Inasmuch as one can have affection for a household appliance, I am in love with my new oven. It’s perfect, really. It is everything I currently want in a freestanding range: new, black, 30 inches wide, 4 burners, working ignition, readable display, converted to liquid propane, very clean, and heats up incredibly fast. Really fast: 67º to 350º in exactly 6.5 minutes.
My old oven came with the house. It was a Kenmore gas range circa 1985. The previous owners of our house were also restaurant owners so that oven had baked its fair share of rhubarb pies for the business. The floor of the interior had holes from where it had rusted out from too many spill-overs. The display could no longer be read so I was the only person who knew how to reach any temperature other than 350. The glow bar ignition had been replaced numerous times. Its most recent demise was the straw that broke the camel’s back; it was time to call it quits.
I won’t bore you with the details of my research except to say that it was extensive. Interviews, advertising literature, technical specifications, Consumer Reports, show rooms, price comparisons, customer reviews and testimonials all played a part. In the end, we decided on the GE JGB300 in black, a satisfying blend of updated features and financial value. Buying it on the Saturday after Thanksgiving helped, too.
I had a batch of Kari’s chocolate chip cookie dough ready to go and baked them immediately after the cheerful installer left. It is like being a complete person again; I can 
utilize all those baking/roasting/broiling recipes I’ve been passing over these last 6 weeks. Amazingly, 40 days without an oven did not cause any of us here to inadvertently loose weight. Funny, I kind of thought it would, what with the myriad soups we’ve been consuming and all. Regardless, I’ll be hauling out the cookbooks later this week to work up a list of items to make for the neighborhood Christmas goody plates. It’s great to be baking again!
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Thirty Marens Agree 
Congratulations! It’s beautiful too!
In the picture I think it is smiling. I can almost smell the cookies baking and I bet they went fast. I am very happy for you and your new oven and I hope you have many wonderful years together. It is the heart of the home, replacing the traditional hearth.
It is really really gorgeous and I just want to fire up one of those burners to see the blue flame (even though I know this post was about the oven but I have gas range envy.)
It’s a very nice blue flame. Come on up and you can use it.
As the proud recipient of the most delicious Cardamom Challah ever, I too am very grateful for your new oven. Yay!
Congratulations! Sometimes (when I am pondering the state of our emergency preparedness items) I wonder what it would be like to live without an oven, a sink, a dishwasher, etc. I feel confident about being able to do the dishes independent of a dishwasher, and even feel relatively confident about using a dutch oven instead of a conventional oven – until I think of making bread, cake, or roasts, etc. in a dutch oven for a long period of time. Thinking of that inspires a surge of gratitude in me for an oven – and gratitude that you have one! Especially one that fits your every need and desire – hurray for ovens!
I love the cookbooks that Kari sent me through your mom, who happens to be one of my all time favorite people. I love the recipes that your entire family has contributed to the wonderful cookbooks and always use them to find something special to serve guests and my family.
Yummy recipes, always to be counted on to work too.