How to Fill a Kitchen Pantry
Filling your kitchen pantry is not a difficult chore if you keep the lifestyle and preferences of your family members in mind. A well-stocked and organized pantry enables you to have all the staples you need to supply your family with a home-cooked meal quickly. A well-planned pantry should provide you with options every day in cooking your meals. This prevents you from having to make unexpected trips to the grocery store, thus wasting gas and adding impulsive buys to your budget. Does this Spark an idea?
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Instructions
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Write down a list of the meals you and your family enjoy. Doing this will help you create a list of staples that are necessary to stock your pantry. Items such as condiments, flavorings, cream soups, seasonings, pasta, rice, canned goods and other staples will enable you to create meals by simply looking inside your organized pantry. Another efficient idea is to plan your menus weekly, biweekly or monthly. This will enable you to get everything in one trip.
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Adjust your pantry shelves according to the needs of you and your family. For instance, if you will only be storing canned goods in the area, the shelving units need to be adjusted so they are only about an inch above the height of the cans. Designate some shelves for regular-sized cans and others for taller ones. If your family eats a lot of cereal or boxed ingredients, modify some of the shelves to hold these items. This will allow room for tall items, such as bottles of oil and pancake syrup.
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Allow space for other items you deem important, such as wine or plate racks. Items like these keep the wine or plates out of sight, creating less clutter in the kitchen area.
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Designate an area for your canisters in your pantry, particularly if you do not have much counter space in your kitchen area. This will provide a place for your flour, sugar, cornmeal, pasta and other staples. Use glass or clear plastic air-tight containers so that you can easily see what is inside.
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Set small and large baskets in your pantry to hold packaged items, such as bags of dried beans, rice, sauce or seasoning mixes. This will prevent the items from falling through wire shelving and also make them easier to locate.
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Clean out your pantry every six months to a year. Toss out any expired items that are cluttering the space.
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Stock your pantry with foods that you are certain your family will eat. This is especially important if the food budget is tight. Purchasing an unusual food item for your family because it is on sale or you have a coupon may simply be a waste of money if it will not be eaten.
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Rotate the foods on your pantry shelf. For instance, if there is a sale on green beans and you purchase several cans, move older cans to the front of the pantry so they will be used first. This will help keep the foods in your pantry up-to-date and prevent food waste.
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Clear a space to store vegetables that shouldn't be stored in the refrigerator, such as potatoes and onions. If you have a special bin to store them in, it can fit under the bottom shelf of the pantry, if you plan the space well.
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Tips & Warnings
Post a self-adhesive notepad outside the pantry door. If a family member removes an item and there is only one more in the pantry, he is responsible for writing it down on the list.
