black slash

The alarm went off before the sky was fully light, actually it never did get bright out as there was a thick cloud cover all day. Well, back to getting up… the stove was coming between 8am and 12, so we had to get at it and get the old stove out of the way and cleaned up, and the spot wiped clean of years of cobwebs and other yucky things. I guess we aren’t good housekeepers as we don’t drag the stove out very often.


After some scrubbing all there was left to do was wait for the delivery. Happily, at 9am the truck rolled down the laneway. The delivery guys had the stove in and the old stove into the garage within 10 minutes - these guys were efficient.


Once we let the stove come to room temp Carm got in place to plug it in. Nope, nada, not going to happen. The plug orientation had the cord coming out at the bottom and there was no way there was room for the thick cord. The breaker was already flipped to turn the power off, so we got a screwdriver and got to work. Carm was able to rotate the outlet 90 degrees so that the cord would be in the right orientation - it took a few tries to figure out how to do it, but eventually the stove was plugged in.

The huge black cooking service, and the huge black glass door, are like a huge black swath in my all-white kitchen. The stainless parts are minimal and therefore don’t look too bad. It’s the black that catches my eye. I can’t say that I was overjoyed. Oh, and that black and stainless: impossible to keep clean, showing every fingerprint and smudge.

And then it was time to fit in the stuff from the bottom drawer… you know, the cookie sheets, baking pans, muffin tins… not happening… at least not all of it… the drawer was ½ the size. Now I had to find room for the rest so emptied a spot in another cupboard and tried to find a place for THAT stuff… the ripple effect.

After an hour of ‘break-in’ time (run oven at 400f), I put in a batch of shortbread cookies and was pleased when they came out perfectly.

So what next? I decided that, even though we rarely cook meat, I wanted a roast of something so we trundled out to the grocery store. A pack of pork tenderloin had our name on it.  I searched the internet for cooking instructions and finally settled on a method. In at 375 for 30 minutes, but since I was cooking at the convection roast setting I backed the time to 25 min. It was perfect.

The top of the stove wasn’t so perfect: I had browned the meat before putting it in the oven and the black stovetop was spattered with oil… oh yuck. I suppose my old stovetop would have been the same, but I don’t think it would have required a special cleaner to make it streak free again.

Tonight I might make biscuits. Any suggestions of other oven dishes that I can try out?


“Cooking is at once child's play and adult joy. And cooking done with care is an act of love.”
~Craig Claiborne