Amaranth can get really tall, like 8 feet or so, almost as big as many sunflowers, and more bulk. The yield can be impressive, up to a lb of seed from the biggest kinds. And yes, it can be weedy in its reseeding habits. Quinoa is more diminuative, about 3 feet tall in my garden, yielding probably an ounce per healthy plant. I'll save you the trouble with garbanzos/chickpeas. Yield is VERY low, almost everyone, including myself, who's tried it at home says its not worth it, except to see the plant grow (it's actually very pretty, quite at home in the flower garden as an accent). Corn has all of the usual pest problems, but it varies from place to place. I was going to buy a grain mill, but I just bought a Black and Decker coffee mill with adjustable grind on sale last year at Target, $15, and it's been great. It grinds everything from hard, hard flint corn to wheat, rice, you name it. At the finest setting, it produces flour comparable to commercial flour, coarse setting gives cornmeal texture. Hard corn needs to go through twice to make fine flour. It has a 2 cup capacity, and takes between 20 seconds to 2 minutes to grind that much, depending upon how hard the item being ground is. I use it probably on average twice a week, and its been going for about 14 months now with no trouble. Every once in a while, something, usually corn, gets stuck in the mill, and I have to take the thing apart to clear the jam (it unscrews, easy to do).

Just tell him, whatever he does, not to buy a Bodum. It is the worst coffee grinder I have ever used. The only way I can get evenly ground coffee is by shaking it up and down and all around as it grinds, and then stopping every so often to stir the coffee with a chopstick so that the bottom doesn't get ground to coffee while the top has chunks in it. I have had a Mr. Coffee, and a Krups, both of which were excellent (and are still working, having been delegated to spices and such when we bought the Bodum because they'd gotten pretty worn and beaten up in one way or another and didn't look nice on the counter anymore) and both of which sell for under $25 unless you get into really fancy schmancy models which is really unnecessary.

Actually, the more I think about your hidden sink counter, the more I like the idea. I would love to see a drawing of it in the open position to get a clearer idea of how it will look and function. I'm not big on designing for resale either so I get it. This is your home and if you plan on being there for awhile, you should design it the way you want. I suspect some of my design decisions aren't going to appeal to everybody either. However, I do think all people appreciate good function. So, to the hood....the distance the hood should be from the cooktop depends on the manufacturer's specifications. If you're committed to the cooktop/hood at the island, this is something you'll need to be aware of while choosing your hood. But really do your due diligence and read reviews. You might want to search around here at GW/Houzz for more feedback on island hoods. For example, there is a ceiling hood system that does not drop down but, rather, is more like a bathroom fan in that it doesn't project down from the ceiling. Sounds great, right? Except I've read time and again bad reviews. Even though it's a powerful and expensive system, it just defies the laws of physics regarding how smoke/grease/steam rise and can be captured. In general, people just seem to report more problems with the capture and noise with island hoods. If you're aware of this and choose carefully, you may make a choice that minimizes these issues and that you'll be happy with in the long run. You bring up hood noise. Yes, it's a much bigger issue with an island hood. As you're standing there cooking and speaking with guests at the island or the table beyond, the hood is right above and in-between you and your guests. The noise is being generated right there. So, yes, there will be more noise than from a wall hood 4-6 feet away. It's a reality. Also, many people don't use their hoods correctly to minimize grease build-up in their kitchens. I learned here that it's best to turn the fan on low several minutes before you start cooking in order to generate the proper air movement to capture the particles. Then cook. Then wait until about 10 minutes after cooking to turn the fan off. It makes a big difference. Not only do cooking smells disappear better but, also, grease and grime on your surfaces are greatly reduced. For those of us who really don't like to clean, this is fantastic! Hopefully, the low, quieter speed handles everything well by using this routine. If not, you may have to change to higher settings which are always going to be louder. So, with an island hood, if you use this routine, think about how long that fan will be on while visiting with guests. If you buy a better hood with lower noise output, it might not be too loud or a problem. But, depending on what you cook, it could be. Just something to consider. Another thing to consider is that, per time studies, most cooks spend about 70% of their time doing prep, 20% cooking, and 10% on clean-up. So, if you want to visit with guests while cooking, you'll actually have more face time with them if your sink is in the island and you're prepping while visiting. And, if kids are ever in the picture, it is harder to keep an island cooktop safe for them to be around. If that's a future concern, you might consider induction which doesn't get hot and is super-safe compared to gas or electric cooktops. 48" is the suggested minimum aisle width for multiple cooks. In our family, we prefer wider. We were going to do 54" but have recently moved our temporary peninsula out to 60" and like that even more. So these are things you need to play with. I always suggest mocking up using furniture or boxes to simulate and then do some pretend cooking sessions to see how the different widths feel. I hand wash so few items that I just put down a towel for drying which I then use to dry the few things I hand wash and put them away immediately. My hand washing is limited to large pots and knives and a few other obscure things. For example, I might hand wash a bowl I've just used if I need it again in the prep process. My preference is to keep the DW door open while prepping and cooking and immediately plop things into it after I'm done using it. If I empty the DW immediately upon finishing, I rarely have more than a few dishes waiting for the next load and they are easily hidden in the sink. So I rarely have items, dirty or drying, cluttering my counters. (Of course, the rest of the family isn't as good as this so it depends on what all they did while I wasn't around to keep up after them, darn it anyway.) DW's, especially the newer, efficient ones use less water than even the quickest, most efficient hand washers per studies as they usually use less than 5 gallons of water for an entire load. Believe me, none of us could wash that many dishes with that little water. DW's also use less soap. So they are cheaper to run and usually gets items cleaner while sterilizing, too. And it's a waste to rinse prior to plonking something into it as the detergents need the enzymes from the food particles to work best. You should, of course, still scrape. So my feeling is that if you change your dish washing habits to something more like that, you won't have to deal with a drying rack of dishes on your counter. I have no upper cabinets so everything, including dishes, glasses, and utensils are kept in lower drawers near the DW. Yes, your DW should be placed near those types of storage areas. When my remodel is done, my DW will be on one side of the sink and the drawer stack with those items will be on the other side of the sink. Most cookware and prep items will be just across the aisle from the DW. The only things I have to walk a bit farther to put away are my items specifically for baking (9 feet away) and items used in my coffee/blender center which are a few more feet. Hope this helps a bit.

snookums - I usually split my ghee order between regular and cultured. Cultured ghee has a mild (tangy) fermented flavor, but not a whole lot of difference between it and regular. You would want to use cultured ghee (or cultured butter for that matter, if you make or purchase it) as a spread, not in baked goods, since heat destroys the "good" bacteria from being cultured. That's why I never heat-process homemade sauerkraut. I'll freeze it, but won't home-can it, to preserve the good bacteria. And you're right about the high price of Kerrygold butter. We just use less....to compensate for the higher price, but believe the health benefits are worth it (even on my $125/month food budget for 2 adults). TIP: If you are buttering pancakes/waffles, toast, etc., if you melt a small amount of butter first, apply it with a pastry brush, you'll use MUCH less than if you spread it with a knife. I buy less-expensive butter at Aldi for baking and often use a blend of coconut oil and butter in baked goods. Coconut oil is expensive, too, when you compare it to butter prices (although butter prices just went up a couple months ago). The nice thing about coconut oil is that you can use up to 25% less in many recipes, than the amount of fat it's being substituted for, and get the same results. I also blend natural peanut butter (purchased or homemade) 50/50 with softened coconut oil; keep it in a canning jar at room temperature and use it as a spread. Sometimes I'll add a little sweetener to the mix (coconut palm nectar, molasses, honey, golden syrup, maple syrup, sorghum syrup, all will work). If you get a sugar craving, slowly eat up to 1-T. of this mixture (or even plain coconut oil). I start with a teaspoonful and the craving will usually go away.