I own a 36" Wolf DF and am one with porcelain issues. I love the burners with a great low heat and the oven is wonderful. I am looking to replace it though. After dickering with Wolf they have agreed to provide the part and $350 in labor. The problem is the labor starts at $800+ because they don't know what they will find and the time may vary depending on how fast the guys work. They will only guarantee the part one year. They used to replace ovens with this problem even when 4+ years old for a small fee. Most posters here and elsewhere have had more than one replacement and the replacements don't last as long as the one before. I don't want to risk inhaling or ingesting tiny glass shards when the liner starts to degrade. "I thought electric was a more consistent, and therefore better, option for baking/roasting? " "gas is better for roasting because of the moist heat. " Consistency has nothing to do with gas or electric, but bulk for thermal stabilization (providing radiant heat), air movement within the oven chamber(providing convective heat), placement of burners and accuracy of thermostat. Some companies seek to improve this by adding among other things,more insulation, more bulk, fan(s), a third and possibly a fourth element with computerized controls and and a thermostat with a narrower variance from the set temperature. When looking at humidity in an oven, you have to look past the immediate heat source and look at what happens with the oven and the cooking process. In general a gas oven has more ventilation through the oven chamber so the water that is a product of combustion is vented out along with more heat, so the heat is drier. Electric ovens are not ventilated as much so hold moisture from cooking. The moisture in the electric oven is beneficial the first half of baking breads and cakes because it allows the dough/batter to expand a little more, promotes starch gelatinization and allows better heat penetration of what you are baking. "Dry" is better the second half of the baking process. People seem to pay more attention and it makes more difference for bread. There are many ways people use steam for bread. "Dry" heat from a gas range or using the convection mode on an electric stove gives crispiness to a roast and may be better for some cookies, pies etc. External moisture has nothing to do with internal moisture of a roast. The amount of internal moisture is due to the temperature of the meat. Plus you have to pay a huge premium for dual fuel when in fact it does not cost the manufacture a lot more to make. You pay a premium for the additional elements, fans and the computers to make them run correctly. It would be up to the individual to decide what is huge and if it is worth it. They have fantastic 23k btu open burners with very even heat. No need for high maintenance tin lined French copper pots. What the heck does this mean??? If you have a burner with a flame pattern of 5-6 inches wide, if you use anything wider than 8 inches, you will benefit from a pan that has good heat conduction. Best is heavy gauge copper, lined in tin or stainless. Not everyone polishes. You can also get plied cookware with copper that goes in the dishwasher. Cheaper is aluminum available in several configurations including plied cookware. This is a very biased statement from a sealed burner owner that thinks dual stacking makes any meaningful difference. The purpose of dual stacked burners is to provide two separate burners each with its own range of heat. You would have to look at the range of BTU output for each burner to see the benefit. Rating by temperature is meaningless. I might have a BTU output of 325 and the temperature of what I am cooking could be 190 or 80 depending on the pan and what I am cooking. CC's 23k btu burners are capable of 145 degree simmer which is more than reasonable. Other than raw foodist, virtually no one needs or can use Wolf's 100 degree simmers. This is unbelievably presumptuous to pontificate about what other people should or should not find useful in their kitchen. I use low heat daily for -cooking a whole dinner or pot of soup in a LeCreuset pot using minimal energy -serving off the range, no worries about any scorching pastas, mashed potatoes etc -a short term sous-vide -anything that used to require a double boiler A few weeks ago I was making a syrup that had to be held hot while another step in the recipe was completed and even with the low simmer, it would not stop boiling. I could have "used" even lower heat. There is a whole big world of people that cook in many different ways. Wolf's sealed burners will not give you a decent stir-fry or Pittsburg steak while the CC will. Cooking is about the temperature of the cooking surface. The source of heat is just one component of this. A cook who understands how the properties of cookware work as well as how what you are cooking comes into play will be able to combine these things to come up with the right temps for the cooking surface on both high and low end. You can find blogs where cooks preheat cast iron to extremely high temps by low powered burners to cook pizza. Some restaurants cook a steak on a rock table side with no flame underneath. You just need to understand how to accumulate heat in your cooking surface. How are those pictures representative of the burners referenced? The CC is way off. I have cooked on many different open and sealed burners over 50 years. I agree with weissman that ease of cleaning burners depends on the build and also has a very subjective component. I think you have to avoid generalizations. Even the black enamel on the Dacor range we had was much more difficult to clean than the black on our current Wolf. This, an observation from my husband.

Thanks so much everyone for the generous comments! Gsciencechick, for the white on the walls, ceilings and cabinets we brought a subway tile in and had it color matched at SW. The walls and ceilings are painted with a semi gloss, the cabinets are painted with Cabinet Coat. This is actually the same white we've used on all of the trim on the inside of our home, since the bathrooms use the same white subways. It's a warm white, not quite an off white, but not bright white either. After the girls get home from school I'll go out to the cottage outback and see if we have a can around. Garden18C .. How cool you had a kitchen growing up so similar to this one!! We're in NC. I honestly love this stove, it amazes me every day it's 60 years old and still is turning out great meals.

Thank you all again for your kind comments. It has always been function over form, but I have been very pleased with how things are looking as well. I wondered how overpowering the cabinets would be going all the way up to the 9' ceilings, but I really like the look now. My mother was very adamant about not having a "dust catcher" space or paying extra for a large crown. We were quite impressed with the cost of everything including stain and install. This quote has the bathrooms also included, but everything was still under $13K. (We nixed the light box, so you can take almost $800 off this quote.) I know it's not a fancy design or paint/stain treatment, but they are nice, substantial cabinets that will last. Actually, had they not pissed my mother off about the island countertop, she would have used them for other projects in the house instead of having the contractor build them. But, she holds grudges... And, since it is her money, she can choose who she wants to give it to. :) I thought I might post some pictures of the pantry, but I wasn't very good at taking them. I just couldn't get far enough back to get a good angle. As you can see in the full house layout, the pantry is around the corner. It has a section of shelving that is about 8" deep where she is supposed to keep 2-3 of commonly used cans in one row so you can quickly see your supply. Then on the sides are shelves that are around 18" wide, and they are 24" wide on the back wall. Another full size refrigerator and chest freezer will go in here. The spaces left for the fridge and freezer are larger than the actual units she will be using, but we did not want to be limited too much by size when those needed replacing. Here is the basic layout. We used a double set of pocket doors here because we wanted at least a 4' opening. I see the doors staying open most of the time, but it will be nice to be able to shut them if company is coming. We didn't want to sacrifice hall space to doors that would stay open most of the time. My mother wanted the contractor to stain these shelves instead of painting them as she thought it would hold up better to sliding canned goods. Here is the small shelf that will hold 2-3 of each type of canned good and the 18" shelf on the side. They needed to go above the height of the door to get a good place to anchor the shelves since it is hollow where the pocket door slides in. The shelving wraps on around to 2' wide before leaving a spot for a fridge. Similar layout on the other side with shelves above the freezer area. And, a bit off topic, but here is my mother's shoe closet in one of the spare bedrooms. We had a shallow closet due to the 2nd HVAC system so the contractor put her in some shelves to try to take full advantage of the leftover space. There is a regular sized closet next to it. The doors were kept at one end to allow a small table/chest to go in between the closets. And, if you want to see any other pictures, I have been taking pictures at almost each step and keeping them in an album. Construction Album

It looks like nobody has volunteered information about building a thing like you describe. I have not tried to make any combination worm composter/planters. Although the idea of combining functions "all-in-one" sounds appealing, I think the problem here is that the functions are not totally compatible. Container plants need to be watered, in such a way that the soil drains freely and dries out to some extent before the next watering, otherwise the soil will be waterlogged and not have enough oxygen in it for root growth. Worm bins need to consistently stay within a certain range of moisture; not too wet and not too dry, but the range they need is generally much more wet than what container plants need. Also, composting worms are not the same species of worms that live in and burrow through the soil. So they are not really ideally suited to burrow through soil in a container. That's why composting worm bins are filled with looser, more moisture-retaining and air-retaining materials like shredded paper and cardboard, not potting soil or garden soil. I think it will generally be much easier to keep the right conditions in each if container plants and worm bins are kept in separate containers. It is not difficult to add worm castings/vermicompost to container plants by hand.