by Tracy Blankenship

Created on: September 20, 2009

Kitchen too small? Kitchen big enough but just seems junked up? Creativity and imagination can help reduce clutter when applied to the problem of storage in the kitchen.

Start with canisters. Chances are you have a very nice decorative set of four canisters lined up neatly along the back of the counter. Chances also are that the two smaller ones are empty, and the larger ones are full of sugar and flour that don't get used all that often. Find modular plastic storage containers that you can stack in the cupboard. Keep like items with like, for instance, keep the flour and sugar in the same cupboard with the baking powder, brown sugar, vanilla etc. This also helps to keep track of inventory when it comes time to make the emergency bake sale cookies and you can tell at a glance if all the ingredients are there. If you do use flour and sugar on a regular basis, determine how much at one time you need to access and keep that amount in a smaller stackable container. Flour keeps very well in the freezer.

Keep cutting boards in a magazine file. This rounds them up in one place and keeps them from slithering out from behind the microwave oven or from falling over in a cabinet or taking up space in the ever scarce drawer. Use contact paper to decorate a cardboard type, or go big and find one in wood or metal to suit your decor. Use another for your favorite cookbooks. By alternating directions you can store the notebook styles quite nicely. You know the one or ones you use most often, so keep those handy and store the others on a bookshelf elsewhere.

Try the magnetic racks for storing your knives on the back wall of your counter. You might be able to eliminate that butcher block storage unit altogether, or at least get a smaller one just for steak knives.

Have a martini shaker? Keep your shot glasses inside. Swizzle sticks too. Have a decorative tea pot? Put the tea steeper balls and spoons inside of it. Have a cookie jar but never keep cookies in it? Put the napkin rings inside. Put your measuring cups and spoons inside.

Mount a "media storage unit" of three or four drawers on the wall under the cabinet. Use these little square drawers for the daily medicine bottles that clutter the top of the microwave, tea bags, sweetener packets, favorite spices, seasoning packets, recipe card boxes, whatever is light since it is not designed to hold a lot of weight.

Reevaluate your appliances. Do you really need that Kitchenaid stand mixer when a small hand-held mixer will stir that cake batter right up just as well? An electric tea maker? Really? If you find you have appliances that overlap in function, keep the one that is most versatile. Can you cook more on the George Foreman grill or the electric skillet? Choose wisely.

Try the vertical approach for storing cook and bakeware. Some items take up 12 inches square when stored flat, but only 6 inches wide when stored vertically. Great idea for cookie sheets, pizza pans, pot lids. If you can't go vertical, get intermediate shelves to help stack. There is often a significant amount of space between the top of items on the bottom shelf and the the next shelf. Try the ready-made "under shelf" storage racks that slide in and utilize the 4-5 inches directly under the shelf. Use these for kitchen towels, boxed rolls of foil, plastic wrap and wax paper, paper plates.

Once you get started thinking about how to store things creatively, your kitchen will become your new favorite place.

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