Organizing Your Food

If it’s been awhile since you cleaned out your cupboards, you may want to give your kitchen an overhaul before your next shopping trip.  You’ll be surprised at how much easier cooking is when you have a tidy kitchen and know your supplies.  Here are some tips on de-cluttering your kitchen:

• Check your expiration dates; if it is past its prime, throw it out

• If an item isn’t expired, but no one is interested in eating it, throw it out.  Unopened items can be donated to a local food bank.

• Group like foods together; for example, store all canned foods in the same cupboard and all dry goods, such as rice and pasta in the same cupboard.  I even store all soups on one side of shelf and beans and tomato products on the other for quicker searching.

• Keep drink mixes, coffee, and tea in the same area and keep breakfast cereals, breakfast bars, pop tarts, and other breakfast items grouped together.  When you want something, you’ll know right where to go to get it.

• Keep regularly used items front and center. You’ll save time by not continuously reaching and bending for these items.

• If you pack a lot of lunches, designate a “lunch” shelf or cupboard.  Place lunch bags, Ziploc bags, and any lunch food that can be stored in a cupboard (peanut butter, crackers, pretzels, etc) in the same place.

• When you start packing the lunch, you simply open the lunch cupboard, grab your lunch stuff and start packing.  Of course, you’ll need to walk over to the fridge to grab meats, cheeses, jellies, fruits, and so forth, but having the majority of the items in one place will save you a lot of time.

• Clear out the fridge each week.  Leftovers have a short shelf life and you don’t want to risk getting sick by eating something that should have already been thrown-out.

When you don’t have any clutter in your way, you may find that you actually enjoy cooking for your family much more than before.  Your freezer cooking day will be much more organized when you can find everything quickly and toss meals together.