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danielstutzbach

Side-opening oven placement?

Daniel
9 years ago

We're in the early stages of putting together a kitchen design for a remodel. We plan to get a combi-steam oven over a convection oven and placing them next to a dedicated baking area (lowered counter, storage for flour, pans, etc.). I'm tempted by the Gaggenau ovens, but I'm not sure how the side-opening doors affect my choices for where to put the ovens nor which direction I'd want the doors to open.

Here are some of the options:

1. Next to with a cabinet-depth/integrated french door refrigerator.
a) If the oven door opens toward the counter, it will block landing on the baking center counter but the island will still be available.
b) If the oven door opens toward the fridge, it blocks the fridge (conversely, the fridge can also block the oven).

2. At one end of the L.
a) If the oven door opens toward the counter, it will block landing on the baking center counter but the island will still be available.
b) If the oven door opens away from the counter, it will block a doorway.

3. Near the corner of the L. I'm don't see a good way to make this work, but I'm open to suggestions.

If you have a side-opening wall oven, where is it placed? What are the pros and cons? Are there any other options we should consider?

We're both right handed. Aside from placement issues, will we care which way the doors open?

Comments (5)

  • DIY2Much2Do
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I don't have a side-opening oven, but I would opt to have it open to make the landing areas of the counters most accessible. Oven doors are generally opened only for a few seconds at a time, and the landing space-oven relationship should rule.

  • dretutz
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    My side opening Gaggeneau is in a tall oven cabinet between the pantry (to the right) and the refrigerator (to its left). It swings towards right and there are a counter spaces on U where things land. I would never return to a drop down door oven. This saves my back and is very convenient.

  • alex9179
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    My Gagg is in a cabinet that has easy landing space next to and across in the island. I use the island cooktop for landing 99% of the time. The other side has my toaster oven, but isn't used for much else.

    Landing space for the hot pans is the first consideration. Traffic flow is important, if people won't see the hot, open door until they're on it.

    Interfering with the fridge would drive me crazy. At meals, there are all kinds of last minute drinks and condiments being accessed, along with the contents of the oven.

    Looking at how your meal time comes together, which will be the least annoying?

  • lee676
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    Here's where I put my side-opening Fagor oven. In a previous home we also put it against a pantry cabinet and the end of the room, but that one was in the center of a full-height oven cabinet rather than below a countertop. But even below the countertop, the glide-out racks (which are an extra-cost accessory on the Gaggenau) make it possible to easily reach your food without leaning down at all.

    {{gwi:1957983}}

    Putting it next to a counter-depth fridge with the hinge next to the fridge and the door opening toward it coud be problematic, as even counter-depth fridges stick out a few inches from the cabinets and oven door, so the oven door could hit the fridge just a few inches from the pivit point if the door is opened just over 90 degrees.

  • plllog
    9 years ago
    last modified: 9 years ago

    I grew up with side opening ovens. They're best at waist high. Because the Gaggenaus are really meant to be stacked, I did that, but I'm tall enough (as is family) to use the combi-steam on the high side of optimum. It should be at about shoulder to head height, and the regular oven should be as high as you can get it underneath.

    If you install them integrated, they only open 90°. Much better to let the doors open freely.

    Even though, in my kitchen, the ovens are a spice rack away from the baking counter, I rarely use that counter for landing. Mostly things go on the island. Sometimes I set up cooling racks for baking on the induction cooktop, just off the right side of the below picture, across from the island. When it's a gigantabird (GW for turkey over 20#), I set up a small table right in front of the oven, two of us lift the roaster from either side, and from there the bird is lifted onto the carving board on the island.

    What's the big deal about blocking the fridge? If you have a fridge to oven casserole or something, you can put it down to close the fridge and open the oven. In my mother's tiny kitchen, the 60's side opening oven was in the doorway to the service porch and back door. Drop down wouldn't have fit. When she had to replace it, the only choice was Gaggenau. :) Y'know what happens when something is coming out of the oven? We get out of the way! And if you're at the water cooler in the service porch, you stay there until the way is clear. It's really no big thing. :)

    For general oven placement, the best place is where you don't have something more important. Baking cookies, you might have a lot of in and outing, but even then, you're not tending the oven. You just go switch pans. I have one old fashioned recipe that calls for basting with wine every 15 minutes for hours, but it's not really conducive to the way modern ovens cook. Better to put it in the combi-steam and baste once per hour or less. For most oven cooking, you put it in, peek, take it out. You don't stand over it. Given that, put the ovens in the most out of the way place where it's a straight shot to the cooktop, not more than six paces, no impediments. Eight paces will do, especially if you don't do a lot of stove to oven dishes. The distance doesn't matter for things like gravy, because you make a pitstop at the carving/dishing up spot before you put the roaster on the stove.

    I have an Advantium (my only MW, plus third oven/light duty oven/speed cook oven) next to the fridge and dishes, which is great for heating stuff up. The ovens are on the opposite side of the island, with about four paces in a shallow diagonal to the cooktop. The main work of cooking happens at the cooktop, the prep area of the island facing the cooktop, and fridge/freezer/Advantium (and warming drawer) facing the short side of the island. The cleanup sink is next to the cooktop. That L is where the action is, and the ovens are on the quiet leg that turns the L into a U. On the far side of the ovens is a cupboard opening to the side with pitchers, vases and cookbooks.

    In your kitchen, next to the fridge might be the out of the way location, or it could be at the end of the L. That depends on the rest of the arrangement and the flow of work.