Hi! Welcome! I didn't see your first post. Probably it slipped away before a lot of people saw it. It happens sometimes. Don't let that get you down. You did exactly the right thing by trying again.

Are the numbers without " on them the metric ones? No, that can't be right going by the proportions. Okay, it's the exterior numbers on the elevations that are in cm. I get it...

I have a friend whose husband was a mashkiach (sp?) for restaurants, so I have no doubt about her kashrut, and they had a postage stamp kitchen, less than half the size of yours, with only one sink and no counters that were kosher. They had separate cutouts of Formica skin for Pesach which they put on the regular counters after cleaning, which made that much easier. I take it your rabbi allows Ceasarstone as a kasherable material?

Question: Do your kids, friends, other family members have trouble keeping things separate? Because you might achieve a more functional kitchen design if you didn't have to have separate counters.

Re the dishwasher, they do save water and energy over hand washing, but I think locating it next to the parve sink is asking for trouble. There are some disagreements about dishwasher usage. Some rabbis allow the same racks to be used for meat and dairy, while others require different racks and a cycle run in between. That, in both storage for the racks and extra water/energy usage, could negate the savings. I think having a meat only dishwasher could be a bit of a waste, though if your Shabbat and Yom Tov dishes can go in it, it could be very useful just for getting them out of the way.

I've seen kitchens with two sinks side by side and they look fine, but I'm not sure how well that will function for you with the turned sink you're talking about. Another thing that is oven done is to continue the counter over the divide of a large double sink. You could plumb each side separately if it makes you feel better (it's not necessary, but some people do that). That would give you the function and appearance of two sinks, but wouldn't require the extra bracing and all that real separate sinks would.

Just going on your plan as is, it seems to me that it might work better to have the meat sink by the dishwasher, and put the parve and milk sinks together. I'd think it would be easier to kasher that way too if things go awry.

Is that a little cooktop I see by the parve sink?

Do you expect proper kitchen seating where the stools are drawn? Or are they just for cooks and kibbitzers? Some overhang is necessary for a proper breakfast bar.

Re the toaster oven, you need more air circulation space than is shown in the drawing, but it should be okay with several inches all around it, especially if you line it with tile or metal so that the surfaces won't scorch.

Do you currently own the range? If not, you might want to look into the double oven ones. They have an extra shallow oven instead of a storage drawer or warming drawer. Though I guess maybe you have and need a warming drawer? It would make your dairy oven use a lot easier than with a toaster oven, though it might not be in the budget.

I'm picking apart the little questions as a way of wrapping my head around the plan as a whole. I have to think about it awhile longer before I make any substantive suggestions.

I think the wood tone Formica, especially a light birch color, would look excellent with black Caesarstone and the stone floor. Is the floor the ubiquitous every floor in Israel stone? Or is it darker?

Thanks!

We're very lucky this Pesach- the kitchen is slated to go in shortly before, so we won't use it at all until Pesach and then we won't have to cover anything. In the coming years, we'll do what we normally do and cover with PVC or the like.

I'm actually not sure how kasherable the Caesarstone is, but it's the only thing in the budget. We cover our counters anyway for Pesach, so it'll do.

Things sometimes do get mixed up and having separate sections just makes things much simpler, in general. Separate dairy and meat counters are more important, but the pareve section gives me a place to bake and make kugels, etc., since my appliances will go in that cabinet. My husband would really like me to have a separate pareve sink, so that pareve pots, etc, don't sit together with the meat ones in the sink. (it can get complicated when you pour a pot of boiling water in a sink with meat residue and then realize that, oops- the pareve knife was underneath everything.)

We don't own dishwashers, but would like to leave space for them in the future. I have fibromyalgia and my hands are often in a lot of pain. The plan is to have a full size one for the meat dishes and a half size one on the dairy side. (our Rabbi holds that you can only use a dishwasher for one or the other)
I doubt we'll save money with them, but we might save my joints:)

The two sinks that are next to each other are mislabelled on the plan- sorry- that must have confused things. The fleishig sink is on the left and the pareve one is on the right. The milchig one is on the other side of the kitchen, in the section with the peninsula. I'm not worried about plumbing problems between the two sinks, since they're pareve and fleishigs- it won't treif things up if there's a back-up.

We looked at double sinks, but none of them were big enough- each side needs to be able to handle large pots on its own and none of the doubles in our price range could.

The little cooktop is by the dairy side. We do a lot of pasta and eggs, so walking pots and pans around the peninsula to the range would have been a real pain. Two burners by the dairy is just right.

I'm hoping that my kids will be able to sit and eat there (though it may be quite squishy) and that it will be a nice place to work together with them. Currently, when we make challah, or roll out babka, or decorate cakes- anything that they like to sit and do with me, we do it on the dining room table because there's just no space and that way we can all sit down. There's about a 30 cm. overhang of the counter top- it just didn't show up properly in the plan.

My kitchen guy doesn't seem to think we need more than a few cm. gap for the toaster oven, but that makes me nervous- our current one gets very hot on top-it melts plastic left up there by accident. I'd like a different one, but still. Are you saying I should line the shelf with tiles?

We currently own the range and while I would love built-in double ovens, it's way out of our price range. Especially since our oven is only 13 years old.

The formica that is my top pick right now doesn't have a name, just a number, so I'm not sure how it relates to birch. It's a light colour with a warm tone- a little brighter than some of the other light ones, because it doesn't have that grayish cast some of them do.

Our floors are the ubiquitous Israeli stone- it is what it is. Since almost all houses here have that same floor, it's not impossible to ignore. It just kind of fades into the background, like the annoying ads you get used to ignoring on every site.

Thanks so much for taking your time with this- I really appreciate it!

Welcome to the forum! I think that professional in person advice from a KD who understands the requirements is going to be your best bet, even though plllog gave you some great advice. I don't think you are getting a good response because we simply do not have that many members familiar with a kosher kitchen's requirements. I know I'm not at all familiar and I've done hundreds of kitchens over the years.

Thanks- I actually sat down with my kitchen guy's designer and I'm not really asking about the kosher requirements- I explained it, because otherwise I'm sure a kitchen with three sinks looks completely wacky. The issues I'm having now relate to more generic design things- like the toaster oven shelf, etc.

Oh, yes, I wasn't following the description that well, and was looking at the labels on the pictures. The dairy sink being the separate one makes sense. I also totally missed the 24" dishwasher on the plan. So sorry about that! Ignore entirely what I said about it. That's why I ask questions. Besides learning more, I also get my mistakes fixed. :) And it helps my approach to know that your rabbi requires separate dishwashers. That pretty well points to the other requirements you have. :)

One really important piece of advice: Have a backup plan for Pesach. Unless you're much further along than you sound like, you're in the zone of if everything goes right. Make a plan for what to do if things go wrong and you're not in your new kitchen in time. At least if the sinks and appliances are in on time you'll be able to cook ahead. :)

Re the overhang (which doesn't show at all on my screen), 30cm should be adequate. It's a little tight, for long term comfort, but so is the width. For squeezing in a few kids for breakfast or baking it should be fine. OTOH, I have many fond memories of my mother bringing the mixer to the table so that we could make hamentashen, cookies and other fun things. If you're kneading by hand, you might like doing that on the table better than the counter unless you're tall. My optimal height for kneading or rolling is 33", which is halfway between the standards for table and counter. I figured out, however, since I have a carpet under the table and don't want to bake there, that I could use my counter by wearing tall clogs, rather than having a special, lower, baking counter. :)

Can you explain more about how the range and window will interact?

Do you ever kasher the oven for dairy baking? Would you ever consider getting a wall oven rather than the toaster oven? I know there are budget limitations, but sometimes you can build what works for you now then allows for an easy transition to a planned change in the future. The big problem with the toaster oven niche is the heat. Toaster ovens aren't usually well insulated and they throw a lot of heat around all sides. OTOH, if you have a niche big enough to transition into an oven later, it should work well for either.

I think the whole niche should be lined with tile for it to be safe for the toaster oven. That's five sides.

The whole plan makes much more sense to me now that I know that the L is the dairy zone. If you had enough produce for that to be your parve zone, I'd think you had a farm and could process it outside. :) Yes, the whole thing makes a lot more sense now. I can definitely see all the baking and dairy meals in that area. I just think you're going to need a bigger dairy oven as your kids get bigger. Teenagers are a lot like goats--they'll eat anything and everything and leave a wasteland behind them. Is the dairy cooktop induction? The boil time would be great for pasta, and it's really wonderful to cook on in general. You can melt chocolate or make toffee (matzah toffee!!! major crowd pleaser) without a double boiler on induction, for instance.

The biggest issues I see for the perimeter flow are the path from the stove to the dining room, which I assume is outside the bottom opening, since the other is the laundry. (Do you have a kitchen porch? Or is that the laundry? Or does it open off the laundry?) I'm thinking the straight path is going to be handing things across the peninsula, which isn't a good idea, dripwise. I'm not understanding the prep flow, though. If the parve sink is on the right, then it's the parve counter that runs by the stove? And if you wash meat on the meat side, and then carry it through the parve zone, does that make sense? Or do I have it backwards still?

Regarding pantry size, the amount of pantry storage you need is just a bit more than your cabinet will hold. Do you have a makolet (sp?) on your block? That relieves a lot of the storage pressure. 60 cm really isn't enough for a family of 8 for American style, shop once a week, storage. If you can send a kid out for a can of whatever six days a week, it's a lot easier. The best way to know if it'll do is to start with the must haves. If your baking supplies will be in the pantry, for instance, group them together as if they're on the right sized shelves and see how much room they take up. Do the same with all your staples. Since you won't have drawers (roll out tray shelves), consider collecting boxes that will fit that you can slide in and out...but remember, either one takes up some of the shelf width.

One way to gain more room in the kitchen is to find some space elsewhere for the cookbooks. You can copy out your most used recipes and put them in a single binder. Keeps your books clean, too. :) That takes a lot less space than all the books. I'm not assuming you have room for them elsewhere, but if you can find it, you'll have more pantry space.

I think you've done a good job of squeezing things in, covering your requirements and staying on budget. I keep thinking of ways to change things around, but they start to compromise that.

Regarding the backsplash and corner by the range, tile before you put the range in, including behind the riser. Just let it be what it is. It'll be much more comfortable to cook with the range away from the wall, even if it's just by that little bit, the tray cabinet is good to have, and it gives you a place for a spoon rest and a trivet on the far side.

As to colors, the Formica sounds like a good color. I was asking about the floor because that ubiquitous stone (agreed about the ignorable factor) is nice and light and should look fine with the color you're describing which is more toward a medium value. I think you could go with either the black or the blizzard white (very low speckle factor) Caesarstone and have it look good. The black will be snazzier, but show more streaks. OTOH, the white can yellow over time and exposure to sunlight. It sounds like it will be attractive, warm and pleasant. Too much "character" in a small, busy kitchen can be overwhelming. Your neutrals should have enough variation not to be boring, and enough boring to be calm amid the chaos.