Pantry from Wikipedia
A pantry is a room where food, provisions or dishes are stored and serves in an ancillary capacity to the kitchen. The derivation of the word is from the same source as the Old French term paneterie; that is from pain, the French form of the Latin panis for bread.
In a late medieval hall, there were separate rooms for the various service functions and food storage. A pantry was where bread was kept and food preparation associated with it done. There were similar rooms for storage of bacon and other meats (larder), alcoholic beverages (buttery) known for the "butts" of barrels stored there, and cooking (kitchen).
Wow! Can you imagine all of those separate rooms for the different stuff we use in the kitchen rather than trying to cram it all into one small space! My pantry is small and I hope to one day have a larger one and my dream of dreams is to have a butler's pantry one day to organize dishes, linens and fun, special hostessing goodies for use with my family and friends. But I am very, very thankful and happy to have a pantry of any kind right now. Not only are there those without food at all but when I was apartment hunting last summer, upon noticing the lack of a pantry in one apartment I was shown, the leasing agent actually told me, "oh, you don't need a pantry. No one really uses pantries these days!" Well, I do!
Right now my pantry is an absolute disaster! That just happens from time to time in my experience. I feel the urge to gain some kind of handle on organization before going back to work next week.
So . . . here we go, as naked as this can be, here are "before" pics of my pantry, the kitchen shelves I'm thinking I may be able to put to good use in this project and my fridge and freezer. I would love any suggestions that any of you would like to share! This would be a great time for those of you who don't comment to chime in! (Not that I mind if you want to hang around regardless of whether or not you comment, comments are just always so nice.)
Right now my pantry is an absolute disaster! That just happens from time to time in my experience. I feel the urge to gain some kind of handle on organization before going back to work next week.
So . . . here we go, as naked as this can be, here are "before" pics of my pantry, the kitchen shelves I'm thinking I may be able to put to good use in this project and my fridge and freezer. I would love any suggestions that any of you would like to share! This would be a great time for those of you who don't comment to chime in! (Not that I mind if you want to hang around regardless of whether or not you comment, comments are just always so nice.)
p.s. I will post after pics too!p.s.s. if anyone has suggestions of where to buy cute, cheap, vintage looking clear glass canisters, send them on!
p.s.s.s. A new Costco membership also has more bulk items flowing through my larder so if anyone has tips on how to shop, use, & organize when buying in bulk, that would be helpful too. Thanks!
4 comments:
So glad you are inspired to organize your pantries! By the way, you can get wonderful clear glass Anchor Hocking pantry jars at Wal-Mart and Target. I think they come in three sizes (up to half-gallon) with tin lids. I just got a mess of them and spray-painted the lids a tomato red. They are very vintage looking--in fact, repros of the old glass jars you can find for much more money in antique shops. I just love them! You can label them, too.
Best wishes, Catherine Seiberling Pond
What if you got a wire shelf for your freezer so that you have two levels and could store more?
By the way, I told dad that the picture at the top of the page is the pantry that I want and he chuckled. Don't you just love the word chuckled???
Like the idea from "a pond near you" for spray painting the lids.
Happy organizing!
MOM
Mom, thanks for commenting. I do actually have a wire shelf in my freezer already creating two shelves but they're both full to overflowing making it look like one big jumble! ;)
I do like the word "chuckle" and I can just hear Dad chuckling about that pantry but my goodness, isn't it pretty?!
I like the idea about spray painting the lids too and fun fact: after further conversing with Catherine of "a pond near you", I learned that she wrote the wikipedia entry about pantries! One didn't exist previously. Isn't that cool?! She has also written a book about pantries.
Love Costco myself, but have never figured out how to organize all the bulk myself. Looking for a second fridge/freezer for the garage, now... And I just re-did my pantry, but it's still not quite how I'd like it to be!
I'll be watching your posts for tips :)
~Jaime
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