Small technical note - if you pull the wall cabinets out an inch, fillers in corners or blind corner cabinets can become challenging to figure out as both runs need to now be an inch shorter. Also, remember to leave a little slack because your walls will not be square, level or straight - and I do mean little, like 1-1.5". Personal opinion is that it would be just fine to break the line in the uppers and just use single doors over the refrigerator. Why? Visually, the cabinet depth is already changing and it's a big box anyway with the side panels. Also, because you won't be able to open those upper doors except with a ladder. With taller doors, you might be able to reach more stuff before pulling out the ladder. I have bakeware stored on the cabinet floor with trays on a fixed shelf above with tray dividers. I can reach both things without a ladder because I only need to grab a bottom corner to slide out trays.

"-if you increase the landing space on the right side of the cooktop, I'd suggest doing the same on the left side for balance, and omitting the pull-out beside the hutch" Mama Goose, do you think it'll still look off balance considering the corner base cabinet has 12" on that run (super susan) + the 18" cabinet (30" total) which is the same number of inches as what lharpie suggested adding to the right of the cooktop? Oh, wait, I think maybe what you adjusted next to the cooktop was the uppers and the size of the appliance garage. That's totally do-able. If I did glass cabs to the left and right of the range hood I could put serving dishes in them seeing as the oils and spices have places in the base cabinets. Then the hutch can house stemware, barware, and decorative pretties. I like that. It brings the serving dishes closer to where they'll be needed. I agree with not adding seating at the prep island. If they want, and I expect they will, friends can pull a stool over to that space and hang out. Or better yet, they can set their wine glass down and pick up a knife. ;) If I put seating there I'll end up with iPads and whatnot on my prep island. Must give my best attempt at thwarting the hoard of children! LOL I think I can do without the pullout pantry.

Mine are boat-shaped or oval, and I'm not sure where I bought them, but I think I found them at Bristol Farms when I wasn't even looking for them. I like the oval shape much better than round. I think mine hold around 12 oz, but I'm not sure, and I can't measure them, as I am not in L.A. at the moment. Oval might be more difficult to find, but they are ideal for individual pot pies, which is what I bought them for. I think you get more crust this way, and that is my favorite part.

Tonight I sort of made the Vivian Howard turnips. I probably should have looked at it analytically first but I'm glad I sort of mad it (except where I didn't). It's called "Gratin". I read the ingredients. A gratin is usually a cheese dish, the word referring to the grating of the cheese. This is indeed a cheese dish with a custard carrier and enough bread to make it bread pudding. Here are the ingredients: 2 tbsp butter, divided 8 oz greens , wilted to 1 cup 3 medium onions, halved and sliced with the grain 1 egg 1 1/2 tbsp salt, divided 1 cup Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated on a microplane 2 cups turnip roots, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice 1 cup Fontina, grated on a box grater 2 cups heavy cream 10 turns of the pepper mill or scant 1/4 teaspoon black pepper 5 garlic cloves, sliced thin 3 cups stale crusty bread cut into 1/2-inch cubes 1/2 tsp dried thyme I just didn't want to go so heavy, so I used 1 tbsp butter in the veg and sunflower oil spray on the dish, 2 bunches of baby turnips and their greens, which just about filled the measures correctly, a tiny bit on the scant side. I had a really big onion, closer to softball sized than baseball sized, which filled the sauté pan, so I went with that. It didn't say what kind of salt, but I assumed coarse from the quantity, and used about half. I have parm and fontina but want them for something else, and I had some Lamb Chopper which needed using and was tasty enough and mid-dry to sub for both. I also have cream, but I just didn't want it to be that heavy, so I used a 12 oz. can of whole evaporated milk and made up the quantity with half a cup of non-fat leben. No crusty bread, so I used a slightly freezer burnt bakery croissant. And I spilled the thyme a little, but it was curly and airy, so that probably didn't spoil the measure. I used about three handfuls of the cheese in the body, as directed, plus another handful on top, or about a third of the total amount called for. What a mess!! She points out where you can reuse the sauté pan but given all the other pots and vessels, how could you tell you were saving washing up? I didn't want to boil my turnips so I precooked them in the microwave, so that was only a Corelle bowl rather than a 6qt. pot. It was still a lot of vessels. I hope they pay their scullery workers fair wages and plenty of perks! So ratios by volume: turnips + greens = bread = cheese = cream + onion + egg-ish. This is not a vegetable recipe. It came out fine. Very tasty. I didn't do the long soak because the custard had no trouble permeating the croissant. Conclusion, the bread pudding is very tasty. Using cream and the correct amount of cheese would have made it that much more gooey and decadent. It did nothing for the turnips, however. The sweetness of the caramelized onions fought with the sharpness (which is mild in these tiny turnips. The greens were more about hey, what's that in my pudding than desirable. If you need to bribe people with fancy fats to eat turnips, I guess this is a way to do it. Definitely worth the try, and it'll make nice breakfast food. ETA--it's something of a hit (though the greens get picked out and eaten separately). I doubt there'll be any left tomorrow.