Pantry on Parade

There was a wonderful post over at Little Jenny Wren (www.littlejennywren.blogspot.com) the other day entitled 'The Womanly Art of Thrift'.  It is all about having a well-stocked pantry and stocking up when you find cut-price offers on tinned goods, or stocking the freezer with seasonal fruits and vegetables if there is a glut.  This got me thinking about my own very small pantry.

I don't have a pantry in the typical sense as we live in a rental property (don't ask, long story, now waiting for the housing market to fall from its ridiculous current position) and although the kitchen is a reasonable size, only one wall has any units.  When we moved in we bought some cheap shelving from Argos and this is now my pantry.

I was very unsure about this arrangement at first, fearing that everything would look really untidy (looking at the photo it probably does but I don't notice any more) and that there wouldn't be enough room for everything.  I have to say these open shelves have worked really well as it is easy to see at a glance what I have or haven't got, and there is no danger of things 'getting lost' at the back of a cupboard.  All our current foodstuffs are kept on these shelves, except items that need to be kept chilled, they are in the absolutely minute fridge!!

Although shelf space is limited I do like to stock up on any special offers I come across, or to buy in bulk if we go shopping using the car.  This leads to some very imaginative storage ideas.  The spare teabags are kept in the wardrobe, as are any spare breakfast cereals, toilet rolls, tissues and, as far away as possible from the other items, unopened packets of washing powder.  Extra tinned goods are kept in the cupboard in the hall, which also houses all my electrical kitchen items - food processor etc.

Amy Dacyczyn in The Tightwad Gazette also recommends stockpiling tinned / non-perishable goods when they are on special offer, and she too suggests keeping them wherever you can find a space - under the bed, behind the sofa, in outbuildings.  I haven't gone as far as to store things in the shed as yet but you never know should I come across a really good deal on something non-perishable.

Apart from the logistics of having limited storage space in the kitchen, I'm further hampered by not having a freezer.  In many respects this doesn't bother us as we haven't eaten much in the way of frozen food in years, although I don't half miss having ice cream available.  However, it does mean that I can't freeze any of the plums or apples that we harvest each year from the fruit trees in the garden.  So, in time-honoured fashion, we tend to eat an awful lot of these fruits when they are in season, and I also share out a lot with the next door neighbours.

I once saw Nigella Lawson on TV showing her pantry, it was a small room - probably the size of my bathroom - stacked floor to ceiling with built-in shelves and, as you can imagine, stocked with the most wonderful exotic array of tinned and bottled goods.  Ah, what I could store with a space like that!!

Comments

[Gill]

I've got a small house too, not enough storage space in the kitchen and no chance of a pantry. Like you I have to store things where I can, which makes for some interesting storage areas! I keep wine and beer under my bed (not that much, honestly!). The front porch stores cat food, fabric softener and orange juice.
The cupboard under the stairs has a small fridge somehow crammed into it along with more cat food, kitchen rolls, tin foil and more. How lucky is Nigella to have a pantry like hers! I drooled over it too when she showed it off too, wow couldn't we have fun with a space like that!