Food, food everywhere and nothing to eat.

Does your cupboard or pantry have mass chaos going on? Do you spend more time digging around for the things you need than you do cooking? If so this is for you. This is another project I challenge you to do that will take more than 5 minutes. First empty your cupboards or pantry. (I will refer to pantry if you don’t have one and only use cupboards that is ok). Sort your food according to type i.e. can food, pasta, sauces, snacks, baking goods, etc. Now go thru all your items and check the dates. Even dry goods have dates on them. If it is out of date please get rid of it. Now break down your types further i.e. can food into meats, vegetables, fruit, etc. Take a moment to clean out your pantry, wipe down the shelves, and sweep the bottom out. Now that it is all clean figure out what you want to go where. I keep my baking supplies on the top shelf since I don’t get into them as much as other things and I keep the snacks on the bottom, because when you are looking for something to eat quick you may choose something at eye level that is healthier rather than bending over to look at the snacks. If you have small children you may need to rethink this step and keep the snacks up higher to keep them out of them. Now start to put things back into your pantry. Place like items together. My pantry door has shelves on the inside to place my can goods; this is very handy for me and my family. When putting the food back into your pantry make sure that the date that expires the soonest is in front of dates that have more time. This will help you in using the oldest stuff first.

               I personally have one shelf for baked goods, the cans are in the door, one shelf for boxed meals, and noodles, one for sauces, marinades etc. and yet another for cereals, lunch items etc. I try to keep things that I use more often in the center of the shelf and the things used less often to the outsides. When making out your grocery list you can see much easier what you are low on or out of. (I keep a running list on my fridge so that when I use something and see I am low or out of an item I can put it on the list.) There is no right or wrong way to do this, it is whatever way works better for you and your family. I am just giving some suggestions of how I do my own pantry. Like I have said before it takes time to do this, but it is time well spent and helps you save your precious time when looking for ingredients, a snack, grocery list, or even when trying to figure out what you will be cooking for a meal. If you have children they can help, make it a game and have them match items for you, this will allow you to be doing something else and cut down on your time so the task will go much quicker for you.