A Galley Makeover Part 1

This makeover actually began with our microwave dying and was replaced by Scott, neighbor Serge and myself on February 2.   A few months ago our 15 year old stove began a downhill slide.  The thermostat stopped working, the strikers in the oven and stove failed, the gas/air ratio caused yellow flames and the burners hissed loudly.  The New Zealand maker had gone out of business years ago and parts were no longer available.  Honestly, as the chief cook and bottle washer, I (Melissa) wasn’t sad that it would need to be replaced as I don’t like playing with fire.  I’ve never had an interest in building a fire, grilling or lighting fireworks.  We resigned ourselves to replacing it with a Blue Star open flame, a model that typically is installed into the new Kadey-Krogens.  However, when we went to the appliance store the salesman showed us the induction cook tops and it was love at first boil, well first sight!

As an electrical engineer Scott was excited about the magnet mechanism and since it heats 40% faster than gas and was cool to the touch I was thrilled.  Aesthetically, the induction was much more appealing to us being that it is sleek, contemporary and flush mounted.  Practically, it presents a potential problem with generator use but we would have a back-up gas grill should both generators fail.  We would have to monitor our electrical use while at anchor and possibly use a generator if both cook top and oven were in use.  After many, many hours of researching  we decided to buck tradition and go for it!  Because of the 24″ available space in the galley we were limited to two brands, neither of which were cheap.  We finally settled on the Wolf since it’s American made, has a great reputation, it’s made to last at least 20 years, and has many service sites.

We arrived in  Stuart, FL last Wednesday and the mess began! On Thursday the cook top and stove arrived and are being stored in our saloon. Our pots/pans and drawers had to be moved as well to the saloon since our wonderful carpenter, Phillip Van Zyl, is rebuilding the cabinetry and replacing the counter top.  We hit a glitch yesterday when we dropped the cook top into the new piece of corian and realized that the measurements that Wolf provided are inaccurate and the entire piece of corian counter top has to be replaced, AGAIN!

On top of this delay we are experiencing a “boil water warning”.  And, our tanks ran out of the clean water right after I unpacked all the new induction pots and pans and began to wash them.  So, the small galley is currently packed with 3 meals worth of dirty dishes, pots, pans,  tools, wood pieces, etc.  Our $10 single burner has certainly got a workout these past 7 days since the makeover began.  The electrician and carpenter have been working today and hopefully will wrap up tomorrow.  Looks like we are going out for dinner tonight!

Next up…the new blue tile!