I have had wood-burning stoves where I lived for about 30 years, from the little mobile home I lived in for six years when I moved to Huntsville, to the house I bought near the little town of Gurley, to the house where Leah and I live now. So, naturally, I wanted a wood stove in our new house. This time, instead of putting it in the basement, we’re putting it in the living room, so we wanted something that will look good even when it’s not providing heat.

There isn’t much in the way of choice in Rome, so a few weeks ago I drove down the Martha Berry Highway (US 27) to the small town of Bremen, not far from Interstate 20, to Bollen’s, which has a large selection of stoves. I was looking for a stove that would be small enough not to run us out of the living room with too much heat, but large enough that I can duct some of the heat into the bedroom and bathroom. I found several smaller stoves that would work. I took some pictures and brochures home for Leah to see. So on Wednesday we drove back down to make our decision.

Along the way we stopped at El Nopal in Cedartown for our traditional huevos rancheros.

Nopal is Spanish for cactus. The fruit of the nopal is called “tuna” in Mexico. In the US, it seems that the cactus and the fruit are called prickly pear, which is a native here, too, although we don’t eat them.

Every restaurant prepares their ranchera sauce differently. We like the way it’s prepared at Los Portales, our nearest Mexican restaurant. El Nopal’s was different, but good. We don’t usually eat the tortillas, but El Nopal’s were almost fluffy in a flat kind of way, so I ate a couple. Good.

After Leah ate and I stuffed myself, we continued on to Bollen’s, where we picked out our new stove.

It’s a smallish Hearthstove Tribute, which is made with soapstone rather than plate steel or cast iron. The iron framework is covered with what is called brown majolica enamel. The stove manufacturer doesn’t describe how they coat the iron, but it may be a porcelain coating, which would explain the term “majolica.” In any case, it looks very nice. It was available in a pale, blue-green majolica enamel, but everyone thought the dark, reddish brown would go with more colors. That’s a good thing, since we haven’t selected the wall colors for the living room.

There are other, larger soapstone stoves in the background. Soapstone and iron or steel stoves have somewhat different heating profiles. An iron or steel stove heats more quickly, but soapstone absorbs more heat before it begins to radiate, so it heats the room more slowly. On the other end of a heating cycle, iron or steel also cool more quickly, so a soapstone stove should provide at least some useable heat longer than an equivalent iron or steel stove. I hope it will also moderate the heating so that the living room doesn’t get too hot.

I’m used to flat black iron or steel, which can be fairly decorative, but this stove is really pretty. We thought that would be a good thing, since the stove will be a prominent part of our living room décor, even when it’s just sitting there without a fire.

We left the stove at the store, since we can’t install it or even store it in the house yet. I think we’ll be ready for that in about three or four weeks, depending on when we get an engineer’s letter for repairing the joists that the plumber damaged.