I was quoted $ 2500 for similiar work. My uncle made the referral. Meanwhile the same plumber retiled his bathroom and fixed a leak whick took about 3 days. All material was included in the price except the tiles. The price was much less and more labor intensive. You gotta watch those plumbers! nyc.

If you want to see my slab mess you can look at my demolition diary (scroll down from there). I'm in SoCal, with slab, but I have to admit I don't even know what "post-tension" is. There's some fill in the front of the house, but I don't think this was a concern in the kitchen. Regarding the floor after the trenching, there's goop my artisan tile setter used, called anti-fracture membrane. It takes a couple of days to put down, but not a month of curing. It's supposed to keep the tile from breaking if the new concrete expands and shifts at a different rate than the old. When you're considering the sink relocation, remember the plumbing vent and fall of the drain line, as well as running the water. It's important to be able to drain into your existing line (since you don't want to dig up the whole house), and vent somewhere feasible. For mine, before we even started demolition, the master plumber traced where the vents were, and sent the camera robot into the drains to see where they were, at what depth, and at what rate of fall. I was very lucky that they could tie into what was there without much trouble. It's much better to do it this way than just start digging and take your chances. The dust CAN be controlled. Just act a little hysterical around the GC. :-) Mine brought in the thin plastic sheeting from Home Depot, and put it over everything. Well, his helper did. :) It also drapes the open wall between the dining room and living room, and covers the kitchen door. There isn't an outside lock, so one of the guys comes in, opens the kitchen slider, comes back and tapes the kitchen door, then goes around. Too much dust escaped when they removed the dining room door, however, even though there were drapes between DR and LR. A solid barrier is...solid, and it took them awhile to get the shrouding just right. If you have an open plan, several separate layers become crucial. But it can be done. Although dust is inevitable, I've had remarkably little to deal with, and since I have respiratory issues I was expecting the worst.

In order to gain access to the blind corner, do you mean to create an opening in the wall and punch into the existing corner cab? I don't see how you need to mess with the sink cabinet, unless you want to have doors accessing all cabinets along that peninsula. Here's what we did to make better use of the corner cabinet space (it's also accessible from other side; we store trays in there now) We had a local crafstman build this shelf insert and cut into the cabinet & peninsula skin (old photo: tiling/painting complete now)

Some combination steam ovens (such as the Miele models) even have rudimentary support for "sous vide" cooking. They are not quite as precise with their temperature settings as a genuine water bath, but with a little trial-n-error, you can often get very comparable results. A steam-assist oven would typically not be able to do this. I have only been able to use my Miele CSO for a few days now, as the kitchen remodel is not 100% finished and we haven't quite moved back in. Back what little I have done so far does blow me away. It is so much more versatile than my old traditional oven. And yes, I am so glad I sprung for the plumbed model; makes it such a breeze to use steam whenever it helps a given recipe.