Join me in freedom from Kitchen Clutter!

Cafe Society
1

(Yeah, this is another of my threads that I’m not sure where it goes. Definitely Mundane and likely soliciting Personal Opinions. OTOH, it is about cooking (sort of?) and that seems to get priority when slotting topics…but feel free to shove it elsewhere, mods.)

My kitchen has gone pretty much untouched for years, maybe decades. I mean, yeah, I cook it in daily, do dishes daily, but I rarely step back and LOOK at what’s going on in it in the larger sense.

And in the larger sense, what it is is Damned Cluttered. I have sooo much stuff. Every cabinet is full, every drawer is crammed, the back edges of my countertops are an almost solid line of appliances and containers and ‘organizers’ (HAH!) leaving just the front eight inches of so for actual use. It adds extra hassle to every task. I can’t just decide to do something. I first have to dig the necessary equipment out of whatever crammed slot I fit it into. What is way worse is when, after I’ve washed/dried the whatever, I have to get it stowed away again – and that is a 3D game of tetris, especially in the case of my drawers.

And, why? It’s not that I cook elaborate stuff often. Most of our meals are pretty basic, and require little past the ordinary pots/pans/bowls/knifes/spoons type stuff. So why do I have so much?

Well, for thing I’ve been blessed with having loving family and friends that give me presents. Hey! You like pasta, you ought to have your own pasta machine! Look, this food processor will also grind meat and stuff sausages, isn’t that neat? Wouldn’t a 16 knife set with wooden block look great on your counter? So handy! How about a Snow Cone maker? Such fun!

And other friends have thrown Pampered Chef and Tupperware ‘parties’ and the like. Of course you’ve got to support them. Of course I need a new set of color coded measuring cups and spoons! How about a gizmo that chops stuff up when you whack your hand on the knob on top? (It does a lousy job of getting an even chop and hurts your hand in the bargain.)

And the ‘aspirational’ stuff. Of COURSE I’m the type of cook who does XXXX from scratch always. (You want to know the truth? I haven’t used my garlic press in several years. The stuff in the jars or tubes is Good Enough.)

And then there’s the stuff I can’t blame on anyone but my own impulses. Those fried batter frilly cakes were so tasty at that Colonial fair! Better buy the weird metal dipper thing so I can recreate them at home. (No idea what that thing should be called, but it’s been here unused for maybe 25 years.) And that carved wooden reamer sized exactly for limes looks sooo much more upscale than my old juicer that handles everything from grapefruit to lemons just fine, but it’s cheap green plastic so you have to keep it out of sight in a drawer.

That ‘keep it’ is the killer. ‘Durable’ stuff that enters my kitchen basically never leaves, no matter if it turns out that it doesn’t work well or I’ve since got a replacement (what if the new one breaks?) or even never wanted one in the first place.

So this morning, while trying to get one of my ‘special’ spatulas back into place so I could actually close that drawer…something snapped. I pulled the drawer out and dumped the whole thing out onto the kitchen table. Then I removed the divider/organizer containers and washed them. And pulled out the drawer liner stuff and tossed it. And washed out the drawer, too, and left those things to dry while I looked at each and every item in the drawer, one by one. Had I used the (whatever) recently enough I could remember doing it? (That did in the frilly batter cake thingy.) Did it do whatever it was for better enough than a more basic item that it was worth its space? (The strawberry huller works fine. But so does my dandy little paring knife that also does a million other tasks.) Is it something good but you have essentially multiple copies of it? (Just how many rubber spatulas does any kitchen need? And the TWO other sets of measuring cups, beyond the one I actually use?) Do you even know what it was for? (Some attachment gizmos for something, maybe? And this thing that’s sort of a heavy metal spiral wire mounted in a heavy-ish wooden dowel handle? I suppose it could be a whisk circa Fred Flintstone era? But the only thing I think it could be used for is beating dust out of crocheted doilies, maybe?)

I tossed stuff with abandon. I now have one full carton of stuff to toss/donate that I’ll trash/inflict on some charity type store. Another shoebox of ‘not sure’ stuff. Like the immersion blender I’ve used a couple times in the past year, but would I miss it if it were gone? I’ve labeled and dated the box and stuck it into the garage. Any items still in the box come Fall will go.

And, best of all, my ‘secondary’ utensil drawer is barely 1/3 full of stuff. Stuff I use, which I can now easily find, and can simply put back in with no effort and close the drawer! Hurrah for me!

Tomorrow I tackle the drawer beside it, my main silverware/everyday cooking utensil drawer. That should go faster.

After that the cabinets above my stove where ‘not the usual’ pots and pans hang out. I know I have three Bundt pans.

Join me! You have nothing to lose but your chains! The world WILL be ours!

2

Hell yeah! That felt good to read. Actually doing it myself, well, I don’t know. :slight_smile:
I’m lucky to have a very large kitchen, but I also have :musical_note: gadgets and gizmos aplenty…I’ve got whosits and whatsits galore…
When my mother-in-law died, I inherited all her kitchen objects and I don’t know what they all are. But it’s nice when I need something, sometimes I already have it.
Now, this doohickey I bought to make zucchini noodles, I could get rid of that.

3

My kitchen is 100% uncluttered at the moment.

We’re increasing counter space by about 50% over what we had. The kitchen will be well organized for our needs. More cabinet space but the lower cabinets will almost all be large drawers now. Which is great as we’re getting older. Pantry will be slide out shelves.

4

My wife and I did something like this about 5 years ago. I would have gone further but my wife insisted on keeping some stuff. About 20 years ago I bought a Kitchenaid mixer and a bunch of attachments. The mixer hasn’t been used in 10 years, some of the attachments have never been out of the boxes. We were given a picnic basket with utensils and plates. Used it once, it’s not really handy. Paper plates and throw away utensils are much easier. The ice cream maker my wife had before we met and I have never seen used. The junk drawer is a mess. We have 3 crock pots. Only one is ever used. I have a wok that won’t work on our glass top stove. My wife said we might need it anyway.

Last year I got brutal with the Fiestaware we use for our everyday dishes and I had a ton of it, I was seriously into collecting it. I had 6 storage containers of it in the shed, we never used this stuff. Besides the 100 or so pieces in our kitchen, we had 3 display cases full of stuff we don’t use. I sold off much of the stuff in the shed, what didn’t sell I gave away. And the 24 different Fiesta vases that lined the top of our kitchen cabinets? All but 5 are now gone. My next quest will be to sell off much of the vintage pieces including my prized 1930’s covered onion soup bowl. It is the rare turquoise, the bowl only cost me $200, the lid cost me $1200. I’ll be lucky to get half that for it now.

My wife’s usual response when I mention clearing out some stuff is to point to the garage. She doesn’t understand that one does not get rid of tools, you just upgrade to better tools. Then you consider, for a few seconds, on getting rid of the old tools.

5

I visited a senior citizen, who lived alone, a little old woman weighing 90 lbs. Her counters were cluttered with every machine and device imaginable. Air fryer. Deep fryer. Toaster, InstaPot, Kitchenaid mixer, drip coffee maker, keurig coffee maker, blender, matching canisters for coffee, sugar, flour, tea. You name it. I said, do you use all of this, and she sighed and said, ‘presents from my son. He just keeps giving me this stuff. He doesn’t seem to know what else to give me at Christmas or my birthday.’ (Yeah, I could see him thinking it was easier. Someday it will all be his.)

6

Smaller scale, but I did this recently. Installed a pull out spice cabinet and hung my new measuring cups and spoons under my cabinet. I have a small kitchen, so efficient use of space really helps.

7

Perfect, you’ve got two-thirds of a drawer to fill with avocado tenderizers and shrimp inflators!

8

People are amazed when I tell them I don’t own a mixer. But you bake all the time! they say How do you mix things? Wooden spoon and elbow grease. If I ever really, really need a mixer I have a friend who will let me use hers. (She does custom cakes as a hobby/small business).

I have a tiny kitchen with almost no counter space. My microwave takes up literally half of it, and it’s a small microwave. I have found a few good knives, a cutting board, and an assortment of mixing bowls to be essential. Not much else.

I do have multiples of a few things - three cutting boards, several knives, two sets of measuring cups which is handy if I have more than one cooking project going at once, three sets of measuring spoons for the same reason. Three normal sized Pyrex mixing bowls and one bowl big enough to mix the dough for four loaves of bread at once or bathe an infant in it. Two frying pans, one large and one small. Three pots (I regret only one of them has a lid). Three sheet pans. An assortment of Pyrex/ceramic casserole dishes, most with lids. An assortment of wooden spoons, three pairs of tongs, two strainer-spoons, and alas only one metal spatula (the elder of the two broke - it was part of the collection I got from mom so it was likely older than me). Four bread loaf tins (remember that bowl large enough to make four loaves at once? Yep, done it many times).

You might note a lack of food processors, Insta-pots, rice cookers, air fryers, etc. I do have a toaster, but most of the time it’s in the utility closet/pantry because I don’t have room on the counter. I do own a crockpot, but it’s a small one. I have a salad spinner, because in the summer I eat a LOT of lettuce and I eat greens all year round and it makes cleaning the foliage sooooo much easier. That’s about it.

I gave away my juicer then discovered I needed on after all. My new one is 1/3 the size and entirely sufficient for my needs.

I couldn’t find my grater and wound up buying a neat little thing with four different grater/slicer panels and the part they fit into neatly catches what you’re working on, and it all closes to make a storage container for all the parts that takes up little space. Mine is a different selection of colors and slightly different shape but it’s essentially this.

I also have an egg slicer, cheese slicer, vegetable peeler, hand crank can opener, rolling pin, two types of cooking thermometers, a pastry board, and a mortar and pestle. And a splatter shield for the larger frying pan. And an electric kettle (how did I ever live without one?)

That’s about it. Last move I did I gave away/donated a LOT of kitchen duplicates. A couple pots wound up with the recycling because of damage and/or rust. I gave the electric can opener and battery operated jar opener away to people with wrist problems (that’s why my late spouse had them). When the old microwave died I replaced it with a smaller one.

Downsizing was a good thing. I have a couple of “specialty” items like the over sized mixing bowl, pastry board, and salad spinner but they are ones I actually use. Much of what I have is old but it’s quality. I can do a lot with my small kitchen and a few tools and I can find what I’m looking for easily.

(Debating about keeping the blender. Also the late spouse’s. I have used it a few times since I moved to my current places but I don’t use it much at all. It mostly lives on top of the refrigerator next to the Cheerios, bird food bins, and storage containers. All of which have matching lids, mind you, and which also get used a lot because I cook in batches and eat leftovers on subsequent nights.)

9

I am trying to reduce things I don’t use. I just got rid of a set of stoneware dinner plates. they were too big and too flat to be the ones I chose first. I still use the bowls from that set.
Next I am going to move the spices from their spot so I can put my coffee cups and coffee fixings next to the sink. No idea what to do with spices.
The pots and pans could use a good culling. Especially the one where the handle is split.

The Post Office “Stamp Out Hunger” food drive is on May 13 this year. Check your pantry stuff-toss out of date things. And donate some that you never seem to pick for dinner.

10

I try to keep it simple and stick to basic items and only one or two max of anything. Also took way too long to get a large drawer organizer for the “large utensil” drawer but that helped a ton too.

Our main problem is containers. Always have a use for them, but when they’re empty you have to store them somewhere and that’s our biggest problem. Would probably help a lot if they all matched but of course it’s all mismatched sets all with unique lids that are all mixed together. Tried to solve the lid thing with stretchy silicone “universal” lids but then you have to store those somewhere…

11

We got rid of quite a bit of kitchen stuff before our move, but there is still a lot left. Thing is, I use most all of it. Yes, I need three graters because they do different things. Yes, I need two sets of mixing bowls because some creations just require it (I got rid of two other sets). Yes, I need three colanders because they also have different uses. I could probably ditch a couple of knives and maybe the two-slice toaster, keeping the toaster oven. The kitchen is pretty full, much like described in the OP, but I honestly don’t know what I could pare down, other than a bunch of wooden utensils that I never use, but the wife wouldn’t allow it. I also have too many cutting boards.

12

I HATE drawers when I’m cooking. And I have the smallest kitchen in North America, I’m sure. But I have 3 ceramic tubs at the back of my sink for utensils, just so I never have to open a drawer with icky hands. Knives live happily on the magnetic rack above and to the right of the sink. There is a silverware drawer across the room, where I can stop when I am setting the table. No cookware there. Big appliances go in the laundry room where they have a special waist high shelf. Only the coffeemaker lives in the kitchen. And I have 3 large cutting boards that fit over the sink when I need more counter space. Pot and pans hang from the ceiling rack, weird utensils on top (egg beaters etc) Pan lids under the stove top in plastic bins by size. Also under stovetop, cookie sheets and broiler and grilling sheets.

13

I’d have even more kitchen stuff if I hadn’t moved so much, but living in an apartment means there’s never enough storage space. More to the point, there isn’t enough of the right-sized storage space. I have a 4 ft. x 2.5 ft. cupboard. But it doesn’t fit tall stuff, and there’s a wood piece between the doors that runs the height of the cabinet, so anything wider than about 14 inches isn’t going to fit. In fact, there’s no place where my oft-used electric skillet or big crockpot will fit, so they both live on top of the refrigerator.

14

So many fellow warriors in the fight against clutter! Heroes we are, one and all. :slight_smile:

That is truly a masterpiece of minimalism! Except for the excessive duplicates of electric outlets. :slight_smile:

Ohgod, the stand mixer. I’d forgotten about that. Part of our bottom cabinet stretches behind the side of the fridge, with no direct access. You have to open the cabinet beside that one, pull out virtually everything in it, and them twist/crawl to get at the stuff in it. I mean, really, what sadist invented that? I stowed the mixer and attachments there, probably in the 80s – never been seen since. I think there’s also a carton of a zillion decorative copper molds I inherited from my mother… Have to add clearing that corner out to my To Do list. :frowning:

Actually, shrimp inflators are probably one of the few kitchen gifts I would have politely refused. Hubby is seriously allergic to shrimp, rush to hospital level reactions. Now, an avocado tenderizer? Hmmm.

This highlights a great point and my flaw that lies behind the whole problem. I tend to just ‘go along’ with common norms and default behaviors without thinking them through. All those gifted appliances cluttering my countertops? Well, you can’t say ‘no thanks’ to a present, can you? And you certainly can’t just dispose of the present, right? (Wrong! I mean, be polite and all, but just because someone gives you something SHOULD NOT mean you have to give it space in your house for the rest of your natural life! I’m late learning that, but hopefully I can stick to it in future.)

And also there is nothing sacred about ‘sets.’ I like our current everyday dishes fine. But it includes 8 cups and 8 saucers that are taking up prime cabinet space, and we NEVER use them! We’re mugs only for our hot drinks. I have on rare occasions used one of the cups to beat up a single egg before pouring it into some recipe I’m making, but that could be just as well done with the baby size of my nest of mixing bowls. I think I will go throw out the cups/saucers as soon as I get off line!

That’s the key. It’s not how much or what you have, it’s that you only have what you like and use. If you need six specialty spice graters and seventy-leven knives, then that is what you should have.

Besides my everyday dishes, I have three complete other sets of fine china, all of them inherited. One I actually really like the looks of…but we have simply never been invite a houseful of people to formal dinners type people. But there’s the formal dining room, with sideboards and corner cabinets and built-in storage closet and drawers, all full of that china and two silver services and glassware and tablecloths/candlesticks/display/serving pieces/etc. 95+ percent of which I’ve never used.

You know what? I think I’m going to turn that dining room into a computer/game room and thin the burden on the living room. I’ll post word on the family chat about all of these ‘treasures’ (some of the stuff have real value, or did when people valued having that formal stuff) that they can have if they want it. And whatever no one wants, which is likely to be almost all of it, will be sent to Goodwill or the like.

15

I am a minimalist. I can’t stand clutter. I live alone in a three bedroom, two bath house and I have completely empty closets and nothing but a car and a bicycle in my garage. If I don’t use something, it gets donated.

I am also in the middle of a kitchen remodel. I emptied out my entire kitchen two weeks ago. I think that there were three small things that I threw out. Most of the rest I use regularly and a few things I use only occasionally.

16

We had a set of plates and glasses (12 settings) that belonged to my wife’s mother. We were able to give them to one of her nieces, which freed up a lot of space. There were also a bunch of decorative soup bowls and cheese/dessert plates that went to the same person. We just NEVER used that stuff. Gave away the cast iron pizza pan, along with the cutter, the docker and the peel. Again, never used them other than keeping the pan in the oven as a heat sink. Most people have temporary enthusiasms, buy the gear, then the urge dies and they’re stuck with the “stuff”.

17

Sounds like marriage.

18

If you have the space and have kids, I highly recommend having two dishwashers to remove kitchen clutter. With two dishwashers, one is being loaded and one unloaded. Unwashed crap doesn’t pile up in the sink.

19

One reason my counters are so cluttered is that if I put a gadget away, it’s generally “out of sight, out of mind.” For me, there’s no point in having a small appliance if it’s not handy at any given moment. This doesn’t apply to, say, the Instant Pot or the rice cooker, because they’re glorified cooking pots, but I keep the food processor on the counter next to the cutting board so that if I’m starting to slice five pounds of potatoes for scalloped potatoes, I’m more likely to notice I own a device that will do that for me quickly.

I do need to go through all my kitchen stuff, though. For some reason, although I can persuade myself to donate decent items that are duplicates or impractical for me, I have an awful time just throwing away things that are just a little broken. And because I’m a sentimental fool, there are a lot of things in my kitchen that belonged to my mom or my mother-in-law that I just haven’t been able to bring myself to get rid of.

20

I’m the exact same way. If I don’t see it, I’ll forget to use it.