Читать книгу 1001 Ideas for Kitchen Organization, New Edition - Joseph R. Provey - Страница 14

Just as important as using all available space is making sure that what you store is easily accessible. Your storage solutions may be sized correctly and located exactly in the work area where you’ll need them, but if they’re hard to get to, they will not qualify as optimal. There are several simple rules for avoiding such problems.

Always put items back in their proper place. Otherwise, you’ll spend half your time searching for the right tool or ingredient. This is especially important when two or more cooks will be sharing the same kitchen.

Avoid piles. If your serving dishes are under your dinner plates, which are in turn under your dessert plates, you’re going to have a problem. Ditto for your cutting board collection. Either you must perform the precarious feat of pulling out the plate you want from under the others, or you have to lift half the stack and lay it aside while you grab the one you want. Instead, add shelves or use racks so that each grouping of dishes or boards is separate and easy to access. Vertical racks can work, too, but they will generally take up a bit more space because you need dividers to keep the items upright.

Heavy items, if not stored on the countertop, are best stored between waist and eye level. Avoid storing heavy pots or fragile items where you have to stretch to reach them. Drop a cast-iron cooking pot, and your kitchen floor could be damaged. Or, worse, you could drop something on yourself.

Utensils that fit drawer organizers like pieces in a puzzle leave no excuses for putting the pizza cutter in the wrong drawer.

Horizontal cabinet doors that open upward allow you to access or reload contents without the doors getting in your way—and with little danger you’ll ever bump your head on them!

Vertical storage beats piles, especially overhead. You only have to be able to reach the bottom corner of a cookie sheet to pull it down.

SMARTtip

Storage Strategies

Tiers allow you to see what’s in store behind the first row. You can buy tiered shelf inserts at many home-goods stores, or you can build them for little or no cost. (See page 59.)

Elongated, clear containers like these make good use of cabinet space and allow you to see what you have. Always choose food containers that have airtight lids.

Helper shelves make it easy to reach the dinner plates without having to remove the dessert plates first. Many models are available, or you can build your own. (See page 57.)

When loading a cabinet, put the tallest items toward the back, as shown in this section view. That way, you can see smaller items up front, but the taller items remain visible.