The ideal kitchen is in the center of the house.

Jennifer Rubell: Well I just designed a new kitchen for myself, and that is my ideal kitchen.  I live in a 19th century house, and I took my absolute favorite room in the house and left it exactly the way it is and plopped a kitchen right down in the center.  So the ideal kitchen to me is the center of the house.  So wherever you like to spend the time the most, the ideal kitchen should be there.  Whether that’s in the middle of your living room, or out on your deck, or whatever it is.  And then . . . and then you don’t need too much.  I mean I am somebody who professionally cooks at home and I have four burners.  You know I don’t . . . I don’t think that having, you know, 100 burners in your kitchen makes you a great cook.  So I think a really beautiful environment where you like to be and that has everything that you need.  You know part . . . part of the beauty of cooking at home is that it’s yours and you do things your way.  So I’m somebody who can live with one knife.  So some people need 15 knives.  Just as you walk into some people’s house and they have all kinds of little things everywhere; and you walk into some people’s house and they have one book sitting on a shelf and that’s it, it’s a personal self-expression.  So you know sort of the message on high about how to stock the perfect kitchen; or how to create the perfect environment in your home in any way is totally wrong.  You need to . . .  You need to search your soul, figure out who you are.  If you’re a minimalist, have one knife.  If you’re a maximalist, have 100.  Whatever you wanna do is your perfect kitchen.