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Your pantry is the heart of the home kitchen, when you really think about it. From being a place where pretty mich everything from spices, snacks and extra supplies being stored, it also offers refuge to your favourite late night treats to enjoy sneakily. But having a pantry is a tricky situation because it is easy to lose track and go haywire with knowing what’s in there until one fine day you discover a bunch of ingredients you bought and forgot about. Here are some tips to avoid making common disorganisation mistakes and keeping your pantry in top form, at all times.
Take Stock
Making an inventory list of things that you already have stocked up in your pantry or might need more of, will help you plan better in terms of space challenges as well as grocery shopping. Pulling out everything from your shelves for a quick wipe-down followed by checking the expiry dates on labels, will enable you to avoiding hoarding ingredients or supplies which might not be of any use. This activity also helps you clear our any half-opened packets of ingredients and use them up before opening brand new cans or containers.
Grouping Items
Using large baskets or trays to put together items of similar categories, helps locate things easily in your pantry. Make a basket for just all of your baking ingredients, make a separate one for spices, sort items out by cuisine and so on. Using transparent bins or baskets helps you also see what you’re running low on and replenish stocks as and when necessary. Using baskets and bins in the pantry also makes the visual appeal more uniform than just plain chaos.
Essentials At Eye Level
Ingredients that you know you need to use up every day can be the ones that are placed closest to reach in your pantry while ingredients reserved for special occasions can be placed on top shelves. Keep a couple of baskets handy to hold a surplus stock of supplies or ingredients that are sold in units. Having a small stool inside your pantry will also enable you to reach things and check-in once in a while to see if everything is okay.
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Upcycle
Buying expensive or aesthetic jars and containers online or at your favourite décor store is not always a compulsion when you can wash and reuse jars and containers that remain once a specific sauce, dip or spice is exhausted. Dress up these jars using cool bits of fabric or labels, so it is easier to identify what you might have put in them, for a later date. Typical suspects would be jam bottles, ketchup bottles, containers with fresh food, etc.
Keep Family In Mind
As the key person managing and operating your kitchen, you’d often see kids running in to find themselves a snack or your spouse stashing an extra supply of the things they’d like to eat. One of the key reasons why pantries might seem disorganised is because your family members might not be used to putting things away where they were taken from, so placing items such as these within reach might ensure that the rest of your pantry remains untouched and less messy.
