Our range died. A homesteader’s nightmare, to say the least.
Early last week, I was in the kitchen and the appliances sounded weird. Running hard, making weird ticking noises. I called Kyle at work to express my concern. While on the phone, I looked outside and the neighbor’s power line was on fire.
Like any sane person, I panicked lmao.
I grabbed W and our dog Max and ran.
After hours of the fire department and power company working, it was determined that some of our power was damaged due to a power surge from the road. And my oven was collateral damage.
We don’t have just any range. We have the Maytag Gemini double oven with the toast feature.
Have you ever been wealthy like this?
If you have, then you know this is not an appliance we want to part with. It is no longer made in white, and all the new models like this don’t have the toast feature.
Did you know that you can toast bagels for everyone in your family AT ONCE in this oven? Just four minutes in the oven, no preheating, and we all have bagels to enjoy.
I feel like I just lost my best friend.
This week has consisted of meals using every device our basement holds. The Instant Pot, Ninja air fryers, Crock-Pots and our Weber gas grill.
And damn, this week was going to be the week I started sourdough again. 😂
Annoying to use a bunch of different devices to cook dinner? Yes. But I’m actually pretty used to this style of cooking.
We are in the middle of a house build two hours away, and takeout for every meal while we’re up there working is just NOT an option. We use our makeshift kitchen there to create home cooked meals to enjoy together around a folding table with camping chairs.
It’s fun to imagine us years from now, sitting around a new table reminiscing about these memories.
This week I have come up with some pretty decent meals.
Were there meals that were not photo worthy or blog worthy? Of course. But that’s a pretty common theme when you’re a homesteader.
Some days are unplanned and are just survival mode… using half-used ingredients from the fridge and hoping you can pull something together. I can almost always tell when the meal is going to be poked at and questioned at the dinner table lol.
The meals that were noteworthy this week are linked below for you to enjoy.
And don’t forget… dinner recipes are always open for interpretation. That’s how we become better cooks and eventually end up with our own tried and true recipes.
And maybe that’s the real theme of this week… figuring it out with what we have.
No oven and no sourdough comeback… but everyone still got fed. There were dinners around our kitchen table here and dinners around a folding table at the house we’re building.
Someday I’m sure I’ll miss parts of this season… although I can confidently say I will not miss cooking dinner with six different countertop appliances.
And if anyone happens to find a white Maytag Gemini with the toast feature hiding somewhere… you know where to find me. 😂
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