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Kitchen



 
 
For the Banana Yashimoto novel see Kitchen (novel)
Kitchen (novel)

Kitchen s a novel written by Japan author Banana Yoshimoto Although one may notice a certain Western influence in Yoshimoto's style, Kitchen is still critically recognised as an example of contemporary Japanese literature; The Independent, The Times and The New Yorker have all reviewed the novel favourably....


A kitchen, is a room or part of a room (sometimes called "kitchen area" or a "kitchenette
Kitchenette

A kitchenette is a cooking area in motel and hotel rooms, studio apartment, college Dormitory, or office buildings. It usually consists of a small refrigerator, a microwave oven or hotplate, and, less frequently, a sink....
") used for food preparation including cooking
Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat, selecting, measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible food....
, and sometimes also for eating and entertaining guests, if the kitchen is large enough and designed to be used that way.

A modern kitchen in the affluent parts of the western world is typically equipped with a stove and possibly a microwave oven
Microwave oven

A microwave oven, or a microwave, is a kitchen appliance that cookings or heats food by dielectric heating. This is accomplished by using microwave radiation to heat water and other dipole within the food....
.






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For the Banana Yashimoto novel see Kitchen (novel)
Kitchen (novel)

Kitchen s a novel written by Japan author Banana Yoshimoto Although one may notice a certain Western influence in Yoshimoto's style, Kitchen is still critically recognised as an example of contemporary Japanese literature; The Independent, The Times and The New Yorker have all reviewed the novel favourably....


A kitchen, is a room or part of a room (sometimes called "kitchen area" or a "kitchenette
Kitchenette

A kitchenette is a cooking area in motel and hotel rooms, studio apartment, college Dormitory, or office buildings. It usually consists of a small refrigerator, a microwave oven or hotplate, and, less frequently, a sink....
") used for food preparation including cooking
Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat, selecting, measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible food....
, and sometimes also for eating and entertaining guests, if the kitchen is large enough and designed to be used that way.

A modern kitchen in the affluent parts of the western world is typically equipped with a stove and possibly a microwave oven
Microwave oven

A microwave oven, or a microwave, is a kitchen appliance that cookings or heats food by dielectric heating. This is accomplished by using microwave radiation to heat water and other dipole within the food....
. It also has a sink
Sink

In plumbing, a sink or basin is a bowl-shaped plumbing fixture that is used for washing hands or small objects. In American plumbing parlance, a bathroom sink is known as a lavatory....
 with hot and cold running water available for cleaning food, for providing water to cook with, as well as for washing dishes, although some modern kitchens have a dishwasher
Dishwasher

A dishwasher is a mechanical device for cleaning dishware and cutlerys. Dishwashers can be found in restaurants and private homes....
. One or more units in which to store food, and to store utensils, pots and dishes, are also usually present in or near a kitchen, either in the form of an adjacent pantry
Pantry

A pantry is a room where food, provisions or dishes are stored and served in an ancillary capacity to the kitchen. The derivation of the word is from the same source as the Old French term paneterie; that is from pain, the French language form of the Latin language pan for bread....
 room, or more commonly as kitchen cabinet
Cabinet (furniture)

File:Glass cabinet.JPGFile:Tansu.jpgA cabinet is usually a box-shaped furniture, either standing alone as a piece of furniture or built into or attached to a wall typically made of wood but now often made of synthetic materials, and used for storage of miscellaneous items....
s and a refrigerator
Refrigerator

A refrigerator is a cooling appliance comprising a thermal insulation compartment and a heat pump - a mechanism to transfer heat from it to the external environment, cooling the contents to a temperature below ambient....
 which often has a freezer compartment too.

Although the main function of a kitchen is supposed to be cooking or preparing food, the kitchen can be the center of other activities as well, especially within home
Home

A home is a place of residence or refuge. It is usually a place in which an individual or a family can rest and be able to store personal property....
s, depending on the size, furnishings, and equipment
Major appliance

A major appliance, or domestic appliance, is usually defined as a large machine which accomplishes some routine housekeeping task, which includes purposes such as cooking, food preservation, or cleaning, whether in a household, institutional, commercial or industrial setting....
. If, as sometimes happens, the home does not have a laundry room, but instead has a washing machine
Washing machine

A washing machine, or washer, is a machine designed to clean laundry, such as clothing, towels and Bed sheets. The term is mostly applied only to machines that use water as the primary cleaning solution, as opposed to dry cleaning or even ultrasonic cleaners....
 and possibly a dryer in a closet in the kitchen, then washing
Washing

Washing is one way of cleaning, namely with water and often some kind of soap or detergent. Washing is an essential part of good hygiene and health....
 and drying laundry
Laundry

Laundry is the act of washing clothing and linens....
 may also be done in the same room. The kitchen may also be the place where the family eats
Eating

In general terms, eating is the process of consuming food to provide for the nutritional needs of an animal, particularly their food energy requirements and to growth....
, provided it is large enough and has a table and chairs. Sometimes, the kitchen is the most comforting room in a house, where family and visitors tend to congregate. In this respect a large modern kitchen is still the psychological "hearth" of the home.

The transformation of the kitchen

The development of the kitchen in the western world
Western world

The term Western world, the West or the Occident can have multiple meanings dependent on its context . Accordingly, the basic definition of what constitutes "the West" varies, expanding and contracting over time, in relation to various historical circumstances....
 has been intricately and intrinsically linked with the development of the cooking range or stove
Stove

A stove is an enclosed heated space. The term is commonly taken to mean an enclosed space in which fuel is burned to provide heating, either to heat the space in which the stove is situated or to heat the stove itself, and items placed on it, for cooking purposes....
. Until the 18th century, open fire
Fire

Fire is the oxidation of a combustion material releasing heat, light, and various Chemical reaction products such as carbon dioxide and water....
 or charcoal were the sole means of heating food, and the architecture of the kitchen reflected this. When technical advances brought new ways to heat food in the 18th and 19th centuries, architect
Architect

An architect is trained and licenced in planning and designing buildings, and participates in supervising the construction of a building. Etymologically, architect derives from the Latin architectus, itself derived from the Greek arkhitekton , i.e....
s took advantage of newly-gained flexibility to bring fundamental changes to the kitchen. Water
Water

Water is a common chemical substance that is essential for the survival of all known forms of life. In typical usage, water refers only to its liquid form or States of matter, but the substance also has a solid state, ice, and a gaseous state, water vapor or steam....
 on tap in private homes only became gradually available in the western world during industrialization
Industrialization

Industrialization is the process of social and economic change whereby a human group is transformed from a pre-industrial society into an industry one....
 and more recently than that; before, water had to be collected from the nearest outdoor source: well
Water well

A water well is an excavation or structure created in the ground ??by digging, driving, boring or drilling to access water in underground aquifers....
, pump, or spring, and then carried to the kitchen and heated or used in some other way.

Ancient history

The houses in Ancient Greece were commonly of the atrium
Atrium (architecture)

In modern architecture, an atrium is a large open space, often several stories high and having a glazed roof and/or large windows, often situated within an office and usually located immediately beyond the main entrance doors....
-type: the rooms were arranged around a central courtyard. In many such homes, a covered but otherwise open patio served as the kitchen. Homes of the wealthy had the kitchen as a separate room, usually next to a bathroom (so that both rooms could be heated by the kitchen fire), both rooms being accessible from the court. In such houses, there was often a separate small storage room in the back of the kitchen used for storing food and kitchen utensils.

In the Roman Empire
Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the Roman Republic phase of the Ancient Rome, characterised by an autocracy form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
, common folk in cities often had no kitchen of their own; they did their cooking
Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat, selecting, measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible food....
 in large public kitchens. Some had small mobile bronze
Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive, but sometimes with other chemical element such as phosphorus, manganese, aluminium, or silicon....
 stoves, on which a fire could be lit for cooking. Wealthy Romans
Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC....
 had relatively well-equipped kitchens. In a Roman villa
Villa

A villa was originally an upper-class country house, though since its origins in Roman Republic times the idea and function of a villa has evolved considerably....
, the kitchen was typically integrated into the main building as a separate room, set apart for practical reasons of smoke
Smoke

File:Bling-Bling Skywriting David Shankbone.jpgSmoke is the collection of airborne solid and liquid particulates and gases emitted when a material undergoes combustion or pyrolysis, together with the quantity of air that is entrainment or otherwise mixed into the mass....
 and sociological reasons of the kitchen being operated by slaves
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
. The fireplace
Fireplace

A fireplace is an architecture structure to contain a fire for heating and, especially historically, for cooking. A fire is contained in a Firebox or firepit; a chimney or other flue directs gas and particulate exhaust to escape....
 was typically on the floor, placed at a wall—sometimes raised a little bit—such that one had to kneel to cook. There were no chimney
Chimney

A chimney is a structure for venting hot flue gases or smoke from a boiler, stove, furnace or fireplace to the outside Earth's atmosphere. Chimneys are typically vertical, or as near as possible to vertical, to ensure that the gases flow smoothly, drawing air into the combustion in what is known as the stack effect....
s.

Middle Ages

Medieval Kitchen
Early medieval European longhouses had an open fire under the highest point of the building. The "kitchen area" was between the entrance and the fireplace. In wealthy homes there was typically more than one kitchen. In some homes there were upwards of three kitchens. The kitchens were divided based on the types of food prepared in them. In place of a chimney, these early buildings had a hole in the roof through which some of the smoke could escape. Besides cooking, the fire also served as a source of heat and light to the single-room building. A similar design can be found in the Iroquois
Iroquois

The Iroquois Confederacy is a group of First Nations/Native Americans in the United States that originally consisted of five nations: the Mohawk nation, the Oneida tribe, the Onondaga , the Cayuga nation, and the Seneca nation....
 longhouses of North America
North America

North America is the northern continent of the Americas, situated in the Earth's northern hemisphere and almost totally in the western hemisphere....
.

In the larger homesteads of European nobles, the kitchen was sometimes in a separate sunken floor building to keep the main building, which served social and official purposes, free from indoor smoke
Indoor air quality

Indoor air quality is a term referring to the air quality within and around buildings and structures, especially as it relates to the health and comfort of building occupants....
.

The first known stoves in Japan
Japan

Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south....
 date from about the same time. The earliest findings are from the Kofun period
Kofun period

The is an era in the history of Japan from around 250 to 538. The word kofun is Japanese for the type of tumuluss dating from this era. The Kofun period follows the Yayoi period....
 (3rd to 6th century). These stoves, called kamado, were typically made of clay and mortar; they were fired with wood
Wood

Wood is an organic material; in the strict sense wood is produced as secondary xylem in the stems of woody plants, notably trees but also shrubs, etc....
 or charcoal
Charcoal

Charcoal is the blackish residue consisting of impure carbon obtained by removing water and other volatile constituents from animal and vegetation substances....
 through a hole in the front and had a hole in the top, into which a pot could be hanged by its rim. This type of stove remained in use for centuries to come, with only minor modifications. Like in Europe, the wealthier homes had a separate building which served for cooking. A kind of open fire pit fired with charcoal, called irori, remained in use as the secondary stove in most homes until the Edo period
Edo period

The , or , is a division of History of Japan running from 1603 to 1868. The period marks the governance of the Edo or Tokugawa shogunate, which was officially established in 1603 by the first Edo shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu....
 (17th to 19th century). A kamado was used to cook the staple food, for instance rice
Rice

Rice is a staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in tropical Latin America, and East Asia, South Asia and Southeast Asia, making it the second-most consumed cereal grain, after maize....
, while irori served both to cook side dishes and as a heat source.

The kitchen remained largely unaffected by architectural advances throughout the Middle Ages; open fire remained the only method of heating food. European medieval kitchens were dark, smoky, and sooty places, whence their name "smoke kitchen". In European medieval cities around the 10th to 12th centuries, the kitchen still used an open fire hearth
Hearth

In common historic and modern usage, a hearth is a brick- or rock -lined fireplace or oven used for cooking and/or heating. Because of its nature, in historic times the hearth was considered an integral part of a home, often its central or most important feature: its Latin name is focus....
 in the middle of the room. In wealthy homes, the ground floor was often used as a stable while the kitchen was located on the floor above, like the bedroom and the hall. In castle
Castle

A castle is a defensive structure seen as one of the main symbols of the Middle Ages. The term has a history of scholarly debate surrounding its exact meaning, but it is usually regarded as being distinct from the general terms fort or fortress in that it describes a residence of a monarch or noble and commands a specific defensive territor...
s and monasteries
Monastery

Monastery , a term derived from the Greek language word ???ast?????, neut. of ???ast????? - monasterios denotes the building, or complex of buildings, that houses a room reserved for prayer as well as the domestic quarters and workplace of Monk, whether monks or nuns, and whether living in Cenobium or alone ....
, the living and working areas were separated; the kitchen was sometimes moved to a separate building, and thus couldn't serve anymore to heat the living rooms. In some castles the kitchen was retained in the same structure, but servants were strictly separated from nobles, by constructing separate spiral stone staircases for use of servants to bring food to upper levels. An extant example of such a medieval kitchen with servants' staircase is at Muchalls Castle
Muchalls Castle

Muchalls Castle stands overlooking the North Sea in the countryside of Kincardine and Mearns, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The lower course is a well preserved double groined 13th century towerhouse structure, built by the Frasers of Muchalls....
 in Scotland
Scotland

conventional_long_name = ScotlandAlba|common_name= Scotland|image_flag = Flag of Scotland.svg|flag_width = 130px...
. In Japanese homes, the kitchen started to become a separate room within the main building at that time.

Smoke Kitchen
With the advent of the chimney, the hearth moved from the center of the room to one wall, and the first brick-and-mortar hearths were built. The fire was lit on top of the construction; a vault underneath served to store wood. Pots made of iron
Iron

Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. Iron is a Group 8 element and period 4 element. Iron is lustrous and silvery in color....
, bronze
Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive, but sometimes with other chemical element such as phosphorus, manganese, aluminium, or silicon....
, or copper
Copper

Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29.It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity....
 started to replace the pottery
Pottery

Pottery is the ceramic ware made by potters. Major types of pottery include earthenware, stoneware, and porcelain. The places where such wares are made are called potteries....
 used earlier. The temperature was controlled by hanging the pot higher or lower over the fire, or placing it on a trivet
Trivet

A trivet , also known as a 'hot plate,' is an object placed between a serving dish or bowl , and a dining table , usually to protect the table from heat damage....
 or directly on the hot ashes. Using open fire for cooking (and heating) was risky; fires devastating whole cities occurred frequently.

Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci

Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci was an Italy polymath, being a scientist, mathematician, engineer, inventor, anatomist, Painting, sculptor, architect, botanist, musician and writer....
 invented an automated system for a rotating spit for spit-roasting: a propeller in the chimney made the spit turn all by itself. This kind of system was widely used in wealthier homes. Beginning in the late Middle Ages
Middle Ages

File:Karl 1 mit papst gelasius gregor1 sacramentar v karl d kahlen.jpgThe Middle Ages of European history are a period in history which lasted for roughly a millennium, commonly dated from the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century to the beginning of the Early Modern Period in the 16th century, marked by the division of Western Christi...
, kitchens in Europe lost their home-heating function even more and were increasingly moved from the living area into a separate room. The living room was now heated by tiled stoves, operated from the kitchen, which offered the huge advantage of not filling the room with smoke.

Freed from smoke and dirt, the living room thus began to serve as an area for social functions and increasingly became a showcase for the owner's wealth and was sometimes prestigiously furnished. In the upper classes, cooking and the kitchen were the domain of the servants, and the kitchen was set apart from the living rooms, sometimes even far from the dining room. Poorer homes often did not have a separate kitchen yet; they kept the one-room arrangement where all activities took place, or at the most had the kitchen in the entrance hall.

The medieval smoke kitchen (or Farmhouse kitchen
Farmhouse kitchen

A farmhouse kitchen is a kitchen room designed for food preparation, dining and a sociable space. Typical of poorer farmhouses throughout the Middle Ages where rooms were limited, wealthier households would separate the smoke of the kitchen from the dining and entertaining areas, farmhouse kitchens were also known as smoke kitchens....
) remained common, especially in rural farmhouses and generally in poorer homes, until much later. In a few European farmhouses, the smoke kitchen was in regular use until the middle of the 20th century. These houses often had no chimney, but only a smoke hood above the fireplace, made of wood and covered with clay, and used to smoke meat. The smoke then rose more or less freely, warming the upstairs rooms and protecting the woodwork from vermin.

Colonial American kitchens

In the Colonial America
Colonial America

The term colonial history of the United States refers to the history of the land that would become the United States from the start of European colonization of the Americas to the time of independence from Europe, and especially to the history of the thirteen colonies which declared themselves independent in 1776....
n kitchen, the same distinction as for the medieval European kitchen is visible. The early settlers in the north often had no separate kitchen; a fireplace in a corner of the cabin
Log cabin

A log cabin is a small house built from loggings. It is a simple type of log house. A distinction should be drawn between the traditional meanings of "log cabin" and "log house." "Log cabin" generally denotes a simple one, or one-and-one-half story structure, somewhat impermanent, and less finished or less architecturally sophisticated....
 served as the kitchen space. Later, the kitchen did become a separate room, but remained within the building.

The development in the southern states was quite different, but then, so were the climate
Climate

Climate encompasses the temperatures, humidity, atmospheric pressure, winds, rainfall, atmospheric particle count and numerous other Meteorology elements in a given region over long periods of time, as opposed to the term weather, which refers to current activity of these same elements....
 and sociological
Society

A society is a group of humans characterized by patterns of relationships between individuals that share a distinctive culture and/or institutions....
 conditions. In southern estates, the kitchen was often relegated to an outhouse, separated from the mansion
Mansion

A mansion is a large dwelling house. The word itself derives from the Latin word mansio In the Roman Empire, a mansio was an official stopping place on a Roman road, or via, where cities sprang up, and where the villas of provincial officials came to be placed....
, for much of the same reasons as in the feudal kitchen in medieval Europe: the kitchen was operated by slave
Slavery

Slavery is a form of forced labor where a person is compelled to Labor for another . Slaves are held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase, or birth, and are deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to receive Remuneration in return for their labor....
s, and their working place had to be separated from the living area of the masters by the social standards of the time. In addition, the area's warm climate made operating a kitchen quite unpleasant, especially in the summer.

Completely separated "summer kitchens" also developed on larger farms further north to avoid that the main house was heated by the preparation of the meals for the harvest workers or tasks like canning
Canning

File:Berthold Weiss Canned Foods.jpgFile:Canned food factory .jpgCanning is a method of food preservation in which the food is processed and sealed in an airtight container....
.

Industrialization

Technological advances during industrialization
Industrialization

Industrialization is the process of social and economic change whereby a human group is transformed from a pre-industrial society into an industry one....
 brought major changes to the kitchen. Iron stoves, which enclosed the fire completely and were more efficient, appeared. Early models included the Franklin stove
Franklin stove

The Franklin Stove is a metal-lined fireplace with baffles in the rear to improve the airflow, providing more heat and less smoke than an ordinary open fireplace....
 around 1740, which was a furnace
Furnace

File:Piec krepa.JPGA furnace is a device used for heating. The name derives from Latin fornax, oven. The earliest furnace was excavated at Balakot, a site of the Indus Valley Civilization, dating back to its mature phase ....
 stove intended for heating, not for cooking. Benjamin Thompson
Benjamin Thompson

Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford , Fellow of the Royal Society was an English-American physics and inventor whose challenges to established physical theory were part of the 19th century revolution in thermodynamics....
 in England
England

native_name =|conventional_long_name = England|common_name = England|image_flag = Flag of England.svg|image_coat = England COA.svg|symbol_type = Royal Coat of Arms...
 designed his "Rumford stove" around 1800. This stove was much more energy efficient than earlier stoves; it used one fire to heat several pots, which were hung into holes on top of the stove and were thus heated from all sides instead of just from the bottom. However, his stove was designed for large kitchens; it was too big for domestic use. The "Oberlin stove" was a refinement of the technique that resulted in a size reduction; it was patent
Patent

A patent is a set of exclusive rights granted by a state to an inventor or his assignee for a term of patent in exchange for a disclosure of an invention....
ed in the U.S. in 1834 and became a commercial success with some 90,000 units sold over the next 30 years. These stoves were still fired with wood
Wood

Wood is an organic material; in the strict sense wood is produced as secondary xylem in the stems of woody plants, notably trees but also shrubs, etc....
 or coal
Coal

Coal is a readily combustion black or brownish-black sedimentary rock. The harder forms, such as anthracite, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure....
. Although the first gas street lamps
Gas lighting

Gas lighting refers to a technology used to produce lighting from a gaseous fuel including hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, or ethylene....
 were installed in Paris
Paris

Paris is the Capital of France and the country's largest city. It is situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the ?le-de-France Regions of France ....
, London
London

London is the capital of both England and the United Kingdom, and the most populous municipality in the European Union. An important settlement for two millennia, History of London goes back to its founding by the Roman Empire....
, and Berlin
Berlin

Berlin is the Capital of Germany city and one of sixteen States of Germany of Germany. With a population of 3.4 million within its city limits, Berlin is the country's largest city....
 at the beginning of the 1820s and the first U.S. patent on a gas stove was granted in 1825, it wasn't until the late 19th century that using gas for lighting and cooking became commonplace in urban areas.

The urbanization
Urbanization

Urbanization is the physical growth of rural or natural land into urban areas as a result of population im-migration to an existing urban area....
 in the second half of the 19th century induced other significant changes that would ultimately change the kitchen. Out of sheer necessity, cities began planning and building water distribution pipes into homes, and built sewer
Sanitary sewer

A sanitary sewer is a type of underground carriage system for transporting sewage from houses or industry to sewage treatment or disposal....
s to deal with the waste water. Gas pipes were laid; gas was used first for lighting purposes, but once the network had grown sufficiently, it also became available for heating and cooking on gas stoves. At the turn of the 20th century, electricity
Electricity

Electricity is a general term that encompasses a variety of phenomena resulting from the presence and flow of electric charge. These include many easily recognizable phenomena such as lightning and static electricity, but in addition, less familiar concepts such as the electromagnetic field and electromagnetic induction....
 had been mastered well enough to become a commercially viable alternative to gas and slowly started replacing the latter. But like the gas stove, the electrical stove had a slow start. The first electrical stove had been presented in 1893 at the World's Columbian Exposition
World's Columbian Exposition

The World's Columbian Exposition , a World's Fair, was held in Chicago in 1893, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World....
 in Chicago
Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the U.S. state of Illinois and the Midwestern United States, as well as the List of United States cities by population city in the United States with more than 2.8 million residents....
, but it wasn't until the 1930s that the technology was stable enough and began to take off.

Industrialization also caused social changes. The new factory
Factory

A factory or manufacturing plant is an industry building where workers manufacturing Good or supervise machines Process Manufacturing one product into another....
 working class
Working class

Working class is a term used in academic sociology and in ordinary conversation to describe, depending on context and speaker, those employed in specific fields or types of work....
 in the cities was housed under generally poor conditions. Whole families lived in small one or two-room apartment
Apartment

An apartment is a self-contained House unit that occupies only part of a Apartment building. Apartments may be owned or rented .A common alternative term for apartment is flat....
s in tenement buildings up to six stories high, badly aired and with insufficient lighting. Sometimes, they shared apartments with "night sleepers", unmarried men who paid for a bed at night. The kitchen in such an apartment was often used as a living and sleeping room, and even as a bathroom
Bathroom

A bathroom is a room that may have different functions depending on the cultural context. In the most literal sense, the word bathroom means "a room with a bath"....
. Water had to be fetched from wells and heated on the stove. Water pipes were laid only towards the end of the 19th century, and then often only with one tap per building or per story. Brick-and-mortar stoves fired with coal remained the norm until well into the second half of the century. Pots and kitchenware were typically stored on open shelves, and parts of the room could be separated from the rest using simple curtains.

In contrast, there were no dramatic changes for the upper classes. The kitchen, located in the basement
Basement

A basement is one or more Storey of a building that are either completely or partially below the ground floor. Slab-on-grade foundation buildings do not have basements....
 or the ground floor, continued to be operated by servants. In some houses, water pump
Pump

A pump is a device used to move fluids, such as gases, liquids or Slurry. A pump displaces a volume by physical or mechanical action. One common misconception about pumps is the thought that they create pressure....
s were installed, and some even had kitchen sinks and drains (but no water on tap yet, except for some feudal kitchens in castles). The kitchen became a much cleaner space with the advent of "cooking machines", closed stoves made of iron plates and fired by wood and increasingly charcoal or coal, and that had flue pipe
Flue pipe

A flue pipe is an organ pipe that produces sound through the vibration of air molecules, in the same manner as a recorder or a whistle. Air under pressure is driven down a Flue and against a sharp lip called a Labium, which causes the column of air in the pipe to resonate at a frequency determined by the pipe length....
s connected to the chimney. For the servants the kitchen continued to also serve as a sleeping room; they slept either on the floor, or later in narrow spaces above a lowered ceiling, for the new stoves with their smoke outlet no longer required a high ceiling in the kitchen. The kitchen floors were tiled; kitchenware was neatly stored in cupboard
Cupboard

A cupboard or press is a type of Cabinet , often made of wood, used indoors to store household objects such as food and crockery, and protect them from dust and dirt....
s to protect them from dust and steam. A large table served as a workbench; there were at least as many chairs as there were servants, for the table in the kitchen also doubled as the eating place for the servants.

The middle class tried to imitate the luxurious dining styles of the upper class as best as it could. Living in smaller apartments, the kitchen was the main room—here, the family lived. The study or living room was saved for special occasions such as an occasional dinner invitation. Because of this, these middle-class kitchens were often more homely than those of the upper class, where the kitchen was a work-only room occupied only by the servants. Besides a cupboard to store the kitchenware
Kitchenware

Kitchenware include utensils, appliances, dishes, cookware, and so on for use in the kitchen.See:*List of food preparation utensils* List of Japanese cooking utensils...
, there were a table and chairs, where the family would dine, and sometimes—if space allowed—even a fauteuil
Fauteuil

A fauteuil is a style of open-arm chair with a primarily exposed wooden frame originating in France in the early eighteenth century. A fauteuil is made of wood, and frequently with carved relief ornament....
 or a couch.

Gas pipes were first laid in the late 19th century, and gas stoves started to replace the older coal-fired stoves. Gas was more expensive than coal, though, and thus the new technology was first installed in the wealthier homes. Where workers' apartments were equipped with a gas stove, gas distribution would go through a coin meter.

In rural areas, the older technology using coal or wood stoves or even brick-and-mortar open fireplaces remained common throughout. Gas and water pipes were first installed in the big cities; small villages were connected only much later.

Rationalization


The trend to increasing gasification and electrification continued at the turn of the 20th century. In industry, it was the phase of rationalisation, where work processes were attempted to be streamlined. Taylorism was born, and time-motion studies
Time and motion study

A time and motion study is a business efficiency technique combining the Time Study work of Frederick Winslow Taylor with the Motion Study work of Frank Bunker Gilbreth and Lillian Moller Gilbreth Gilbreth ....
 were used to optimize processes. The first German kitchen brand 'Poggenpohl'- established in 1892 by Friedemir Poggenpohl brought forth ideas to further improve work processes with ergonomic work-top heights & storage chutes that were later adopted by Schütte-Lihotzk's Frankfurt Kitchen. These ideas also spilled over into domestic kitchen architecture because of a growing trend that called for a professionalization of household work, noted in the mid-19th century by Catharine Beecher
Catharine Beecher

Catharine Esther Beecher was an American educator known for her forthright opinions on women?s education as well as her vehement support of the many benefits of the incorporation of kindergarten into children's education....
 and amplified by Christine Frederick's publications in the 1910s.

Frankfurterkueche


Working class women frequently worked in factories to ensure the family's survival, as the men's wages often did not suffice. Social housing projects led to the next milestone: the "Frankfurt kitchen
Frankfurt kitchen

The Frankfurt kitchen was a milestone in domestic architecture, considered the fore-runner of modern fitted kitchens, for it realised for the first time a kitchen built after a unified concept, designed to enable efficient work and to be built at low cost....
". Developed in 1926, this kitchen measured 1.9 m by 3.4m (approximately 6'2" by 11'2"), with a standard layout. It was built for two purposes: to optimize kitchen work to reduce cooking time (so that women would have more time for the factory) and to lower the cost of building decently-equipped kitchens. The design, created by Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky
Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky

Margarete Sch?tte-Lihotzky was the first female Austrian architect and an activist in the Nazism resistance movement. She is mostly remembered today for designing the so-called Frankfurt Kitchen....
, was the result of detailed time-motion studies and heavily influenced by the railway dining car kitchens of the period. It was built in some 10,000 apartments in a social housing project of architect
Architect

An architect is trained and licenced in planning and designing buildings, and participates in supervising the construction of a building. Etymologically, architect derives from the Latin architectus, itself derived from the Greek arkhitekton , i.e....
 Ernst May in Frankfurt
Frankfurt

is the largest city in the German States of Germany of Hesse and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants in Germany, with a 2008 population of 670,000....
.

The initial reception was heavily critical: people were not accustomed to the changed processes also designed by Schütte-Lihotzky; it was so small that only one person could work in it; some storage spaces intended for raw loose food ingredients such as flour
Flour

Flour is a powder made of cereal grains. It is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many civilizations, making the availability of adequate supplies of flour a major economic and political issue at various times throughout history....
 were reachable by children. But the Frankfurt kitchen embodied a standard for the rest of the 20th century in rental apartments: the "work kitchen". Too small to live or dine in, it was soon criticized as "exiling the women in the kitchen", but the post-World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
 conservatism coupled with economic reasons prevailed. The kitchen once more was seen as a work place that needed to be separated from the living areas. Practical reasons also played a role in this development: just as in the bourgeois homes of the past, one reason for separating the kitchen was to keep the steam and smells of cooking out of the living room.

Friedemir Poggenpohl, led innovation in the kitchen area by presenting the 'reform kitchen' in 1928 with interconnecting cabinets & functional interiors. The reform kitchen was a forerunner to the later unit kitchen, & fitted kitchen. In 1950, Poggenpohl presents the form 1000, the world's first unit kitchen, at the Furniture Fair in Cologne.

Technicalization

Ponderosa Kitchen
The idea of standardized dimensions and layout developed for the Frankfurt kitchen took hold while Poggenpohl began exporting to neighboring countries which for the first time required a kitchen specifier known today as a kitchen designer. The equipment used remained a standard for years to come: hot and cold water on tap and a kitchen sink and an electrical or gas stove and oven. Not much later, the refrigerator
Refrigerator

A refrigerator is a cooling appliance comprising a thermal insulation compartment and a heat pump - a mechanism to transfer heat from it to the external environment, cooling the contents to a temperature below ambient....
 was added as a standard item. The concept was refined in the "Swedish kitchen" using unit furniture with wooden fronts for the kitchen cabinets. Soon the concept was amended by the use of smooth synthetic door and drawer fronts, first in white, recalling a sense of cleanliness and alluding to sterile lab or hospital settings, but soon after in more lively colors, too. A trend began in the 1940s in the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
  to equip the kitchen with electrified small
Small appliance

Small appliance refers to a class of home appliances that are portable or semi-portable or which are used on tabletops, countertops, or other platforms....
 and large kitchen appliances
Major appliance

A major appliance, or domestic appliance, is usually defined as a large machine which accomplishes some routine housekeeping task, which includes purposes such as cooking, food preservation, or cleaning, whether in a household, institutional, commercial or industrial setting....
 such as blender
Blender (device)

A blender, or liquidiser in British English, is a kitchen appliance used to mix ingredients or puree food. The term typically refers to a stationary, upright electrical device, which is to be distinguished from a hand-powered or electric mixer that may be used for similar purposes....
s, toaster
Toaster

A toaster is a small electric kitchen appliance designed to toast multiple types of bread products. A typical modern two-slice toaster draws anywhere between 600 and 1200 Watt and makes toast in 1 to 3 minutes....
s, and later also microwave oven
Microwave oven

A microwave oven, or a microwave, is a kitchen appliance that cookings or heats food by dielectric heating. This is accomplished by using microwave radiation to heat water and other dipole within the food....
s. Following the end of World War II
World War II

World War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a Participants in World War II, including all of the great powers, organised into two opposing military alliances: the Allies of World War II and the Axis powers....
, massive demand in Europe
Europe

Europe is, conventionally, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally divided from Asia to its east by the water divide of the Ural Mountains, the Ural , the Caspian Sea, and by the Caucasus Mountains to the southeast....
 for low-price, high-tech consumer goods led to Western European kitchens being designed to accommodate new appliances such as refrigerators and electric/gas cookers.

Parallel to this development in tenement buildings was the evolution of the kitchen in homeowner's houses. There, the kitchens usually were somewhat larger, suitable for everyday use as a dining room, but otherwise the ongoing technicalization was the same, and the use of unit furniture also became a standard in this market sector.

General technocentric enthusiasm even led some designers to take the "work kitchen" approach even further, culminating in futuristic designs like Luigi Colani
Luigi Colani

Luigi Colani, , is a Germany industrial designer whose father came from Madulain near St. Moritz in Switzerland and mother from Poland.The prime characteristic of his designs are the rounded, organic forms, which he terms "biodynamic" and claims are ergonomics superior to traditional designs....
's "kitchen satellite" (1969, commissioned by the German
Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
 high-end kitchen manufacturer Poggenpohl
Poggenpohl

Poggenpohl M?belwerke is a cabinet manufacturer based in Herford, Germany, specializing in luxury kitchen cabinets. Poggenpohl is recognized as the oldest kitchen brand in the world and one of the leading international brand names in kitchen design, known in more than 70 countries worldwide....
 for an exhibit), in which the room was reduced to a ball with a chair in the middle and all appliances at arm's length, an optimal arrangement maybe for "applying heat to food", but not necessarily for actual cooking. Such extravaganzas remained outside the norm, though.

In the former Eastern bloc
Eastern bloc

During the Cold War, the terms Eastern Bloc, Communist Bloc or Soviet Bloc were used to refer to European annexed or expanded Soviet Socialist Republics of the USSR and Satellite state states, including members of the Soviet-dominated organizations Comecon and the Warsaw Pact....
 countries, the official doctrine
Doctrine

Doctrine is a codification of beliefs or "a body of teachers" or "instructions", taught principles or positions, as the body of teachings in a branch of knowledge or belief system....
 viewed cooking as a mere necessity, and women should work "for the society" in factories, not at home. Also, housing had to be built at low costs and quickly, which led directly to the standardized apartment block using prefabricated slabs. The kitchen was reduced to its minimums and the "work kitchen" paradigm taken to its extremes: in East Germany for instance, the standard tenement block of the model "P2" had tiny 4 m² kitchens in the inside of the building (no windows), connected to the dining and living room of the 55 m² apartment and separated from the latter by a pass-through or a window.

Free for all

Starting in the 1980s, the perfection of the extractor hood
Extractor hood

An extractor hood or range hood , also known as a kitchen hood, stove hood, exhaust hood, cooker hood, extraction hood, cooking canopy, ventilation hood, extractor fan or electric chimney, is a device containing a fan that hangs above the stove or cooktop in the kitchen....
 allowed an open kitchen again, integrated more or less with the living room without causing the whole apartment or house to smell. Before that, only a few earlier experiments, typically in newly built upper middle class family homes, had open kitchens. Examples are Frank Lloyd Wright
Frank Lloyd Wright

Frank Lloyd Wright was an United States architect, interior designer, writer and educator, who designed more than 1,000 projects, which resulted in more than 500 completed works....
's House Willey (1934) and House Jacobs (1936). Both had open kitchens, with high ceilings (up to the roof) and were aired by skylight
Skylight

Skylight may refer to:* Skylight * Skylight , by David HareSee also* Diffuse sky radiation* Light pollution...
s. The extractor hood made it possible to build open kitchens in apartments, too, where both high ceilings and skylights were not possible.

The re-integration of the kitchen and the living area went hand in hand with a change in the perception of cooking: increasingly, cooking was seen as a creative
Art

Art is the process or product of deliberately arranging elements in a way that appeals to the senses or emotions. It encompasses a diverse range of human activities, creations, and modes of expression, including music and literature....
 and sometimes social act instead of work, especially in upper social classes. Besides, many families also appreciated the trend towards open kitchens, as it made it easier for the parents to supervise the children while cooking. The enhanced status of cooking also made the kitchen a prestige object for showing off one's wealth or cooking professionalism. Some architect
Architect

An architect is trained and licenced in planning and designing buildings, and participates in supervising the construction of a building. Etymologically, architect derives from the Latin architectus, itself derived from the Greek arkhitekton , i.e....
s have capitalized on this "object" aspect of the kitchen by designing freestanding "kitchen objects". However, like their precursor, Colani's "kitchen satellite", such futuristic designs are exceptions.

Another reason for the trend back to open kitchens (and a foundation of the "kitchen object" philosophy) is changes in how food is prepared. Whereas prior to the 1950s most cooking started out with raw ingredients and a meal had to be prepared from scratch, the advent of frozen meals and pre-prepared convenience food
Convenience food

Convenience food, or tertiary processed food, is commercially prepared food designed for ease of consumption. Products designated as convenience foods are often preprepared food stuffs that can be sold as hot, ready-to-eat dishes; as room temperature, shelf-stable products; or as refrigerated or frozen products that require minimal prep...
 changed the cooking habits of many people, who consequently used the kitchen less and less. For others, who followed the "cooking as a social act" trend, the open kitchen had the advantage that they could be with their guests while cooking, and for the "creative cooks" it might even become a stage for their cooking performance. The "Trophy Kitchen" is highly equipped with very expensive and sophisticated appliances which are used primarily to impress visitors and to project social status, rather than for actual cooking.

Domestic kitchen planning

Beecher Kitchen
Domestic kitchen design per se is a relatively recent discipline. The first ideas to optimize the work in the kitchen go back to Catharine Beecher
Catharine Beecher

Catharine Esther Beecher was an American educator known for her forthright opinions on women?s education as well as her vehement support of the many benefits of the incorporation of kindergarten into children's education....
's A Treatise on Domestic Economy (1843, revised and republished together with her sister Harriet Beecher Stowe
Harriet Beecher Stowe

Harriet Beecher Stowe was an abolitionist, whose novel Uncle Tom's Cabin depicted life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the U.S....
 as The American Woman's Home in 1869). Beecher's "model kitchen" propagated for the first time a systematic design based on early ergonomics
Ergonomics

Ergonomics is the scientific discipline concerned with designing according to human needs, and the profession that applies theory, principles, data and methods to design in order to optimize human well-being and overall system performance....
. The design included regular shelves on the walls, ample work space, and dedicated storage areas for various food items. Beecher even separated the functions of preparing food and cooking it altogether by moving the stove into a compartment adjacent to the kitchen.

Christine Frederick published from 1913 a series of articles on "New Household Management" in which she analyzed the kitchen following Taylorist principles, presented detailed time-motion studies, and derived a kitchen design from them. Her ideas were taken up in the 1920s by architects in Germany
Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered to the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea; to the east by Poland and the Czech Republic; to the south by Austria and Switzerland; and to the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium, and the Netherlands....
 and Austria
Austria

Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It borders both Germany and the Czech Republic to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the west....
, most notably Bruno Taut
Bruno Taut

Bruno Julius Florian Taut , was a prolific German architect, urban planner and author active in the Weimar culture period.Taut is best known for his theoretical work, speculative writings and a handful of exhibition buildings....
, Erna Meyer, and Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky
Margarete Schütte-Lihotzky

Margarete Sch?tte-Lihotzky was the first female Austrian architect and an activist in the Nazism resistance movement. She is mostly remembered today for designing the so-called Frankfurt Kitchen....
. A social housing project in Frankfurt (the Römerstadt of architect Ernst May) realized in 1927/8 was the breakthrough for her Frankfurt kitchen
Frankfurt kitchen

The Frankfurt kitchen was a milestone in domestic architecture, considered the fore-runner of modern fitted kitchens, for it realised for the first time a kitchen built after a unified concept, designed to enable efficient work and to be built at low cost....
, which embodied this new notion of efficiency in the kitchen.

While this "work kitchen" and variants derived from it were a great success for tenement buildings, home owners had different demands and didn't want to be constrained by a 6.4 m² kitchen. Nevertheless, kitchen design was mostly ad-hoc following the whims of the architect. In the U.S.
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
, the "Small Homes Council", since 1993 the "Building Research Council", of the School of Architecture of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign is a public university research university in the state of Illinois, United States. It is the oldest and largest campus in the University of Illinois system....
 was founded in 1944 with the goal to improve the state of the art in home building, originally with an emphasis on standardization for cost reduction. It was there that the notion of the kitchen work triangle was formalized: the three main functions in a kitchen are storage, preparation, and cooking (which Catharine Beecher had already recognized), and the places for these functions should be arranged in the kitchen in such a way that work at one place does not interfere with work at another place, the distance between these places is not unnecessarily large, and no obstacles are in the way. A natural arrangement is a triangle
Triangle

A triangle is one of the basic shapes of geometry: a polygon with three corners or wikt:vertex and three sides or edges which are line segments....
, with the refrigerator, the sink, and the stove at a vertex each.

This observation led to a few common kitchen forms, commonly characterized by the arrangement of the kitchen cabinets and sink, stove, and refrigerator:
  • A single-file kitchen (or one-way galley) has all of these along one wall; the work triangle degenerates to a line. This is not optimal, but often the only solution if space is restricted. This may be common in an attic space that is being converted into a living space, or a studio apartment.
  • The double-file kitchen (or two-way galley) has two rows of cabinets at opposite walls, one containing the stove and the sink, the other the refrigerator. This is the classical work kitchen.
  • In the L-kitchen, the cabinets occupy two adjacent walls. Again, the work triangle is preserved, and there may even be space for an additional table at a third wall, provided it doesn't intersect the triangle.
  • A U-kitchen has cabinets along three walls, typically with the sink at the base of the "U". This is a typical work kitchen, too, unless the two other cabinet rows are short enough to place a table at the fourth wall.
  • The block kitchen (or island) is a more recent development, typically found in open kitchens. Here, the stove or both the stove and the sink are placed where an L or U kitchen would have a table, in a freestanding "island", separated from the other cabinets. In a closed room, this doesn't make much sense, but in an open kitchen, it makes the stove accessible from all sides such that two persons can cook together, and allows for contact with guests or the rest of the family, since the cook doesn't face the wall anymore.


In the 1980s there was a backlash against industrial kitchen planning and cabinets with people installing a mix of work surfaces and free standing furniture, led by kitchen designer Johnny Grey
Johnny Grey

Johnny Grey is an architect, designer and author....
 and his concept of the "Unfitted Kitchen".

Modern kitchens often have enough informal space to allow for people to eat in it without having to use the formal dining room
Dining room

A dining room is a room for consuming food. In modern times it is usually adjacent to the kitchen for convenience in serving, although in medieval times it was often on an entirely different floor level....
. Such areas are called "breakfast areas", "breakfast nooks" or "breakfast bars" if the space is integrated into a kitchen counter. Kitchens with enough space to eat in are sometimes called "eat-in kitchens".

Other kitchen types

Canteen Kitchen
Restaurant
Restaurant

A restaurant prepares and serves food and drink to customers. Meals are generally served and eaten on premises, but many restaurants also offer take-out and Delivery ....
 and canteen
Cafeteria

A cafeteria is a type of food service location in which there is little or no table service, whether a restaurant or within an institution such as a large office building or school; a school dining location is also referred to as a canteen or dining hall....
 kitchens found in hotel
Hotel

----A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. The provision of basic accommodation, in times past, consisting only of a room with a bed, a cupboard, a small table and a washstand has largely been replaced by rooms with modern facilities, including Bathroom#Types of bathroomss and air conditioning or clima...
s, hospital
Hospital

A hospital is an institution for health care providing patient treatment by specialized staff and equipment, and often but not always providing for longer-term patient stays....
s, educational & work place facilities, army barracks, and similar establishments are generally (in developed countries) subject to public health
Public health

Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals." It is concerned with threats to the overall health of a community based on population health analysis....
 laws. They are inspected periodically by public-health officials, and forced to close if they don't meet hygienic requirements mandated by law.

Canteen kitchens (and castle kitchens) were often the places where new technology was used first. For instance, Benjamin Thompson
Benjamin Thompson

Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford , Fellow of the Royal Society was an English-American physics and inventor whose challenges to established physical theory were part of the 19th century revolution in thermodynamics....
's "energy saving stove", an early-19th-century fully-closed iron stove using one fire to heat several pots, was designed for large kitchens; another thirty years passed before they were adapted for domestic use.

Today's western restaurant kitchens typically have tiled walls and floors and use stainless steel for other surfaces (workbench, but also door and drawer fronts) because these materials are durable and easy to clean. Professional kitchens are often equipped with gas stoves, as these allow cooks
Cook (profession)

A cook is a person that prepares food for consumption. In Germany, Austria and Switzerland this professions requires government approval . The profession requires profound knowledge concerning nutrition....
 to regulate the heat quicker and more finely than electrical stoves. Some special appliances are typical for professional kitchens, such as large installed deep fryers, steamer
Steaming

Steaming is a method of cooking using steam. Steaming is considered a relatively healthier cooking technique and capable of cooking almost all kinds of food....
s, or a Bain Marie. (steamers—not to be confused with a pressure cooker
Pressure cooking

Pressure cooking is a method of cooking in a sealed vessel that does not permit air or liquids to escape below a preset pressure. Because the boiling point of water increases as the pressure increases, the pressure built up inside the cooker allows the liquid in the pot to rise to a higher temperature before boiling....
—are beginning to find their way into domestic households, sometimes as a combined appliance of oven and steamer.)
Food Tech Room Marling
The fast food
Fast food

File:2008-0614-In-N-Out-burgsfries.jpgFast food is the term given to food that can be prepared and served very quickly. While any meal with low preparation time can be considered to be fast food, typically the term refers to food sold in a restaurant or store with low quality preparation and served to the customer in a packaged form for Tak...
 and convenience food
Convenience food

Convenience food, or tertiary processed food, is commercially prepared food designed for ease of consumption. Products designated as convenience foods are often preprepared food stuffs that can be sold as hot, ready-to-eat dishes; as room temperature, shelf-stable products; or as refrigerated or frozen products that require minimal prep...
 trends have also changed the way restaurant kitchens operate. There is a trend for restaurants to only "finish" delivered convenience food or even just re-heat completely prepared meals, maybe at the utmost grilling
Grilling

Grilling or broiling is a form of cooking that involves direct heat. Devices that grill are called grill . The definition varies widely by region and culture....
 a hamburger
Hamburger

A hamburger consists of a cooked ground meat patty, usually beef, placed in a sliced bun or between pieces of bread or toast. Hamburgers are often served with various condiments, such as ketchup, mustard, mayonnaise, relish etc....
 or a steak
Steak

A steak is a slice of meat, typically beef. Most steaks are cut perpendicular to the muscle fibres, improving the perceived tenderness of the meat....
.

The kitchens in railway dining car
Dining car

A dining car or restaurant car , also diner, is a railroad passenger car that serves meals in the manner of a full-service, sit-down restaurant....
s present special challenges: space is constrained, and nevertheless the personnel must be able to serve a great number of meals quickly. Especially in the early history of the railway this required flawless organization of processes; in modern times, the microwave oven
Microwave oven

A microwave oven, or a microwave, is a kitchen appliance that cookings or heats food by dielectric heating. This is accomplished by using microwave radiation to heat water and other dipole within the food....
 and prepared meals have made this task a lot easier. Galley
Galley (kitchen)

The galley is the compartment of a ship, submarine, train or aircraft where food is cooked and prepared. It can also refer to a land based kitchen on a naval base....
s are kitchens aboard ship
Ship

A ship is a large watercraft that floats on water. Ships are generally distinguished from boats based on size. Ships may be found on lakes, seas, and rivers and they allow for a variety of activities, such as the ferry or cargo ships, fishing, cruise ship, Coast guard, and warship....
s or aircraft
Aircraft

An aircraft is a vehicle which is able to flight by being supported by the air, or in general, the atmosphere, of a planet. Examples include balloons, airplanes and helicopters....
 (although the term galley is also often used to refer to a railroad dining car's kitchen). On yacht
Yacht

A yacht is a recreational boat. It designates two rather different classes of watercraft, sailing and power yachts. Yachts are differentiated from working ships mainly by their leisure purpose....
s, galleys are often cramped, with one or two gas burners fuelled by a gas bottle, but kitchens on cruise ship
Cruise ship

File:MSMajestyOfTheSeasEdit1.JPGA cruise ship or cruise liner is a passenger ship used for pleasure voyages, where the voyage itself and the ship's amenities are part of the experience....
s or large warship
Warship

A warship is a ship that is built and primarily intended for combat. Warships are usually built in a completely different way than cargo ship....
s are comparable in every respect with restaurants or canteen kitchens. On passenger airplanes, the kitchen is reduced to a mere pantry
Pantry

A pantry is a room where food, provisions or dishes are stored and served in an ancillary capacity to the kitchen. The derivation of the word is from the same source as the Old French term paneterie; that is from pain, the French language form of the Latin language pan for bread....
, the only function reminiscent of a kitchen is the heating of in-flight meals delivered by a catering
Catering

Catering is the business of providing foodservice at a remote site....
 company. An extreme form of the kitchen occurs in space, e.g. aboard a Space Shuttle
Space Shuttle

NASA's Space Shuttle, officially called the Space Transportation System , is the spacecraft currently used by the United States government for its human spaceflight missions....
 (where it is also called the "galley") or the International Space Station
International Space Station

The International Space Station is a research facility Assembly of the International Space Station in outer space. On-orbit construction of the station began in 1998, and is scheduled to be complete by 2011, with operations continuing until around 2015....
. The astronaut
Astronaut

An astronaut or cosmonaut is a person trained by a List of human spaceflight programs to command, pilot, or serve as a crew member of a spacecraft....
s' food is generally completely prepared, dehydrated
Dehydration

Dehydration is the removal of water from an object. In Physiology terms, it entails a relative deficiency of water molecules in relation to other dissolved solutes....
, and sealed in plastic pouches, and the kitchen is reduced to a rehydration and heating module.

Outdoor areas in which food is prepared are generally not considered to be kitchens, although an outdoor area set up for regular food preparation, for instance when camping
Camping

Camping is an outdoor recreational activity.The participants, known as campers, get away from urban areas, their home region or civilization and enjoy nature while spending one or more nights, usually at a campsite....
, might be called an "outdoor kitchen". Military camps and similar temporary settlements of nomad
Nomad

Nomadic people, , also known as nomads, are communities of people who move from one place to another, rather than Settler in one location....
s may have dedicated kitchen tents.

In Schools where Home Economics (HE) or Food technology
Food technology

Food technology, or Food tech for short is the application of food science to the selection, food preservation, Food processing, packaging, Food distribution, and use of safety, nutrition, and Healthy diet....
 (previously known as Domestic science) is taught, there will be a series of kitchens with multiple equipment (similar in some respects to laboratories
Laboratory

A laboratory is a facility that provides controlled conditions in which science research, experiments, and measurement may be performed. The title of laboratory is also used for certain other facilities where the processes or equipment used are similar to those in scientific laboratories....
) solely for the purpose of teaching. These will consist of between 6 and 12 workstations, each with their own oven
Oven

An oven is an enclosed compartment for heating, baking or drying. It is most commonly used in cooking and pottery. Ovens used in pottery are also known as kilns....
, sink
Sink

In plumbing, a sink or basin is a bowl-shaped plumbing fixture that is used for washing hands or small objects. In American plumbing parlance, a bathroom sink is known as a lavatory....
 and kitchen utensils.

Kitchens types by region


Japan

Kitchens in Japan are called Daidokoro (??;lit. "kitchen"). Daidokoro is the place where food is prepared in a Japanese house
Housing in Japan

Housing in Japan includes modern and traditional styles. Two patterns of residences are predominant in contemporary Japan: the single-family detached house and the multiple-unit building, either owned by an individual or corporation and rented as apartments to tenants, or owned by occupants....
. Until the Meiji era, a kitchen was also called kamado (???; lit. stove
Stove

A stove is an enclosed heated space. The term is commonly taken to mean an enclosed space in which fuel is burned to provide heating, either to heat the space in which the stove is situated or to heat the stove itself, and items placed on it, for cooking purposes....
) and there are many sayings in the Japanese language
Japanese language

IPA: [n?iho?go] is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is related to the Ryukyuan languages....
 that involve kamado as it was considered the symbol of a house and the term could even be used to mean "family" or "household" (similar to the English word "hearth"). When separating a family, it was called Kamado wo wakeru, which means "divide the stove". Kamado wo yaburu (lit. "break the stove") means that the family was bankrupt.

See also

  • Cooking techniques
    Cooking

    Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat, selecting, measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible food....
  • Cuisine
    Cuisine

    Cuisine is a specific set of cooking traditions and practices, often associated with a specific culture. A cuisine is primarily influenced by the ingredients that are available locally or through trade....
  • Food preparation utensils
    List of food preparation utensils

    This is a list of food preparation utensils, some of what is known as kitchenware.* Baba au rhum* Bain-marie* Proofing #Proofing_Equipment...
  • Kitchen is also a novel by Japanese author Yoshimoto Banana (Banana Yoshimoto
    Banana Yoshimoto

    is the pen name of Mahoko Yoshimoto , a Japanese contemporary writer. She writes her name in hiragana....
    )


Further reading

  • Andritzky, M. (Ed.): Oikos: Von der Feuerstelle zur Mikrowelle, Anabes, Giessen 1992; ISBN 3-87038-669-X. In German
    German language

    German is a West Germanic languages, thus related to and classified alongside English language and Dutch language. It is one of the world's world language and the most widely spoken mother tongue in the European Union....
    ; out of print.
  • Beecher, C. E.
    Catharine Beecher

    Catharine Esther Beecher was an American educator known for her forthright opinions on women?s education as well as her vehement support of the many benefits of the incorporation of kindergarten into children's education....
     and Beecher Stowe, H.
    Harriet Beecher Stowe

    Harriet Beecher Stowe was an abolitionist, whose novel Uncle Tom's Cabin depicted life for African-Americans under slavery; it reached millions as a novel and play, and became influential in the U.S....
    : The American Woman's Home, 1869. The text is available at Project Gutenberg
    Project Gutenberg

    Project Gutenberg, abbreviated as PG, is a volunteer effort to digitize, archive and distribute cultural works, as founder Michael Hart said "To encourage the creation and distribution of eBooks."....
     at .
  • Harrison, M.: The Kitchen in History, Osprey; 1972; ISBN 0-85045-068-3; out of print.
  • Lupton, E. and Miller, J. A.: The Bathroom, the Kitchen, and the Aesthetics of Waste, Princeton Architectural Press; 1996; ISBN 1-56898-096-5. The introduction is available . In English
    English language

    English is a West Germanic language that originated in Anglo-Saxon England and has lingua franca status in many parts of the world as a result of the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries and that of the United States from the mid 20th century onwa...
    .
  • Snodgrass, M. E.: Encyclopedia of Kitchen History; Fitzroy Dearborn Publishers; (November 2004); ISBN 1-57958-380-6.
  • Nicolas Cahill's Household and City Organization at Olynthus ISBN 0-300-08495-1