I can't speak from experience, but we were recently faced with the same decision. I liked the way the glass looked becase it seemed to open up the space more, but we decided to go with the stainless because we too were worried about the dirt/grease on the glass. Our designer warned against the glass saying it will look terrible if it isn't totally clean. Also my DH went saw a glass model in a store and it was covered in dust (as usual in a store) and it looked terrible. The SS model in the same store looked fine - and I'm sure no one was cleaning those. (Now please know I do plan to clean my hood... just not often! ;) ) Hopefully the SS will look OK between cleanings too. Hope that helps- good luck!

Thanks, This "collage" approach got me in trouble in the master bathroom I finished off, was rough plumbed by builder, but not finished. I put in an off white tub, a stand along shower in gloss white, all behind the shower door, and a white sink. I figured I could put in a red toilet if I was so moved. My wife disagreed - the toilet is white too and I am supposed to someday replace the off white tub, but haven't.. yes tub is set in a low-boy (not a show too) white tile that matches the stand alone shower. I also installed a 3' (or thereabout) high wainscot in natural wood, stained Minwax Early American with a dash of Mahogany - and wall paper above. I'm now under pressure to paint the wainscot white semigloss. In the case of the kitchen a neighbor suggested Stainless steel and my wife liked the idea.. but burned once make me want to get some input. Thanks again, I am moved one step closer to stainless steel.

>>> would a recirculating hood such as a Broan cbd330 make much of a difference in grease and odors vs no hood at all?<<< >>>I also know what CO is and why I should care about it.<<< >>>Our house is old and far from airtight.Is my hunch that this recirculating hood won't do much good right? Would it mitigate eau de cabbage stew any better than cracking a few windows?<<< My initial reactions to using that Broan without venting to the outside are these: that your Broan may help a bit with some aerosolized cooking grease (although the hood design means that a lot will not be captured); that the Broan may serve as a surface for condensing vapor but will be otherwise ineffective in dealing with vaporous combustion byproducts and steam, much less the odor/stench of boiled cabbage; and that it will do nothing about CO which you should not need to worry about, anyway. For removing odors when boiling cabbage etc., you might have better luck with the windows, particularly if you can toss-in a box fan or window fan for those occasions. CO emissions from modern gas ranges should be barely detectable with sophisticated equipment -- far below hazard levels --- unless somebody has really screwed with your burner adjustments The combustion byproducts from the burners are rather more smoglike with the principal components being CO2 and NO2. The Dept. of Energy in conjunction with the EPA published a study on air quality in kitchens with "unvented" gas ranges and the effectiveness of realtively affordable venting a couple of years ago. The result was some overblown media attention. It also got some interesting commentary here which you can find at this link if you are interested: http://ths.gardenweb.com/discussions/2304651/ny-times-the-kitchen-as-a-pollution-hazard The idea of getting a convertible hood and later installing outside venting is not a bad one. I'm guessing that you are not currently venting because your stove currently sits on an interior wall and you all have been stumped on how to get outside venting without a full kitchen remodel to relocate the stove. Is that correct? That's a problem I had with my old-house kitchen and I discovered numbers of relatively easy ways to go up from a vent and run ducting over to the nearest exterior wall through a cabinet. This was easy for me because the interior wall behind my stove butted into an exterior wall and because I didn't mind the somewhat industrial look of the ducting. Might or might not be that easy for your old house-kitchen and the look might or might not work for you. Having said that, the 30" Broan cbd330 may not be the best choice. It seems to be a low-rise hood which does not project very far out from the wall, and it has a flat base rather than a canopy. As kas has often pointed out, an actual canopy gives better coverage and capture and can be a significant part of the effectiveness of a range hood. Even better when the hood extends a bit wider than the stove. (Better still when the hood also has enough depth to extend as far out as the front of the stove, too.) Basically, the flat base on the Broan means that the unit depends entirely on fan-power to collect vapors, grease, and etc., The Broan has relatively low fan capacity. (250 CFM?) You might want to consider taking that unit back and swapping it for something with a canopy and, if it will fit, something 36" wide. Again, that may or may not work in your kitchen. My old-house kitchen was such that I also had to resort to a low-rise hood with a flat bottom rather than a canopy. We work with the kitchens we have.

I may have left out some words due to repetition. The number of square feet refers to the entry aperture of the hood. For example, a 36 x 24 hood aperture would be 6 square feet, and would require 6 x 90 = 360 CFM actual, likely needing a blower rated at 540 CFM. Pressure loss not only entails the ducting, but the baffles and the MUA path. Leaky walls are not exactly a free path for air. A leaky house may be sufficient for MUA in practice (given that the blower rating takes the pressure loss into account), but the OP may live where aggressive code enforcement will demand at least a damper in a duct to the outside. The rationale for 90 ft/min is based on ensuring entrainment into baffle gaps that typically are around 50% of the baffle area and have to deal with upward plume velocities of as much as 1.2 m/s. See also the table (Figure 4) on page 9 of the Greenheck Guide available here: https://www.tagengineering.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/KVSApplDesign_catalog.pdf The discussion leading to that table should prove useful for background information. In particular, the Greenheck method vs. the linear feet of hood edge (all the way around for an island hood) method is discussed. (Note commercial cooking rarely is true island type; even located in the middle of a kitchen the hood is connected to the cooktop via a back section. There may also be side skirts on the hood.) Last, let me point out that capture can fail under cross draft conditions, which are almost always worse for island/peninsula configurations than wall configurations.