Basic Kitchen Organizing Part 6 - The Pantry

I hope you are still keeping those surfaces clear and the dishes done! Today we will tackle your pantry. Now, you do not have to have a true pantry cabinet. Look around your kitchen or anywhere you store foods that do not go in the refrigerator or freezer.

As you work your way through, have a basket or box nearby for food donations. Also keep the trash can and recycle bin nearby for out of date foods.  Adding packaging to the recycle bin will take an extra moment, but will reduce the number of times you need to empty the garbage in addition to keeping unnecessary items out of the landfill.

I suggest you also fill the sink part of the way with soapy water and get a dish rag. How often do you get the time to clean these shelves otherwise? Wipe down any packaging as you add it back to the cabinets, too.

Gather the Food

It may be a pain, but I truly suggest that the first time around you put all of your food out on the table and the counters to make it easier to really sort through. When you leave part of it in the cabinets, it makes it easy to miss out of date items, multiples, and things that you really do not use. You will catch items that you have put away in different places.

And having all of it out also gives you an opportunity to really notice the things you do use in abundance that you may not have noticed before. You can look into buying in bulk or into storage containers that would save space. Packaging takes up a lot of space. If you only have one of something, there isn’t a lot you can do about it, but let’s say you have many boxes/bags of the same type of pasta or cereal that you often use. It may be worthwhile to think about getting some containers that hold all of it without the original cartons.

We are going to do one step at a time making the food pile smaller with each step. Make sure to check the expiration dates as you go for everything.

Unwanted Food

Pull out all of the items you don’t use. If it is still within date, add the item to the donate basket. If it has expired toss it. The local food bank will always be thrilled for any little bit you can offer. I know right now many of the local schools are having food drives with the classes competing with each other for prizes.  If you have kids, check in with their schools and see if they have anything similar planned.

Duplicates

Look for multiples. Do you have two open bags of the same chips or other food? Do you have more of an item than you will use? Check the open packages to see if one is stale. Can you combine any of the open packages and dispose of one of them? If you have a lot of one item, but seldom use it, consider donating some of them to the food bank or giving them to family and friends. (If you can get several people to work on their pantry, too, maybe everyone can trade and save a little at the grocery.) Add everything you are keeping back to the food pile and remove everything that you are giving away.

Sorting Canned Goods

Now tackle the cans. I suggest sorting the cans into at least three categories - vegetables, fruits, soups and other meal-in-a-can types. You may have other additional categories to add. Within each category, sort like with like so you have all of the green beans together and all of the fruit cocktail cans together, etc. Put all of the cans away, one category at a time. Next time you are in a pinch to make a meal more balanced, you may be able to just pop open a can of something.  Remember to toss any expired goods and to wipe off each can as you go.

Organizing the Snacks

Go back to the foodstuff pile and pull out all of the quick snack items such as crackers, chips, popcorn and the like. Try to keep all of these items together on a shelf to themselves or even in a separate cabinet space. Next time the family goes to grab a quick snack, the entire pantry won’t be disheveled in the process.

I have been occasionally buying tall, clear snap tight containers one at a time. They are rectangle shaped and fit in my upper cabinets perfectly two deep. I have one cabinet that is dedicated to these and keep them filled with nuts, candy, crackers, and such. Everyone can find something quickly without making a mess. It is also nice to be able to offer anyone who drops in several things to snack on without having to think about it.

This has shaved a little here and there off of my grocery bill, because I only buy snacks when a container is empty and less chips and crackers are tossed because they are kept from going stale. The family also more often chooses a healthier snack than they did before because the nuts and pretzels look just as good as the candy when put in these jugs.

Baking Supplies

Now pull out any bags of sugar, flour, oils and other items used mostly for baking.  Include cake and pudding mixes.  I keep items previously from my spice cabinet such as baking powder, baking soda, food coloring, etc. in this cabinet.  Pretty much anything used for making doughs or desserts. If any of the bags are open, check for meal worms that may have gotten in. If you find any, discard the whole bag. Put these staples on a shelf together.

I prefer to keep as few things as possible on my counter tops.  I do keep canisters on my counter. But, instead of using a regular graduated canister set, I found large air tight plastic containers that could be purchased individually. I purchased three that were the same size. I use one for all purpose flour, one for sugar, and one for cornmeal. They are large enough that they hold a good size bag plus whatever I have left over from before, but are not so big that they take over the counter. Because they are clear, a simple glance tells me when I am running low. Best yet, the seals don’t seem to get stuck on these or dry rot like on canister sets I have had in the past and I have much more space freed in my pantry.

Sauce and Powder Packages

Pull out any envelopes or packets and put these together. I keep mine flip file style in a rectangle disposable storage container without the lid to keep them from sliding all over the place. I have one friend that keeps hers in a recipe file box in her spice cabinet and another that keeps them together using a simple rubber band.

Organizing Spices

Pull out any spices and discard anything that is over six months old. Very few spices last after six months some expire even sooner. I used to keep a cabinet full of dozens of little bottles. When I cleaned the cabinet out, I realized that there are really only a handful that I use regularly. The rest were used only for holiday baking or purchased special for a specific recipe I wanted to try. The ones I used regularly were fairly new, but the others were at least a year old. I tasted a few and tasted absolutely nothing or an aftertaste that was ‘off’.

So now, I have a few little spice bottles in the upper cabinet on the right hand side of my stove, one container of candy sprinkles for ice cream in the snack cabinet, a small handful of extracts and some food coloring in my pantry with the baking supplies, and three shelves in my cabinets that are freed up for other items. I now purchase the smallest containers I can get away with for baking and give the leftovers away.

I love plants. I grow other less but occasionally used herbs live in little pots on my windowsill. I just added a board to make the sill wider. The plants smell great, look pretty, always taste fresh when I do need them, and there is not any waste. Most of them are very easy to take care of, too. Seed packets are really inexpensive. Growing the herbs is much cheaper than buying the dehydrated versions from the store even when the store is running a sale.

Everything Else in the Pantry

The remaining items in you pantry can be sorted like with like in a few different ways. You can sort them together by their packaging, i.e. box or bag. You can sort them by frequency of use. You can even sort them by food type.

I sort mine as if we were selecting a restaurant. What kind of food are you in the mood for? I have all of my spaghettis, macaroni and cheese and other pastas together. With those I keep unopened parmesan cheese, spaghetti sauces, and anything else I tend to use mostly for Italian or pasta dishes. I call this my Italian shelf. I also have Mexican faire, Oriental faire, and another section that I call Comfort food. The Comfort foods shlef includes stuffing bags, one skillet boxes, instant mashed potatoes, oatmeal, beans, etc. I guess mac and cheese and rice should go here, but they seem to complete the pasta shelf well for me.

I also have a shelf that I keep all of my coffee, tea, and hot chocolate stuff. I keep all of them near my coffee maker. Before we start talking about how to organize drawers and cabinets, we will talk about how to set up other special spaces in your kitchen to make everything easier for you.

Spare Condiments.  All of those barbecue sauces, apple cider vinegar, salad dressings, and other sauces. Pretty much anything else that can not be eaten on its own or added to previous groups gets its own shelf space.

Continue sorting out your remaining foodstuff in ways that make sense to you and put them back away. Make sure to keep eliminating anything that your family does not actually eat and to combine or toss multiples when possible.

Anything left should be items that are not food. Put any notes or pieces of paper in your paper box. Toss any disposable items and trash. Try to find a new home for anything that does not belong.

Maintenance and Follow Up

When you do your grocery shopping try to stick to a list to keep duplicates and foods you will not really use to a minimum. We will talk about menu planning and grocery lists another day to help you out. When you put groceries away, try to keep the older items in the pantry to the front.

Go ahead and schedule a day every six months or so to sort through your pantry. I have it planned prior to Thanksgiving and prior to Independence Day. Both are pretty big cooking dates in our house and it helps me to plan while keeping the cabinets in check.

Once you have gotten your pantry to a point where you can always find what you are looking for and have less food waste from expiration dates, you do not need to pull everything out each time. You will be able to spot things pretty quickly that haven’t been touched since the last check. You can just reach in and remove or do one shelf at a time so you can clean the shelving.

Your Pantry

This is the part where I beg for you to add your tips for the rest of us. I am always looking for something new to try. Did I forget anything? Do you do something differently? Have you found any particular containers that help you utilize your pantry space? What unusual tricks have you figured out? Please, share!

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