Sporganizin'

[S.Vashti]

Here's how I keep mine.

[Ensign Steve]

'Tis a thing of beauty!

[livius drusus]

And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy kitchen and bring forth a spice rack and shalt call his name GLORIOUS. He shall be great, and shall be called the Spice Rack of the Most High.

[freemonkey]

Originally Posted by Demimonde

The other option I am considering for the drawer are masala dabbas. The actual authentic ones are crazy expensive but I found this one which is reasonable and seemed pretty sturdy.

I stopped in at World Market today to have a look at these. They are as pretty as they look in the picture. BUT. The small tins inside do not have lids and they are stackable only in the sense that you can put one unit on top of another. They are smooth and slidy, like if you tried to carry a stack across the room, you would risk spilling them. And I could not find that bigger whatsit in the background of that picture.

[Demimonde]

Yeah, the design of them is that the little cups are open, but the big lid goes down over all of them at once. I hadn't thought about carrying a stack of them, but then, there isn't much carrying going on in my kitchen. Just a whole lot of turning around in the same spot like a puppy after her tail.

[freemonkey]

Originally Posted by Demimonde

Yeah, the design of them is that the little cups are open, but the big lid goes down over all of them at once. I hadn't thought about carrying a stack of them, but then, there isn't much carrying going on in my kitchen. Just a whole lot of turning around in the same spot like a puppy after her tail.

really, you could end up knocking them all over the place just taking them out of the cupboard. Well, I would end up doing that. :klutz:

[Demimonde]

A HS friend just pinned this, I only have the image because it was a friend-of-a-friend who uploaded it:



The description read that it was a "broom mount" re-purposed as a spice rack.

[Anastasia Beaverhausen]

In with the "shoved in a cupboard so high I can't reach most of them" crowd. Also the tiny-kitchen people. Inner city studio, building from the sixties.

[Janet]

I just bought a pull-down spice rack that fits quite well in my cupboard, but there isn't any order to how I put the spices in and it doesn't fit them all.


I also have about half a dozen magnetic spice jars. I asked for them and a stainless steel panel to put above my stove but only got the jars, so they are stuck to my prep table right next to the stove. I really need to give in and buy myself that stainless steel panel because it's been ignored on my wish list for many, many years.

[livius drusus]

Originally Posted by livius drusus

Another jammed in a cupboard person. I don't like it, though. I've been fantasizing about the ideal spice rack situation for years, but I have yet to come up with the configuration that resolves all the issues, never mind manufacture it.

Well, it took me two years for all the pieces to fall into place, but today it is finally happening. I have 16 half-pint mason jars, fresh herbs, garlic and onions I either dehydrated earlier this week or am dehydrating now, my el cheapo vacuum pump and a sheet of Avery labels.

Soon, all the freshly dehydrated herbs (basil, oregano, sage, rosemary, dill, tarragon, marjoram, parsley, thyme) and alliums (garlic, roasted garlic, onion, caramelized onion), plus seeds (cumin, fennel, sesame, nutmeg) that were already dry will all be in the wee jars. Larger items (vanilla beans, various dried chiles) will be in pint or quart jars, as will some of the leftovers of giant Costco spices like paprika and cinnamon.

Then I will vacuum the air out of them all and force them to stay as perfectly fresh and beautiful as they are now. I plan to get one of those stair thingies like Chris Porter has on her Spice Rack of Glory only mine will be tiny because my cabinet is like 10" wide and a foot deep.

Today is a good day.

[livius drusus]

Oh, and I'm making this too just because it sounds awesome: Roasted Lemon Zest Powder

[livius drusus]

Ladies and gentlemen, it's time for the best part of the show, the denouement, the climax, the thing you've all been waiting for... BEFORE AND AFTER PICS!



Ain't she purty? I basically maxed out my space, but the little metal shelf I got is modular so you can stack another on top of it securely by locking the legs into place. When I feel the need to expand (which tbh I'm already feeling), I'll replace the regular mouth pints in the back top row with widemouths to make room for a third storey.

[ChuckF]

I just saw this thrad title for the first time and I kept reading it as Sporgazmin'

[livius drusus]

Not too far off.

[lisarea]

HAHAHAHA I was talking about how I was all paring down my collection. LOL @ me.

I have added so many things. I even added a new store to get bulk spices from in addition to the three or so I already had.

I will say, though, that since I reorganized and banned everyone else from that whole shelf, it's been a lot easier to find things quickly. The mismatched containers let me visually locate things without having to pull everything out to read the labels and stuff. (A lot of it isn't even labeled anymore.)

It is pretty unusable by anyone but me, though, which is one reason nobody else is allowed to touch it. The other reason being that it's my stuff.

[BrotherMan]

I am torn by my desire to hoot at your overwhelming desire to organize the "disorganized" shelf of spices and my duty as loyal lackey.

[LadyShea]

livius, that is beautiful.

[S.Vashti]

Very nice, livius! But since I moved, I have had to rearrange my spice organizing a bit. I only have a small shelf in a cabinet now, so a bunch of stuff has had to move to the refrigerator to give me some room.

[livius drusus]

What a shame you had to break up that choir of heavenly hosts. I've considered freezing some of the slow movers, although it would be more for preservation's sake than to give me more space in the cabinet.

[Megatron]

Originally Posted by livius drusus

Ladies and gentlemen, it's time for the best part of the show, the denouement, the climax, the thing you've all been waiting for... BEFORE AND AFTER PICS!



Ain't she purty? I basically maxed out my space, but the little metal shelf I got is modular so you can stack another on top of it securely by locking the legs into place. When I feel the need to expand (which tbh I'm already feeling), I'll replace the regular mouth pints in the back top row with widemouths to make room for a third storey.

Ok now figure out for me how to deal with 3 times as many spices as you have there, with a cabinet hole the same size, and tons of different shaped and sized containers

Our current solution: Shit's all over the fucking kitchen. Some stuff in the cabinet, some in the pantry, some on the butcher's block, and some on top of the fridge.

I use too much shit when I cook, man.

Or really, it's not that I ever use too much shit, it's just that every different way I want to cook (food thing), I need (insert spices) for it, and I don't like not having anything, so I tend to have ... a fuckload of canisters and mason jars and ziplocs and god dammit it's a mess.

[Megatron]

Also that pic reminded me that I'm really low on sage. God dammit, and I want to roast a chicken this weekend. Store trip here we go.

[Dingfod]

I thought I was doing good when I got some tiered spice shelves like these:

[Megatron]

Hmm, those wouldn't fit in my cabinets, but they WOULD fit on my pantry shelves...

[lisarea]

Originally Posted by Megatron

Ok now figure out for me how to deal with 3 times as many spices as you have there, with a cabinet hole the same size, and tons of different shaped and sized containers

This is much like my problem. I have a whole bunch of spices mostly because I kind of do a jack of all trades master of none thing with regional cooking, so I need the stuff for French, Italian, Mexican, Indian, Thai, etc. (I could get really good if I could pick just one or two, but I can't decide.)

I just decided to devote a whole cabinet shelf and a half to spices, which took away some canned food storage, but I'm OK with that. Plus, it's in a cabinet with a deep blind corner that I was just forgetting about stuff in anyway.

So here is my organization scheme:

The primary accessible space is mostly for stuff I use all the time, including made and bought blends like curry powder, Provence herbs, Italian blend, Zaatar, five spice, masala, and salts and peppers.

I have two wooden boxes (the kind you get like 5 lb. of clementines in) that slide back into the blind corner of the bottom cabinet. The back back one contains a few less frequently used spices like saffron and lavender, and a couple of things I keep in larger jars (ground mustard and garlic powder) that I can reach back and get by feel. The front-er box contains individual herbs and spices that I use pretty frequently, like oregano, cumin, sage, basil and stuff.

So if I'm just making something pretty simple and straightforward like curry or a pasta sauce or something, I can usually just use my herb blends and other stuff in the front part. If I'm making something I don't make often and need to get to the individual spices or something weird, I just pull out one or both spice boxes and set them on the counter while I cook.

Then, the top half cabinet is bagged spices for refills and making herb blends in another box back in the blind corner, and I also keep some of that in the freezer.

I could probably take some pictures if you want, but basically, the main thing is that I keep the stuff I use all the time out front and easily accessible, but then I make the secondary and tertiary stuff easy to move and store so that I can make it temporarily accessible when I need it and then put it back away easily. (I bolded this part in case you're ing. This is the main point.)

So maybe you could do something like that, except use your pantry the way I use my blind corners. Like keep them in storage boxes or something that you can stack if you need, and then bring the whole or partial shebang out as you need it.

And seriously, the mismatched containers might not look as organized or whatever, but I find them WAY more efficient than having all the jars the same and having to drag stuff out to look at the labels and stuff.

It sounds complicated, but it is so so much easier now that I got it sorted out like that, and I figure it's worth overthinking and tweaking for something you use all the time.

Also, sometimes, when I have all my stuff out and am replenishing my blends and stuff, I get all kind of muahahaha like I'm the Queen of Seasoning.

[Megatron]

Hmm, I might have to do something like that. And get one of those damn staircase looking things Ding has.

Getting stuff into separate boxes only worries me for one reason: I might stop experimenting as much. I may not want to try to figure out which box my bag of (insert bullshit here) was in and just not add it to (thing it probably shouldn't be in, but somehow would work with) and ... you know what I'll probably do it anyway just to clean up my damn kitchen.