My Birhday and exploding ovens

When we purchased the house about twenty years ago, we gutted the kitchen to the studs and even pulled up the floor. Water had rotted sections of the oak floor and there was a hump in the middle of the floor where the room had originally ended. With the help of a friend, a guy named Fred, we tore it apart and put it back together again. We had a company come in and build kitchen cabinets. We purchased some nice, if a little low end appliances. One of those was the stove. The brand was called a DCS. It was a silver thirty six inch wide four burner, with a griddle in the middle.It was nice when it was new, It started breaking maybe after ten years. The light socks in the oven came loose and the bulbs broke when you tried to change them. The broiler broke twice, each time a new and expensive part was required. After the third time we gave up. Over the last five-six years we used a lighter to light the burners, as the automatic lighter would click away as you cooked. Several years ago it had reached its life's end, but we kept using it, not quite ready to replace it. One evening I was at my mom's and Teri called me about dinner. I tell her I’ll make it and she offers to heat the oven up. She calls me a few minutes later and says the oven blew up. The words for a moment don’t register. Oven blew up, that doesn’t happen. She goes into what happened. She said, “I turned on the stove and I was at the sink, I turned around and a bigbang,, the door to the oven flies open and a huge flame shots out. Everyone’s alright.” I guess dinner is going to be late tonight. We talk it over and decide the stove top is safe. I say, knowing she doesn’t really care, that the igniter in the oven didn’t light on time and the gas built up causing the explosion. We both agree, it’s time for a new stove. One night we head to PC Richard’s in Nanuet. We go there because last time we made a large purchase, they gave us free financing for two years.

When we originally purchased the DCS stove there was a lot of back and forth about what we should buy. Six burners vs four with a griddle, Double stove vs a single, Wolf vs Thermador, vs Viking, or something less expensive. It ended with a four burner, griddle in the middle DCS stove. A quick search of the internet and DCS came up for outdoor kitchens, and that it was sold around the time we purchased our stove. They were not in PC Richards. I wanted something nice that we’d have for the next twenty years and not worry about it breaking. Teri was on the same page. The girls didn’t care, they were doing stuff twenty somethings do and their only concern was what’s for dinner and would they have to eat something they didn’t like or have to warm up something they’d rather have. We remember it as the best time of our lives.

I believe Teri and I had agreed on a Wolf six burner stove before we agreed to meet at PC Richards. I found the griddle in the middle was a place for crumbs to collect and in the winter mice get into the house and love to crap on the griddle, so I quit using it years ago. Teri arrived at PC Richards first and showed me the stove. We dealt with someone, sorry I forgot his name, who she’d known since elementary school at St Ann’s.

On the way to check out I see their mattress department, and out of curiosity I ask about them. Teri immediately says no, we are not getting a mattress. I agree, we just spent a fortune on a Wolf stove. We walk over lay down on a memory foam mattress that reminds me of the foam mattress topper we just took off our bed. Next is a high end Stearns and Foster, it’s nice, then a second tier Stearns and Foster. I comment that you can feel the difference. We get up and sit down to finish the purchase of the stove. Before we go much further, she looks over at me and says, “Do you really want it?” I know she is talking about the mattress. THe mattress was purchased around the same time as the DCS stove, about twenty years ago and it too is long over due to be replaced. I am willing to walk out of the store with just the stove, but if she wants the mattress, I will not pass it up. Long story short, we purchase a stove and a mattress. The mattress is delivered on a Friday, and left in the front living room. The two guys say they can not get it up the stairs.They don’t get a tip. Over the weekend three guys come back and after watching them move the mattress up the narrow stairs with the turn at the top, I feel so bad, my cheap tip becomes $25.00 each for the three of them.. The new mattress is higher than the old one to the point that Teri’s feet don’t touch the ground. The new stove The stove arrives when I’m at work, the way I like it. Teri said they bought the stove in the front door, turned left into the front living room, through the family room, a right into the dinning room and finally a left into the kitchen. KJ drew a picture of them delivering the stove since I wasn't there.

The old stove leaves the opposite way. I love this stove so much that I am willing to cook dinner every night. Some of the meals have been really great and I credit that to the amazing Wolf stove.

For my birthday, we stay home because I’ve been disappointed in The Outback lately, last birthday and maybe Father’s day, so Teri buys steaks, I cook them on the grill outside and I make homemade french fries, it’s really great. Nastia and Sean buy me a tres leches cake from Restaurant Depot.