Now & When

One of the many selling features when we bought this house was the very large fireplace in the kitchen. It is unique, beautiful, a conversation piece, and (more important to me) functional. The sellers claimed it had been “redone” about 10 years ago and was functional. We didn’t know what that really entailed and we know very little about fireplaces so we had it, and the other fireplace in the house, WETT Certified. It passed inspection and was given the OK for use. So the next question was, “How do we use it?!”

One outstanding question we had was, “What are the two ‘ovens’ on the right side of the fireplace for?” Everyone has an idea, but nobody knew for sure. Some said they were ovens, others kindling warmers , and a few said ash boxes. No one could give us a confident answer. One thing I did know is that neither of them would be an oven if there was no flue—where would the smoke go if there’s no connection the chimney?

After a bit of research, we learned that the box to the right (upper) of the fireplace is a “Beehive oven”. Although it fit the descriptions I found online, I couldn’t find the flue at first and just assumed that it might have been decommissioned at some point. However, one final look inside the oven with a borescope revealed the flue connection was right at the front and operated by a slide. You’ll see in the photos Denaige has pulled the flue out. The slide gear is different from the worm gear (also shown) which is used in the main fireplace (and what I was looking for!).

We’ve learned that the oven is heated by building a fire in the oven and then moving the coals down to the fire box below. This Old House has an episode that goes into restoration of a beehive oven and also provides an explanation of how to use the whole fireplace system. Essentially, the fireplace can hold multiple pots on a cooking arm (we have one but are missing a piece), then you can put fire coals to the side to cook in pans, and even heat up an iron and trivet!

Now that we know the fireplace and oven are safe to use, and how to use them, we’re just waiting for the cool weather to hit us so Denaige and I can have our first fire in the kitchen and do some cooking! Denaige is geared up to make fresh bread and pizza in the oven and I’m looking forward to baking some biscotti!. Regardless, I’m sure there’ll be a few ruined meals before we become proficient.