NEXT time you enter your kitchen, watch out. There’s a tiger, a tortoise, a bird and a dragon in there!
Don’t worry. You’re not in any immediate danger. What you’ve got is a symbolic menagerie, with each animal representing an element of your kitchen’s landscape.
Landscape?
Yes, that too. It turns out that every cooking space, no matter how cramped, has a specific layout that can boost favorable energy and bring good fortune.
At least that’s the theory of “The Feng Shui Kitchen,” a new manual based on the Chinese art of arranging objects.
According to the book, putting your appliances and cabinetry in the right spot can bring the kitchen into harmony with chi, the life-giving force that surrounds us.
Feng shui has been embraced widely of late. The design of Beth Israel’s new health center is based on its principles, and such varied celebrities as Donald Trump, Boy George and the late Princess Diana have relied on Feng shui as a decorating philosophy.
Now, it seems, the theory also works for those who toil over a hot stove.
The London-based authors of “The Feng Shui Kitchen” — Lam Kam Chuen (who’s written several books on the subject) and his wife, Lam Kai Sin — say that the energy charging about your kitchen is more intense than in anywhere else in the home.
Should those forces be out of whack, you’ve got more than an unpleasant work space — you’re courting negative energy.
So what if your New York kitchen is the size of a matchbook? You can still create a space humming with chi.
Here’s how:
First, you need to keep in balance five fundamental energies: fire, metal, earth, water and wood. Simple translation: gas and electric, utensils, food, plumbing and cabinets. All should be represented equally.
So what does that mean for you? A chic room filled with stainless-steel counters, cabinets, appliances and sink, for example, might win points with decorators, but it’s all wrong with feng shui gurus. Too much metal throws your kitchen off the scale.
Fire and water should be separated, so the stove, microwave and toaster should ideally go on one side of the room, and the sink and dishwasher on the opposite side — or at least on adjacent walls.
Maybe you don’t need to change a thing. The standard sink-stove-refrigerator triangular floor plan fits right into the pattern mentioned above.
A window positioned over the stove is not in line with feng shui: Drafts can affect gas flames or cool what’s in the pots. And kitchen doors should open outward to avoid collisions with the cook.
The stove, by the way, is not only the epicenter of the kitchen, but it serves as the family hearth and heart of the home. Remember those animals? They’re arranged around it.
The tortoise, with its strong shell, protects from disturbances from the rear — as does the wall that’s behind the stove.
To the left of the stove are rolling hills and the unpredictable energy of a tiger, which needs to be controlled. This can be accomplished with low cabinets.
To the right is a dragon in the clouds (relatively calm energy) — high cabinets and a full-sized fridge should go there.
A soaring Phoenix represents the space in front of the stove, where you, the wise and creative serpent, man your post.
Feng shui instructs us that it’s best to do your cooking in a room separated from your living and sleeping areas. Harmony-seeking studio-dwellers can adapt their one-room digs by using a folding screen to cordon off the kitchen.
As for the food itself, that too can be in harmony.
Spring, for instance, is considered a very important time of transition between yin (winter) and yang (summer), when the body no longer needs fat to protect itself from the cold.
That’s when you should cut down on greasy foods. It is also a time of inner cleaning and a good time for soup.
Other suggested spring bites include dim sum, scallion pancakes and steamed fish with ginger and scallion.
