When we moved into this house, we installed a large underground gas tank for the hot water heater (although now we’ve partially switched to solar) and for the gas stove I’d be getting. But then costs piled up, as they are wont to do with building projects, and a friend offered to loan us an old electric stove he had in one of his rentals.

Now, twelve years later, that sweet little stove is on its last leg. The burners keep slipping down under the metal liners, turning the burners dangerously wobbly. The big one — my most-used burner — lost a screw (or something) and started swiveling out over the stove top. “Remind me to fix that,” my husband said. “I don’t want anyone to get electrocuted.” (And then he fixed it, so at least that’s no longer a problem.) Because I don’t want to be forced into an impulse purchase, and because the stove’s demise is imminent, I’ve finally started stove hunting.

Thing is, I can’t for the life of me figure out what kind of a stove I should get. All the options make my head swim. For a little bit there, I’d thought I’d settled on a stove (this one), but then we read the consumer reports and thought better of it — the oven was horrible, people said. (But then a friend told me she’d just bought that stove and it worked great, so, argh!)

“You need to do a blog post about it,” my husband said. “Get your readers to help out. They’ll know.”

So now, because my husband thinks the world of you, here I am, asking your advice. What kind of stove should I get?

My main question is whether to get a stove with a gas oven or an electric oven. My gut says gas — I can bake when the power goes out and it just feels more wholesome — but my husband says gas ovens leak more heat which would be a real pain come hot summer weather. Plus, we both wonder if electric ovens are more accurate. Also, how important is convection?

Several stipulations:
*The gas stovetop must have solid gridwork so pots and pans can easily be moved around and little kettles don’t get tippy.
*The oven must be well-vented so veggies properly roast.
*The stove must be under a thousand dollars (and preferably between six and eight hundred).

I wish there was a local appliance store — the kind where the employees can actually hold informed conversations regarding the products they sell — but there are none in our area, at least that I know of.  So it’s up to you! What other important criteria am I forgetting? Is there a particular manufacturer that you trust more than others? Or one that I should absolutely avoid?

Thanks, y’all.
xoxo!

This same time, years previous: the blizzard of 2016, rocks in my granola, five things, corn tortillas, pink cupcakes, movie night, baked Brie.

Recently, I’ve been sneaking out of the house while everyone is still asleep, and then driving to Panera to write. I work for three hours (fueling myself with coffee and a seventy-five cent hunk of baguette) before packing up shop. Back home, I go for a run to clear my head of the writing fog. After a shower, I fix lunch for everyone, and then we have a brief rest time before spending the rest of the afternoon on studies, cooking, reading, whatever.

While I don’t like the drive to town, I do like the endless supply of coffee, Panera’s relative early morning quiet, and getting on a first-name basis with the regulars. I also like that having a separate location helps draw a line between my writing work and the rest of my life. Writing at home, an hour here an hour there, I always feel guilty, like I should be writing more. But when I go elsewhere to write, there’s a clear end time — even if I haven’t accomplished much of anything (like today), knowing that I’ve put in the time helps to ease my guilt over never being sufficiently productive.

So far, this routine has worked great for the kids, too. They love sleeping in, reading in bed for a couple hours and then eating a leisurely breakfast, and they appreciate the freedom to do their chores (I leave a detailed list on the table) without me looking over their shoulders, urging them onward.

I don’t know how long this pattern will last — finding time to write is an ongoing challenge, dependent on the time of year, the kids’ ages and needs, and my everyday responsibilities — but for now it works.

I’ll take it.

And now, to finish, these words from David Rakoff:

Writing…always, always only starts out as shit: an infant of monstrous aspect; bawling, ugly, terrible, and it stays terrible for a long, long time (sometimes forever). Unlike cooking, for example, where largely edible, if raw, ingredients are assembled, cut, heated, and otherwise manipulated into something both digestible and palatable, writing is closer to having to reverse-engineer a meal out of rotten food.

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (1.23.17), and so it begins, world’s best pancakes, the quotidian (1.23.12), moving forward, chocolate cream pie, on thank you notes, five-minute bread.

This same time, years previous: homemade grainy mustard, women’s march on Washington, lemon cream cake, lazy stuffed cabbage rolls, hobo beans, the good and the bad, multigrain bread, chuck roast braised in red wine, peanut noodles.