(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!