had my KA for 18 years and I use it at least once a week - more during holidays!! They are great for whipping up a batch of cookies, a quick coffee cake or mashed potatoes. Wish I had more time to bake!!

cotehele--

GIVE ME YOUR KITCHEN!

Seriously, it look like it will be stunning. I am a total sucker for the unfitted look.

The pull-out baking counter in the tear looks silly, though pretty. You want to mix lower, too. What's the point?

reyesuela,
You are seeing my bakery, not my kitchen.
I do not understand your last line. Please explain, and I will respond as best I can.

rikerk, sorry I didn't get back to you. I lost track of this thread. The space from edge of prep sink to baking cabinet is a little less than 4' (9' counter with a 13" sink in center.) I do the mixing at this counter but I tend to roll dough out on the peninsula just across the aisle.

I love all the baking area/rooms shown. Our kitchen has been done for years but looking at the solutions GW'ers have come up with is still a feast!

@cotehele: I'm pretty sure reyesuela's last line refers not to your kitchen but to the picture jeri posted above.

Gee, I wish we had the option to clip entire threads! These baking centers are inspiring!

Kateskouros, can you explain your wall in detail? What else are you planning for the space, and how wide is it?
(the whole wall) It looks beautiful.

''The pull-out baking counter in the tear (sic) looks silly, though pretty. You want to mix lower, too. What's the point?''

tear = rear, reyesuela?

My entire kitchen and bakery remodel was planned around the ''silly'' pull-out baking counter as many GWers can attest. It is a family heirloom originally purchased by my husband's grandmother and made by Napanee-Copes, an Indiana company, in the early 20th century. It is called a Kitchenet. I live in Indiana and appreciate that connection.

Family is of paramount importance to me. Even though Mammaw is no longer with us, I feel a loving connection with her every time I use it. I remember the first time I went to West Virginia to visit DH's grandparents. The Napanee Kitchenet was on the back enclosed porch. She used it for baking the most scrumptious pies. Forty years later I am blessed to have it in my home.

The period piece fits nicely in my 1892 home. It was common for the kitchen functions to be divided among several rooms at the turn of the century. The bakery separates some of the tasks from the new kitchen in the adjoining room. The bakery has the feel of a scullery, and I enjoy the luxury of having painted cabinets in the bakery and quater-sawn oak cabinetry in the kitchen proper.

The piece holds nearly all my baking ingredients. I especially love the built-in flour bin, the original glass tea and coffee jars and the glass sugar bowl, wire stand and tin scoop. The pull-out counter is an excellent surface for any work that may stain the marble counter.

The mixers are stored in the cabinet beneath the marble counter. It is a very stable, long surface that is ideal for using two mixers at once. I bake for our family as well as other people and every bit of the prep space. It is the ideal height for working dough, cutting cookies and baking breads.

Cotehele--I now live in WI but am a Hoosier by birth and childhood, and still have many ties in the area of which you speak. I love that piece, and have a whole new appreciation of your kitchen knowing it's history. I have some of my Grandmother's pie plates--she used to be the pie queen.

Happy Baking
Cj

I'm pretty sure reyesuela's last line refers to the picture jeri posted above.

I think you are right  though I donÂt understand the comment either. I thought the whole idea of the pullout was so that one could have a lower area to knead and roll dough on.

I really would like some comments on this idea. It is not mine, so my feelings will not be hurt  but it is in my "Things to Consider" folder. I thought it was a great way to not have to lower the primary counter space which IMO might affect resale (not sure everyone would appreciate it), while still delivering the lower area to work on when needed.

susied3: i'm sorry, i didn't see your post to me until now. my kitchen will be painted white except for a few pieces that will be stained cherry: island, spice rack and the baking center ...which sits centered on the wall i posted above. it will be 5' wide and the doors will recess to expose mixers, food processors, blender, etc... interior shelves will accommodate utensils and dry goods. the drawers below will house mixing bowls and other necessities. adjoining lower cabs will hold baking pans. the rest of the perimeter cabs are just that ...i have them earmarked for canned goods and other "stuff". i hope that's detailed enough for you! honestly i haven't got it all figured out yet! i like the idea of all the appliances "living" in the cabinet since i can just pull the mixer or whatever forward without lifting. i'll have an island directly opposite so i just have to turn around and have plenty of space to roll out dough and for other work. hope that helps.

cotehele - I swear, if you post another photo of your baking area again I won't be able to mind those manners that my mother spent years teaching to me and I'm just going to have to INVITE MYSELF to your place and spend a day baking there with you!!! LOL I'll bring my KA as a back-up. It looks like soooo much fun to work there (if you want to call it work).

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Cj-Enjoy your grandmother's pie plates. Do you use them? I have Mammaw's pie plate, too. It is nothing special to look at, but memories are never out of style.

country smile-Ok, come on over. :)

Cotehele---

Sorry, last line wasn't about your bakery--it was about the "tear" above, the magazine pic with a high counter and a mixer on it or the low counter. If you have a mixer, you want it to be as low as your kneading area, right? They way, you can pour more easily, reach the back of the mixing bowl, etc.

"tear = rear, reyesuela? "

To clarify--no, a tear is a page of a magazine that you rip out (usually because it's pretty).

I would love to see more of your kitchen. I wasn't saying it was silly at all!

And again, I'm mortified if you thought I was criticizing the "kitchenet"!

Specifically, what I don't like about the other idea is that it does give you a lower counter while having appliance garages above, but you sacrifice all the lower cab storage that could have held the appliances just fine, and the mixer it given a place on the higher cab, not the lower one.

Contrast this to your antique. The antique is, well, a whole lot cooler, but that aside, its pullout gives you more counter space while preserving the under-cabinet space. Much more practical, not so self-aware, and a much better usage of space. (I'm assuming that you'd want a pullout counter because you didn't have enough space for a separate low one--the "kitchenet" does this, but the tear sheet from the magazine does not.)

Plus, the antique add a lot more in character, to me at least, than the table's "color punch" does.

Is this going to be a pantry as well as a baking room? What does the main kitchen look like?

I think my best prep counter surface is 34". I'm going to stand on some books for a while and see if I'm right....

(I also love Willow Decor's, but I love her whole house....)

Oh, not to worry, reyesuela!

It is a good plan to test your ideal counter height for various tasks. I have four different heights. The clean-up run is 36'', the cooktop is 34'', the prep island is 32''-33'' (the floor slopes), and the baking counter is 33''.

I cannot find the thread of my kitchen progress pics. It must have been lost along with many others when GW was having server problems. I need to take better pictures anyway.

There is plenty of room to add some extra storage in the bakery. At this point I don't need, but it is a work in progress, ha.

I'm thinking that with a thick chopping board I can have it just a weeee bit lower than I otherwise would. Better for kneading and for stirring. I'm going crazy-symmetrical in my plan because of the architecture--it looks unfinished if I don't.

Was that a porch, I assume?

I'm nearly finished with a two-bathroom remodel, on the bathroom forum, and very occasionally lurking here.

bluekitobsessed - LOVE how you worked your lowered baking counter into your kitchen. I can just picture a floured surface and someone rolling out pie crusts. A lowered counter was a high priority for me. I love using mine when baking and other tasks and I'm 5'7". Someday, if I have grandchildren, I know they'll love it too.

It's funny how a plan goes through many metamorphoses. We added a garage on that side of the house. The oddly shaped lot required the garage angle back from the house creating this connecting room between the house and the garage. I considered the space for storage, pantry, and laundry. It finally became a bakery when I could not arrange the kitchen to suit my vision. The Kitchenet and ovens always required moving something else, then the work flow was flawed. I am very happy with the efficiency of the kitchen without the ovens in the same room. The ovens area few feet from the cooktop and visible from the prep space so it works very well. My customers come in through the garage and enter directly into the bakery. Well, the ones who don't come in the front door and stay for a chat, lol.

@cotehele: This question comes nearly six years after the conversation, so I hope you see this. Where did you get the faucet hardware for your sink? I need hardware that doesn't require a separate hole for the hose. Thanks.

That looks like a Chicago Faucet with a pre-rinse fitting.

http://www.chicagofaucets.com/catalog/catalog.php?part_number=509-GCLABCP

@wilson853: It does. Thank you!