GlassAngel at Home

So we have talked about stocking your pantry....but how to put it all away? Well there are several problems with keeping you pantry organized.

• you can never find what you need
• you have spills and sticky messes
• you have pests hanging out in your cabinets
  

Today we are going to talk about how to organize your pantry and make using your kitchen a little easier.

In most grocery stores you don't find the flour next to the canned tomatoes or the dry pasta with the canned soup. Think like a grocery store and organize your shelves like one! Put all your items with like items. Find all your canned soup or canned veggies and put them together. Then when you are hunting for canned corn you know where to look on the shelf. The first time you try this you may need to take all the cans out to find everything, but the next time you are hunting for something you will really be happy you have done it.


Grouping items by what is used together is another way to go. As I showed in the first picture at the top of this post, I group all my spices and baking goods in one cabinet. It is right over the work space that I use for most cooking so it makes it easy to take out the thing I need and then put it right back.


I use baskets and step racks in my spice area to keep things neat and easy to find. Baskets are great to keeping lots of things from spices to kids snacks together without taking up a ton of space. Shelf racks that add a second level are also great because they use vertical space that is often unused.







On my counter right next to the stove, I keep a turntable filled with the spices, oils and vinegars I use almost everyday. The turntable was inexpensive and keeps these items in reach as I cook. Keeping them all on the turntable and not spread out over the counter makes it look less cluttered and more organized.





So now that we have gotten ourselves more organized we can keep things a little neater. Next time we will talk about how to keep spills, sticky messes and pests from taking over your pantry.



Previous Kitchen Series Posts

1. The Kitchen Series: Tools I love....
   
2. The Kitchen Series: Stocking your drygoods pantry.
   
3. The Kitchen Series: Stocking your fridge and freezer.
   
4. The Kitchen Series: Stocking your spice pantry.
   
5. The Kitchen Series: Making your own mixes
   
6. The Kitchen Series: Making you own stock.
   

Posted in: In The Kitchen, The Kitchen Series on Tuesday, June 3, 2008 at 11:30 PM