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Wet Bar Revisited

My wet bar is mostly done at this point.  There were a few setbacks but nothing that money can’t solve.

The first issue we ran into was that the floor is very, very uneven in that corner of the basement.  On the order of a couple of inches drop over just over 12 feet.   This required a great deal of work to make the floor appear more level.

First, the contractors applied floor leveler.  Floor leveler is a special kind of underlayer that gets put down before actual flooring.  The leveler is put on the floor and flows till level (I’m simplifying but that’s the general idea).

After the floor was leveled, there was still a significant gap between one end of the bar and the other.  The cabinet installers compensated by shimming the cabinets at different levels.  They hid the shims behind the toe kick.  If you look closely at this picture, you can see how much  taller the toe kicks are on the left side of the photo than they are on the right.

These floor leveling problems lead to another problem.  After the cabinets were installed, the tile guys had to do another round of leveling so that they could install our large (24″x24″) tiles.  This meant that the dishwasher slot “lost” an inch of height on the right side, and half an inch on the left side.  This also meant that my KitchenAid dishwasher wouldn’t fit anymore.

The solution here was to buy a new dishwasher.  Standard dishwashers require a 34″ tall opening but thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act, there exist ADA compliant dishwashers.  I don’t know the specifics as to why this is more accessible, but ADA compliant dishwashers are not as tall and have more options for adjustability.  Unfortunately, there are fewer options and only one American company makes one, GE sells a rebranded Danby as an ADA dishwasher.

To get a dishwasher that fit, I looked at Bosch, Asko and Miele.  Bosch has very long delivery times, and I didn’t like the way the racks worked in the Asko.  This lead me to get a Miele.  Unfortunately, this also cost me about $250 more.  The Miele only comes in a fully integrated model which means I had to buy a panel separately.  On the plus side, Miele makes nice dishwashers and it’ll still be super quiet which was a must.  I am disappointed that KitchenAid doesn’t make one.

Here’s a picture of the final wet bar:

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Grilling inside

I haven’t posted in a while, we’ve been busy finishing the remodel and moving back in.  We’re still not done with either but we are back in our house which means I’ve been able to start playing with all of my new toys.

On the whole, I’m thrilled and I’ll be talking at length about all of the new gadgets, for now I thought I’d share a video of my range hood and range.

You may remember that I chose a Capital Culinarian as my range and a ModernAire hood for my ventilation.  Even with the investment in ventilation, I wasn’t expecting to be able to cook really greasy foods in doors, from what I had read this is just a limitation in indoor grilling.  But, I figured I’d test it before I gave up.

In order to test if I could grill greasy foods, I needed to find something greasy to cook.  I went to my local supermarket hoping to find something pre-made that would put my setup through its paces.  They didn’t disappoint.  I bought two burgers, a bacon cheddar burger and a blue cheese burger.  That’s right, this is ground beef with cheese and bacon mixed in.  Here’s a video of the range in action:

As you can see, the burgers produce a lot of smoke but the hood doesn’t care.  I even had grease fire flare ups and the hood didn’t care.  I’m extremely pleased with both of these appliances!
The hood is running at max speed (which wasn’t actually necessary, I turned it down later), this also kicked on the makeup air flap.  To replace the air that was pulled out of the house, a flap opened when the hood was on high and air was pulled into the furnace.

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Wet Bar and Laundry Room

The four most expensive words in remodeling are “While you’re in there”.  It’s extremely tempting to add additional scope to a project.  In theory, doing more now is cheaper than doing more later, the contractors are already there right?  The downside to this is that it can go on forever and is really unhealthy for the budget.

In our case, we were penny wise and pound foolish, in our eagerness to control scope on our project we didn’t let Stefan (our architect) do any design work for the basement.  In our minds, we thought we were only doing a main floor remodel and the basement would be phase 3 (after the second floor).  The reality is, our basement was completely torn to shreds as a result of moving the stairwell.  In one of our walk throughs with our architect we realized we had an opportunity to “fix” our laundry situation.  The real issue we had is that our laundry was the first thing we saw when going into the basement, we effectively walked through our laundry area every time we went to the family room.

We realized that we could move things around and get the laundry out of the main area which opened up the possibility of a wet bar.  We gave Stefan a few days to come up with some drawings and this is what he came up with:

For those of you who aren’t stalking me, here’s what the original plan was.  The washer and dryer would have gone right next to the window.

The new plan gives us a dedicated laundry room which hides the washer/dryer and gives us a utility sink.  It’d be unamerican of me to let an available sink hookup go to waste so we decided to add a wet bar.

A Wet Bar?

A wet bar is a bar with a sink, in our case, it’s more than that.  We’re not big drinkers, but thanks to our wedding we have enough booze to open a bar.  We also like soda and the idea of having it cold and available in the basement is too good to pass up.  Our wet bar will feature plenty of storage for the liquor and associated glasses, a wine fridge, an under counter bar fridge, and a dishwasher.  As per our style, we wanted to contain costs as best as we could but, we still wanted to get nice things where it makes sense.

Cabinets and Countertops

We knew we didn’t want to pay for the cabinet and countertop quality we’re getting for the kitchen.  In addition to being pretty expensive, the kitchen cabinets have too long of a lead time for us.  I also didn’t want to go Ikea because I didn’t like the styles and I really wanted all wood boxes.  This lead us to the Chinese cabinet companies in Sodo.
Why do I call them Chinese cabinet companies?  The signs on the stores are all written in English and Chinese.  We visited three of them: Pius Kitchen and Bath, First Ave Kitchen and Bath, and G.S. Cabinet and Granite.  We ruled out Pius pretty quickly, their cabinet quality wasn’t very good.  I had used First Ave in the past for a rental unit and knew the cabinets were great quality.  Unfortunately, while I was in there I overheard the woman at the counter snap at a customer “You didn’t understand me…” maybe the customer made a mistake, maybe 1st ave did but it left a bad taste in my mouth.  Finally we looked at GS.  GS had the largest quartz and granite collection, they also supply the cabinets to 1st Ave KB.  Unfortunately, they were a little more expensive than 1st Ave but I was able to talk them down to match the price.
GS also struck me as the most professional, they quickly drew up my cabinets in a cad program so we could approve it.  We went with them and scheduled for an install date a few weeks away.  The trick to these cabinets is that they’re all in stock, which means quick turn around.  It also means reduced flexibility, you only get what they have, they can’t customize for you so you run the risk of having a sub optimal layout in your space.  For us, it didn’t matter, we’re doing one wall of cabinetry.  On the plus side, you get all wood boxes and doors and Blum cabinet hardware.  Blum makes some of the best  hardware for cabinets (they also make the Ikea hardware).  All of our cabinets are going to have soft close drawers and doors, no extra cost.  Speaking of cost, we’re paying $2,200 installed for our cabinets.
GS also does countertops, if you go to Home Depot or a larger kitchen shop, you will end up paying for cabinets by the square foot.  Home Depot has a wonderfully complicated formula, you get a per-square foot cost plus a linear foot cost for the edges.  GS doesn’t do it that way, at GS you buy slabs and pay for installation separate.  I ended up paying $1,150 for the counter tops which includes two slabs of “Swiss White” quartz, which looks a lot like Cambria’s “Whitehall”.  By my math, I have 28 square feet of countertop which works out to $41 installed.  The equivalent at Home Depot was $2,172 or $78 a square foot.  I saved almost 50%.

Appliances

This aspect of the wet bar was just shocking.  Thankfully we already have a “built-in ready” wine fridge so I didn’t have to buy one.  I did however, have to buy an under counter fridge.  If you don’t want to build it in, then you can find one relatively cheaply from Frigidaire.  Lowes has their own version of it that’s $100 less, you should be able to get one for under $450.  Unfortunately, ours needs to be built in.  In addition to adding expense, built-in fridges vent forward instead of out of the back or sides.  Built in under counter beverage centers that get cold enough, as in, below 37F cost more than $1,500 and can go higher than $3,000.
We were between a Marvel and a U-Line.  We ended up going with the U-Line because we liked the shelving layout more.  
We’re also adding a dishwasher, this isn’t a requirement for most people but it should be.  Our wet bar is on a different floor from our kitchen.  In none of my fantasy simulations did I ever think we’d actually wash the glasses by hand.  This means that we’d have to take them upstairs and then bring them down again.  In reality, we would likely pile up dirty glasses in the basement until one of us got frustrated enough to bring them upstairs and wash them, then we’d have a pile of clean glasses upstairs that needed to be moved back down.  Forget it, we’re getting a dishwasher.  We had only two requirements for this dishwasher: quiet, and racking that would let us store a lot of glasses.  Quiet lead us to four different brands: Miele, Bosch, Asko and KitchenAid.  All four brands make great dishwashers but the racks on the Bosch ruled them out for our use case, it’d be awkward to put glasses on the bottom shelf.  Price ruled out Miele and Asko.  We ended up with a KitchenAid KUDE60FXSS.  The KitchenAid has three racks like the Miele do, is only 43 dB (we won’t hear it when it’s running), and cost less than the alternative.  My 8 readers will also recall that I’m a fan of KitchenAid dishwashers, normally because of the grinder which this one doesn’t have.
We bought the appliances the same way we bought the last ones (check out my post on how to buy appliances).  This time, Albert Lee won, we saved a lot and actually did better percentage wise than we did on the kitchen appliances:
I feel sorry for anyone who walks into an appliance store and pays sticker or “sale” price.

Laundry Room

Nothing really fancy going on in here, as per the rest of the remodel, we’re going with LED lighting and we’re reusing our washer/dryer and freezer.  The only notable purchase I made was the utility sink. I originally wanted a traditional utility sink, a plastic tub on four legs.  As I started looking for one, I didn’t like the reviews that talked about cheaply made and flimsy sinks.  This thing is going to hold 20 gallons of water, I want it to be sturdy.  I found a company that sells granite composite laundry sinks, we’re putting granite composite sinks in the wet bar and the kitchen because of their general indestructibility.  We’re going with the Mustee 17F.    
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My kitchen appliances

For the kitchen remodel we’re doing, we had to order new appliances.  I’ve already talked about my range, and range hood.  In addition to those appliances, we needed a wall oven, a fridge, and a pair of microwaves.  We had to buy a new dishwasher when we bought the house but we bought it knowing we would be remodeling so we knew we’d be reusing it.

Dishwasher

We bought our dishwasher when we first moved into the house.  The one that came with the house was probably older than I am, and didn’t actually wash dishes.   Dishwashers come in two general styles, they either have a filter or a garbage disposal built in.  I was adamant that I wanted a garbage disposal, I hate the idea of cleaning a filter and I like that a garbage disposal lets me be lazy about pre-rinsing.  This ruled out the european models, Bosch, Miele, and Asko.  They’re all really nice machines but no disposal means no choice.
For me this was an easy choice, I’ve purchased KitchenAid dishwashers twice before for my rental house and have never had any problems with them.  The model I purchased has three shelves.  The top shelf is a silverware shelf.  This frees up space in the bottom shelf since you don’t need a silverware tray (but it comes with one anyways).

Refrigerator

Refrigerators come in three different styles: Standard depth, Counter Depth and Built-in.  Standard depth fridges are the type most people have, they are deeper than counters which means if they are against a wall with counters they will stick out.  Counter depth are just that, fridges that are designed to be flush with a standard 24″ kitchen counter.  The last class are built-in fridges.  These refrigerators are attached to the walls and are often covered with cabinet panels to blend in.
We ruled out built-in fridges right away, they’re extremely expensive, 3x the cost of the other types.  In short, too rich for our blood.
We also ruled out the standard depth fridges because of our floor plan, the fridge is going to be in line with a wall of cabinets and I didn’t want the fridge to stick out.  This left us with counter depth fridges.  Next requirement was that the fridge have french doors and a bottom freezer, no real reason for this other than we prefer this door style.  
Finally, we wanted a large, and well laid out fridge.  I don’t know anyone who ever said “I wish my fridge wasn’t so big”.
We narrowed it down to three choices: KitchenAid, Samsung, and LG.  The LG and Samsung are definitely larger but we liked the layout of the KitchenAid more.  The KitchenAid is 22 cubic feet while the other two were 26.  However, the KitchenAid had the ice in the bottom and didn’t have an exterior water dispenser this meant that the doors held more.  The Samsung does better in the JD Power reviews and we ruled out the LG because they don’t have as strong of a service network in our area.  
We ended up selecting the KitchenAid, it seemed like the best choice for us, but like the wall oven, it isn’t a super exciting purchase for us.
KitchenAid KFCS22EV

Wall Oven

We chose a 30″ convection wall oven made by KitchenAid.  We aren’t big bakers but given that this oven is smaller than the one in the Capital (30″ instead of 36″), we’ll end up using it more often when we need to bake because it’s smaller and faster to heat.  We were between KitchenAid and Electrolux, we ended up going with KitchenAid because we got a better price.  We liked both oven’s control panels but in the end, we didn’t spend a lot of time on the oven.  KitchenAid cooking products do very well in the JD Power reviews.  It’s hard for me to get excited about an electric wall oven, at the end of the day, it’s a box that heats.  So what if it has a dehydrate feature or a temperature probe?  I don’t know that I’ll ever use those.
We chose the KEBS107SS, at the end of the day, it’s a box that heats.

Microwaves

We planned for two microwaves in our remodel.  We usually get questions about this, but we have two now and love it.  Most of the time we use microwaves it’s to heat leftovers.  Two microwaves means we can heat two plates of leftovers at once.  This means we eat together and both eat hot food.  Frankly, I don’t know why more people don’t have two.  While we wanted two, I absolutely didn’t want a built in microwave.  As far as I can tell, all microwaves have basically the same components inside, the difference between a $700 and a $200 microwave is $500 in markup.  Built-ins are expensive,  and need to be repaired when they break.  I’d rather throw away a broken counter top microwave than fix a built in.  The repair trip will cost as much as the new counter top microwave will.
For microwave, we went Panasonic.  Panasonic has gotten rid of the annoying rotating plate.  Rather than have the food rotate, they rotate the microwave antenna.  This means this microwave is easier to clean, and I don’t have to fight with a plate that comes off of the rotator.
Panasonic is very proud of their design change.

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How I Went Appliance Shopping

We’re building our dream kitchen but that doesn’t mean we wanted to pay nightmare prices for our new appliances.  I had spent months doing the research on which appliances I wanted, why wouldn’t I do a little work to get the best price?

There are many appliance stores in the Seattle area and I quickly narrowed down to three that would work for me, but let’s go through all of the options (that I know of):

Appliance Stores

Nationwide Sellers:

These are the big brands we’re all used to seeing, they’re the big box stores.  They don’t carry the high end brands but you can still get nice brands here.  Home Depot just started carrying Electrolux and the Kenmore brand is pretty good.

Sears: Believe me, I’m as shocked as you are that they’re still in business.  At one point Sears was the largest appliance retailer in the US, they’re also have their own in house brand Kenmore.  Kenmore is the most popular appliance brand in the US.  It’s also not a real brand, Kenmore appliances are rebranded appliances from other companies, often at a lower price.  The trick to Kenmore is finding out who makes the actual appliance.  In my case, I wasn’t interested in the Kenmore brand.  For other appliances, think of Sears as your baseline.  Sears is the most you’ll ever pay for an appliance.  The local stores understand that Sears is the most popular seller and they’re not stupid, they’ll stay competitive.  Of the national stores, I definitely think Sears has the most knowledgeable sales people but it’s been hit or miss for me.

Best Buy: I didn’t even look at Best Buy, they’re prices are normal, there selection is slim compared to the other stores and I’ve never had a good customer service experience at Best Buy.

Home Depot/Lowes: These guys sell a lot of appliances and are usually running some sort of special like free shipping or some other discount.  I didn’t spend too much time here because the selection is slim and they don’t carry any of the appliances I want.

Local Sellers:

The local sellers run a wider range of brand than the big box stores, don’t be intimidated by the show rooms, while they tend to focus on the higher end brands, they can all order the lower priced brands as well.  Usually at a better price than the big box stores.

Albert Lee: Albert Lee is the largest of the local sellers with five stores.  You’ll get your best price with them during the November warehouse sale, usually the first weekend in November.  Albert Lee carries BlueStar, not Capital.


Almvigs: Located above the Whole Foods at 65th and Roosevelt, the store is small but packed full of good brands.  The staff knows what they’re doing and the owner is usually there too.  Almvigs has lots on display and they’re willing to order from companies they don’t normally do business with.  Almvigs carries Capital.

Basco: Basco isn’t really local, they’re a Portland based seller with a Seattle warehouse.  Their Portland sales floor is gorgeous.  They can sell to Seattle but they don’t do delivery.

Metropolitan Appliances: Metropolitan Appliances is in SODO, they used to be called “Direct Buying Services”, they changed their name to disassociate with the “Direct Buy” scam.  Metropolitan has a lot of good stuff on display, and they’re able to get a lot more.  MA carries Capital.

Seattle Home Appliances: I didn’t spend much time in here, they don’t carry as many of the high end brands and didn’t carry Blue Star or Capital and when I asked, they were pretty indifferent about it.  They described Blue Star as ok, and didn’t understand why people like Capital.  They seemed pretty defensive aobut the gap.

Online:

I looked at a few online websites, but decided I didn’t want to go there.  The pricing is better, but if something goes wrong, you’re pretty much on your own.

How I bought my appliances

I limited myself to Albert Lee, Almvigs, and Metropolitan.  They carried the brands I was interested in (BlueStar and Capital).  I had been to each store a few times and had been working with a saleman at each place.  I gave each salesman my list of appliances and asked them to e-mail me their best prices.
Albert Lee gave me good pricing, but said their best prices come during their warehouse sale and I should wait for that if I can.  The problem with this is that they don’t know what’s going to be on sale during the warehouse sale and I thought i twas unlikely that the specific range I wanted would be on sale (not many people order ranges with a grill).  I wasn’t willing to wait until the beginning of November when my delivery needed to be at the end of November.  Finally, Albert Lee was unwilling to order the Modern Aire hood that I wanted.  I didn’t want to have to buy the hood separately, I wanted a single point of contact for dealing with problems.
Almvigs was definitely the most pleasant experience, when I asked them about the right time to buy the salesman said “I have to give my best price every day”, and then followed up with it.  Almvigs pricing was the best of the three, by quite a bit.  They were even willing to store my appliances until I was ready for them (three months later).
Metropolitan Appliances is where I spent most of my time looking at the options because they had so much Capital equipment on display.  They were also willing to order the hood but their pricing was the worst of the three.  They were off by several thousand dollars from the other two.  I was really surprised at how bad the pricing was, but since I had been working with the rep for a few month, I decided to give him another chance.  I let him know that he wasn’t competitive in his pricing and the response was less than optimal.  Metropolitan wanted me to give them the other companies bid so that they would beat it by 10%.  They wanted to make sure it was a real apples to apples comparison.  When I asked for clarification, he said he wanted to make sure that I wasn’t getting a floor model or open box.  I thought that was insulting, as if I didn’t know what I was buying, but it doesn’t matter, business is business.  I responded that I wanted him to give me his best price and that I didn’t want to give him the other bid.  Why should I do their work for them?  Best case, I get a bid that’s better than 10% off, worst case, I get the already very good bid from Almvigs.  MA responded with a competitive bid but it was still $500 more than Almvigs.

How much did I save?

I think I did pretty well, the chart below compares what I paid to the list price as well as what I could have paid if I had bought online.  The online prices are the lowest price for each item on Google Shopping from a 5 star seller.  The chart below is the percentage difference of what I paid from list, online, and online after I factor tax into the local sale.  When the percentage is negative, I paid less, when it’s positive, I paid more.  In the end, I saved nearly 14% off of list price overall and paid 5% less than online.  Of course, the third column assumes you don’t pay the “use tax” after buying online.  If you’re not worried about the use tax, then I would have saved 4% buying online.  Items are listed in terms of most expensive to least expensive, and while I realize anyone could reverse engineer my actual prices off of this chart, I’d rather not publish that.  The 4.18% difference is well less than $1,000, I think that’s a worthwhile fee to pay for shopping locally and having a local company responsible for everything going right.

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This sucks! Kitchen Ventilation

My new range is a 36″ beast with four high power burners and an indoor grill.  To get the most out of this range without setting off the smoke alarms required careful planning around how I’m going to vent.  Making this harder is that I’m putting the range on an island.  This means I lose the advantage of having a back wall to keep the smoke from drifting too far.

On top of this, I really don’t like range hoods, I’m not sure anybody does.  They’re very noisy, they tend not to work (how many times have you triggered your smoke alarm when cooking?), and they block the view and interrupt the openness of my new kitchen/dining area.

This leads to a collection of design goals that feel like they’re at odds with each other:

  1. Quiet
  2. Powerful
  3. Effective
  4. Aesthetic
Quiet
To get quietness, I moved the blower to the outside of the house.  Now, I won’t have to deal with the sound of the motor inside the house.  Unfortunately, the motor only accounts for some of the noise.  The air movement is also a noise generator.  I have a couple of options there.  I can move less air, which contradicts goals three and four, or I can quiet the air movement.  
The Abakka external blower
Plan  B sounds better, to quiet the sound of the air movement, I’m doing to things: Using a big duct and adding a silencer.  My new hood will have a 10″ round duct, a standard home range usually has a 6″ duct.  I’m going from 25 square inches of space to 78 square inches, a 2.7x increase in space.  I’m also adding a Fantech silencer.  The silencer is a muffler that also further reduces the sound the air makes as it travels.
Ignore everything but the “LD Silencer”

Powerful:
This one is easy, because I moved the blower to the outside of the house, I can install the most powerful one I can find.  In this case, that’s a 1400 CFM (cubic feet per minute) blower.  This blower has the power to clear all of the air from my house every 18.3 minutes.  To put this in perspective, the standard microwave hood is closer to 200 CFM.  The downside to a 1400 CFM motor is that building code requires me to add Make-Up Air (MUA) to my kitchen.  MUA is a mechanism for replacing the air that is removed from the kitchen by the vent.  I’ll write about this in detail once I’ve finalized on a solution.

Effective:
All of that air sucking wouldn’t do me any good if it didn’t actually capture the effluent coming off of the stove.  To make that easier, I’m over-sizing my capture area.  Think of the capture area as the overhang of the hood.  If smoke gets into the capture area, then the blower can suck it out of the house.  My range is 36″ wide by 24″ deep.  My range hood is 42″ wide by 30″ deep, an extra 3″ on each side.  This, combined with the powerful blower should provide an effective air removal system.

To further enhance the effectiveness, I want a hood that uses baffles instead of a mesh filter.  The filter is responsible for keeping the grease from clogging up the ventilation duct.  The two types of common filters are baffles and a mesh.  Mesh filters are usually made out of steel or aluminum and work by forcing the effluent to go through small holes in the mesh, the grease gets trapped in the metal.  Baffles work by forcing the air to turn and bend around the metal, when the air bends it accelerates and the grease spins off.  Both types of filters are cleaned in the dishwasher, but over time the mesh filters lose their effectiveness because they can’t be cleaned as thoroughly (certainly not as easily).

Aesthetic:
In a perfect world, I wouldn’t have a hood at all.  I think they’re generally ugly and putting one on my island means I am interrupting the openness of my living space.  I can’t get away from the fact that I’m going to have a large hood, it will have a 10″ wide duct and will be 42″ wide at it’s widest point.  Instead, I went with a hood that tries to be as simple and smooth lined as possible.
In the end, I chose the Modernaire PSI-16
The PSI-16 is custom built when ordered in California by Modernaire.  It meets all of my requirements and has a small horizontal profile so hopefully it won’t be too overbearing.  It also has some other features I really like.  The lights and the blower are on infinite knobs so you can very their settings precisely.  With a 1400 CFM blower, I want a lot of control so I only suck as much as I have to.
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My new range: Capital Culinarian 36″ with Grill

We ordered the new appliances for our kitchen last weekend.  I’ll make a general post on how I bought the appliances, and I’ll also put up another post describing my other appliances but I thought the range deserved its own post.

 

In a previous post, I talked about why I chose a gas range over an induction range.  Gas ranges come with two different type of burners: open burners and sealed burners.
Image of a sealed burner.
Sealed burners are designed to prevent spills from entering the internals of the oven.  Fans claim they’re easier to clean but they have three attributes I don’t like.
  1. Flame Pattern
  2. Power
  3. Cleaning
Flame Pattern: Because the burners are sealed, the flame doesn’t shoot straight up but instead comes out of the sides of the burner.  This creates a heat “donut” on the pan, rather than the more even heat of an open burner.
The fine folks at Eurostoves made a video demonstrating the difference in heat pattern between the open burner Capital Culinarian and sealed burner ranges:

 

Power: For reasons I don’t understand, open burner ranges are available with more power than a closed burner.  We do a lot of searing in our house and I wanted a burner that would get really hot.  I also hate waiting for water to boil.  Further, I’ve never heard anyone complain that their range was too powerful.
Cleaning: In my previous house, I had a sealed burner range, whenever anything spilled over, it meant scrubbing and scrubbing to get the junk off and I always struggled getting the very edge where the burner sits on the range clean.  With an open burner, spillover will fall into a catch tray which can be covered with aluminum foil.  Cleaning that seems easier but I’ll put up an update when I actually have the range and have to clean it.
Given my desire for an open burner, I had three companies to choose from: Blue Star, Capital, and American Range.
I quickly dismissed the American Range, when I saw it in person I found it clunky and I wasn’t happy with the build quality.  I also didn’t like how poor the information on their website was, there were typos and inconsistencies between what the website said and what the vendors said.  The American Range Performer (American Range’s open burner range) is also relatively new and hasn’t been on the market too long so it was hard to find actual reviews of it.
The competition came down to Blue Star versus Capital and I hate to say it, but I don’t have a good reason for choosing one over the other.  They’re extremely competitive ranges with marginal differences between them.  The Blue Star has two high power 22,000 BTU burners, a simmer burner and a 15,000 BTU standard burner.  The Capital has four 23,000 BTU burners and claims that they can all simmer.  Reviews online make me believe the Blue Star wins when it comes to simmering but that’s not a very common use case and I’m convinced I can get a good simmer on the Capital as well.  Both ranges offered a grill and both have infrared broilers.
The infrared broiler is a feature I’m really excited to try.  The infrared broiler produces 1800° F heat.  A traditional broiler is closer to 550°-600° F.  I want an 1800° F broiler to be able to cook steaks the way Ruth’s Chris does.  Ruth’s Chris has custom designed broilers that cook both sides at 1800° at the same time.  Mine at home won’t be quite the same, but I’m hoping to get close.
This decision took months, In the end, I chose the Capital Culinarian for a couple of reasons: I liked the fit and finish more and I also liked the flexibility of having all four burners be the same.
Here’s a stock photo of my new range.  I’m looking forward to having a grill inside the house!  Grilling indoors adds a lot of complication, you need to plan your ventilation solution around the extra smoke that grilling will produce.  I won’t be able to do super messy grilling like you would with an outdoor grill because the cleanup will be more work, no sugary marinades or very greasy meats.  What I will be able to do is easily mix grilled foods with other foods when cooking.  I think the first meal will be steaks cooked with the infrared broiler, grilled asparagus, and sauteed mushrooms.
If you’re curious about how I’m venting this range, see my ventilation post.
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Induction vs. Gas: Picking a range

As part of our remodel, we get to pick new appliances.  We currently have an electric glass top and it’s awful.  Slow response time and imprecise heat control.  When looking at appliances for the new kitchen I knew I wanted anything other than an electric range.  There are two heating technologies worth looking at when picking a new range: Gas and Induction.

Gas Burner (Wikipedia)

Gas
People have been cooking with gas since the 1820s, it’s about as simple as it gets: gas burns, burning gas makes heat, heat cooks food.  Not a whole lot has changed in gas ranges since the 1820s, the mechanics are basically the same: gas flows through a valve into a burner which disperses the gas and burns it in a pattern.  Since the 1820s the ranges have gotten more efficient and safer, we have electric igniters, safety valves and smarter burner designs.  Gas is also the way most restaurants cook.  My last house had a gas range and I really miss it.

Induction in action (GE)

Induction
Induction heats in a way that’s completely different from the traditional electric or gas range.  Induction heats by inducing heat in the cooking vessel rather than transferring heat to the cooking vessel.  In induction cooking, the pot itself generates the heat!  Induction works by using a high power electromagnet in the hob (the equivalent of a burner on a gas range) induces heat in the pan.

Inside of an induction hob (Wikipedia)

Induction is very responsive, heats up quickly, cools down quickly and since it only generates heat in the pan is super efficient.  The picture at the top of this section is of an induction hob that’s not melting ice while boiling water.  Induction is very popular in Europe and Asia and is developing quite the following in the US.  One of the odd limitations of induction is that it requires pans to have some iron content.  This is because induction only works with pans that respond to magnets.  In my case this isn’t a big deal, all of my pans are either All-Clad or some form of cast iron (I’ll have a future post on cookware).

Which one?
In looking for a new range, I had a few requirements:

  1. Responsive – Quick to heat, quick to cool.
  2. High Heat – We do a lot of searing, so I need to be able to get a pan really hot. 
  3. Reliable – Nobody likes calling a service company.
Responsiveness
I bought a portable induction hob to try induction out.  Turns out I love it.  It’s super responsive, as I turn the knob, heat goes up and when I turn the knob down, so does the heat.  I’m able to quickly go from bringing something to a boil to a light simmer.
Gas is also very responsive, gas ranges have infinite controls.  Turn the knob up, more gas comes out, turn the knob down less gas comes out.  I had a gas range in my previous house and I loved the responsiveness of it.
High Heat
People rave about how fast induction causes water to boil but I’m going to be living with this decision for at least 10 years so I wanted something more than anecdotal evidence.  So let’s do some math:
Gas range power is measured in BTU/hr while induction ranges are measured in Watts.  Thankfully, we can convert from one to another.  
I know that more BTU means more power so I went looking for the most powerful gas range I could find.  My search brought me to the Capital Culinarian which has 23,000 BTU burners.  To put that in perspective, I looked at a random GE range and it had a 15,000 BTU “power boil” burner, making the Capital substantially more powerful.  Just for fun, we’ll run the math on the GE range too.
When I mean run the math, I mean ask Wolfram Alpha.  Wolfram says that 23,000 BTU/hr is equivalent to 6,741 Watts.  Wolfram also says that 15,000 BTU/hr is the same as 4,396 Watts.
The most powerful induction cook top I could find had a boost mode that would output up to 4,600 Watts.  It’s a Thermador and it can do that in “boost” mode, where it steals energy from the other burners.  A normal burner is around 2,600 Watts.
So on the surface, the gas range is clearly much more powerful right?
WRONG!  Induction is much more efficient than gas at transferring heat, so we can’t just compare the straight up wattage, we have to account for the efficiency differences.
According to the US Department of Energy, induction is 84% efficient.  Gas ranges are a measly 39.9% efficient.
So now we need to adjust for efficiency: 
Gas (High Power Range): 6,741Watts * 39.9% = 2,690 Watts.
Gas (Normal Range): 4,396 Watts * 39.9% = 1,754 Watts.
Induction (High Power): 4,600 Watts * 84% = 3,864 Watts.
Induction (Normal Power): 2,600 Watts * 84% = 2,184 Watts.
Induction in boost mode blows the gas away and a “normal” induction range is more powerful than a “normal” gas range.

Induction is clearly more powerful, but I think it’s a moot victory.  I’m looking at a high end gas range or a high end induction and I don’t think it matters at that level which is more powerful.
Reliability
This is a tough one.  I couldn’t find any data I’d really trust on reliability but I will say that the gas ranges I’m looking at have minimal electronics and user serviceable parts.  From a reliability stand point, there’s almost nothing to break on a Blue Star or Capital.
The induction cook tops are full of electronics which means more that can break.
I think the gas range wins this one, but again, I don’t have any real data on this and it bugs me that I couldn’t find any.
Conclusion
I’m going with a gas range for a couple of reasons:  I like the reliability aspects, and while this may sound silly, I want knobs and not buttons.  The only induction range I could find that has knobs instead of buttons is made by viking and would cost me more than a gas range.  Further, I like the flexibility of gas, while I don’t have any aluminum pans right now, i do have a round bottom wok which wouldn’t work very well on an induction range.  
If my house didn’t have gas plumbed to it already, or if cost were a more significant factor, I think I’d choose induction and be very happy with it.