Brain Storm: Minimal Kitchen Facilities for Functional Collective Housing

[claire_58]

 A comment about multi-generational living on the Frugal Friday post ecosophia.dreamwidth.org/286498.html sparked another line of questions for me. The commenter, Maxine, mentioned the family compound idea had been tried several times on the island where she lives. The ones where everyone had their own kitchens worked out while the ones where everyone had bed/sitting rooms with a breakfast nook and shared a kitchen didn’t. Other threads about insta-pots, solar ovens and cooking out doors going on at the same time got me thinking. What are the minimum kitchen facilities needed to make it work. 

 

A full kitchen, stove, fridge/freezer, dishwasher, microwave etc and all the assorted smaller appliances for each household is expensive. As JMG has pointed out most potential eco-villages never get off the ground because most people can’t imagine anything less than the full comforts and conveniences of a middle class life in an era of abundance industrialism. If you, like me, have been “low tech hobbyist” (thanks to Misty Friday for the phrase) you probably can imagine living with less, maybe even much less.  

 

So here we go. Imagine there is a full communal kitchen available to you. Your large volume food processing and cooking for large gatherings and parties can be done there. You also have your own private kitchen. What are the facilities you need to make your small kitchen complete? 

 

Let’s assume that they all have running water at least. Electricity is also an option. What do you need for daily food prep to make it work? What are your must-have tools and appliances? Are there alternatives that might be viable? What could you easily do without? What modern conveniences would you most appreciate having? Do you want them all or could you make it work with less?

 

This is a brainstorm. Anything goes: high tech, low tech, modern, retro . . . What would you need? Curious Collapseniks want to know.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Even if you dont make meals, you have to be able to make tea and coffee and toast. A refrigerator. But that is not realy enough.

An intentional community I knew of, out on a large piece of land had something like this, what they had was they started with an existing small house/cabin. SO this remained always the community shared house. Then people built their own small houses. The whole place was off grid, so then having alot whould be expensive. What most of them would have liked and didnt have was a bit of refrigeration. Noone had their own ovens or any appliances of course. They definitely had a sink and a way to make tea, so a burner or two which would have been propane. There were attempts at cold boxes of some sort, but of ocurse that does work in winter but not in summer ( you know, to keep milk for tea and a few things. Generally everything kitcehn had to be done in the common kitchen,, and in this case in general there was a rotation on who was cooking dinner, so there wasnt any problems trying to cook 5 meals at once. There were various toilets scattered around the property and by the time I went there, an indoor shower built into theend of the greenhouse and a couple outside showers by the sauna.

An intentional community I knew of by Stanford might be just about a cult realy, anyways, shared kitchen, usualy some kind of shared cooked dinner, simple. Lots of left overs in the refrigerators that people would individually reheat and such. One shared bathroom. Culture of no privacy in the bathroom, kitchen, common room. All with individual bedrooms. Anyways, a person I know of there who sometimes just wanted to be left alone, that came up in their meetings, and the solution was that noone was to talk to him if he had a hat on.

what would I want ? I like to cook. I dont mind other people around when I do so. For financial reasons, I used to have a roomate, while I had young children, for years and years. I dont mind a shared kitchen. I dont like someone taking the last of my food and if someone is using my pots and pans, I would like hte pot cleaned immediatelly so that I can then cook myself dinner. I do not clean up after others, I would for my elderly family, but not for able bodied adults. But this is all easy to discuss.

FOr a ktichenette, I would need a burner or two, some refrigeration idealy, but realy a small refrigerator using almost as much power as a large one, so some shared refrigeration might be needed. a sink, a toaster or toaster oven. But Im going to use the other kitchen realy, so a way to have a quiet breakfast in my room, if others yell at their kids and such getting out int he morning, I would not awant o watch. But, so we see, it realy depends on culture of the people involved. I dont know why women dont share ktichens, I guess some are just too picky ? It is realy simple, you have some concensus of putting everything away find where everything lives, and hten no one gets to re-arrange. Everyone cleans the pots they used before htey eat, and clean their other stuff right after. If everyone is in the way at dinner time with different meals and such, well, again, why not make one dinner and trade off ? Seems we could come up with some menu plans everyone wiill eat. And if not, well the real problem is the pickiness and lack of compromise of the people involved. That is a problem from a culture of the individual in an era of abundance. Picky kids ? That is an abundance issue, unheard of in broke families or parts of the world. So that is the real issue, them not wanting to come to terms that the world has changed and we are leaving abundance. BUt, in that circumstance they do see it and it makes them grumpy, they "shouldnt have to" compromise, eat Mary's pasta, she always puts olive in it.. I dont want to make burritos with the meat on the side, not in thebeans, so the vegetarians are alright. If we realy love each other, and werent grumpy because we dont like contraction, less abundance, we eat around the olives as that is easy to eat around, and we cook the meat separate, and we have to not mind that meat smell is in the kitcehn. Because we are blessed to have family that loves us and a warm home and food. But that is where people need to be. That place of thankfulness and compromise. I dont think making more kitchens is realy going to fix the issue

atmospheric River

[claire_58]

Refrigeration, yes, in some places a well insulated California cooler cupboard could work. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_cooler_(cabinet) In others it would be much more difficult. Shared fridges can be contentious.
Your point about shared culture and being willing to get along is the key to the whole issue. We've mostly been able to get away with a multi-cultural society and lack of shared expectations in the era of abundance that's passing. Figuring out how to relearn and sussing out ways to make the transitional period easier is the goal here.
Making sure people can withdraw when they want to or maintain some degree of separation is necessary at least until new living patterns are established. I agree; most of the problems involved in making things work are going to be due to people not wanting to come to terms with the changes and being resentful when they clearly do have to accept their diminish wealth and the increased responsibilities that come with collective living.

[methylethyl]

There are some working models for the communal kitchen, if you look at the Bruderhof and the Hutterites. I think in both those, there's a large industrial kitchen, and everyone works in it on a rota, but each family has its own private living quarters. Requires a very large investment in shared religion, and low priority on individuality and individual/family possession of material goods. Hard for most modern people, but can work.

There's a long tradition of communal ovens in all sorts of communities, as a practical way to save fuel, avoid heating the house when it's hot outside-- everybody prepares their own breads, and they bring them to bake in the big oven on baking days. Things that cook in a pot over a small fire get cooked at home. This is efficient, social, and seems to work well enough. One of the problems with "all the modern conveniences" is that it took nearly all of the *social* out of housework, and made every housewife a prisoner in isolation, chained to her technological wonders. In some ways we swapped friends for washing machines and ovens. It'd be interesting to see some experiments in what could be, not just brought back into the communal sphere, but what's most socially congenial. A communal oven for large-quantity baking seems like a good place to start.

We lived nearly a year in S.America, in what was basically a boarding house for the genteel poor. Some of the units had kitchenettes and some did not. Rent varied accordingly. There was a communal kitchen off the open patio, run by the building maintenance ladies. Several of the retirees ate at least one meal a day down there. It was the only kitchen in the building with an oven and a fridge. It's also where the sewing machine lived, which I gather anyone could use, with permission. The building's single washing machine was just outside, and they used it exclusively for sheets and blankets. Everyone did their personal laundry by hand, either in the kitchenette or up on the roof in a big shallow laundry sink. Our kitchenette consisted of a tile countertop with a sink, and a two-burner propane stove, like this one:

https://www.ofertadeldia.com/puerto-rico-ofertas/oferta/Temporadas-Outlet,-San-Juan/22b4456f-c6bc-409a-6acd-08d85ff3da03

It was hooked up to a grill-sized propane tank that sat on the floor, and whenever that ran out, we could pay the landlady and swap it out for a full one. Empties were swapped out by a guy on a bicycle, whenever he came by.

White enamel, with the hinged lid and all-- it was cute :) We had no fridge, no oven, no electric cooking appliances. And it was great. I was totally fine cooking almost all our meals that way with just one saucepan-and-lid, and one frying pan, for about nine months. A big part of what made that OK was having so much fresh food available within walking distance-- we didn't need to store anything because we walked to the grocery, the mercado, or the tienda across the street, every day to pick up whatever we were cooking for dinner. So... in my book the absolute minimum needed to have a perfectly functional kitchen is a gas camp stove and a sink. Even electricity is totally optional.

[claire_58]

Great story about living in S. America. Camp stove, running water, and easy access to a reliable year around supply of fresh food. Sounds good.

I like the communal oven idea. We have a solar oven and a good sized toaster oven that can fit the same pans, as well as our range. We can't use the solar oven year around here but we hardly use the big oven at all. I could see doing my Christmas baking and roasting turkey etc. in a communal oven. I don't make bread because I'm gluten intolerant.

I could certainly get by with much less space and equipment if I didn't do so much food processing and have so much stored food. We have a short growing season so some way of storing food is essential.

I know of the Hutterite model and it works for them. As Atmospheric River pointed out in her comment above it takes a shared culture, which we don't have.
Lots of people raised with the expectations of an era that is passing quickly away are - well - as AR says, they are grumpy and resentful about having to adapt. But one of the big take aways from your S.America experience is that when people have less they do adapt. They create functional systems with what they have.

Kitchens

[mistyfriday]

I've done my time in camp/boarding school/restaurant kitchens. The smallest one feed a fixed population of 75 people, the largest was a busy establishment in a large city. I think a restaurant style kitchen would be the ideal setup for a communal kitchen with rotating staff because the scale and style of cooking is so different from what one does in their own home that there is no way that anyone without significant experience would feel able, let alone entitled, to control the whole thing. Though for groups under 40 people it'd probably be more hassle than it's worth.

A smaller and cheaper alternative would be a food truck/lunch counter run by a dedicated group providing a limited menu and fixed serving hours.

As for a kitchenette, if the communal kitchen produced three meals a day with coffee on tap I wouldn't need one. I didn't have anything at the camp or the school. If only dinner service is provided then I would want a sink, electric kettle, and perhaps a two burner stove. If the food coming out of the communal kitchen was terrible I would add a toaster oven and a fridge to the mix.

Re: Kitchens

[claire_58]

Communal kitchens in the collective housing I'm familiar with are nothing like institutional or commercial kitchens. They were not used for daily collective meals and had no professional staff. It was more like a monthly gathering with volunteer cooks and random other events at other times.

Of course the set up would depend on the agreements between the users and the expectations for volunteer work. Maybe the group would want regular meals and have a semi-permanent kitchen rota. It would be quite different for an extended family group of 7 - 15 people than a housing compound with 25 or 30 units.

In a situation where you could use a bigger central kitchen for large batch food processing or, on occasion, use it to make meals for larger groups at Christmas or whatever, what do you need for daily use? Sink, kettle, two burner stove top, toaster oven, and fridge sounds pretty good. I'd prpbably want a slow cooker too and if I had a deck or balcony I'd add a charcoal grill or a solar oven.

The family compound

[mistyfriday]

If everyone is relying on their kitchenette for daily meals then I think it would be better to convert the main kitchen to something else like a small laundromat to avoid the jealousy and friction that comes from sharing one "real" kitchen. Then, on special occasions, having a potluck where everyone uses their kitchenette to prepare a dish.

However from both an electrical utilization and cost perspective it would be more efficient to have a single kitchen with a dedicated staff than to have a bunch of individual kitchenettes.

This would also help alleviate jealousy and friction because who doesn't love ready to eat food? I would suggest a weekly rotation of dishwashers and servers with group planned menues and one dedicated shopper. For large families this would be ideal with retirees and and kids taking on the bulk of the duties.

Imagine a living environment more like a functional mansion where the family does the job of the staff. I believe these arrangements should be positive and profoundly social experiences. Many hands make light work.

The boarding school experience was very informative. Between the dormitories, kitchen, laundry (bedding only), and transportation services I believe there was only 12 paid staff for over 300 students. The students provided all the housekeeping labor including washing dishes and personal laundry. For a family of 15 none of the duties would be paid, but chef and shopper/gofor would be full-time positions and additional divisions of labor would become apparent over time such as groundskeeper and head gardener.

My family didn't produce enough children for such a lofty ideal, but it would be nice to retire and become a groundskeeper with the ability to pull labor from a group of young people.

Re: The family compound

[mistyfriday]

It's probably important to note that in the boarding school example six of those twelve staff were trained counselors whose primary function, from a student's perspective, was conflict mediation. In a family environment having a trained mediator, a matriarch/patriarch, or a committee to settle disputes would be necessary and its role in dealing with said disputes should be agreed upon before anyone moves in.

Re: The family compound

[claire_58]

Interesting ideas. I've also thought about a functional mansion/estate for collective living with work teams for the various production facilities. A kitchen team with a main core of dedicated people and other people on a rota to help out. A garden team set up the same way. Maybe a team for animal husbandry or . . .

Re: The family compound

[claire_58]

Conflict resolution! You've nailed it. I've been thinking of creating living arrangement to reduce conflict. Good but it only goes so far.