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When I was single and living on my own, I didn’t have a great spice storage solution. But I had a system that worked well enough for me: In one easy-access cabinet, I had the spices I reached for all the time; in another, I kept the others I’d use less often.
Salt, pepper, chili flakes, and cinnamon were non-negotiable in the primary storage area. Sometimes, I would cook with a ton of cumin or paprika and those bottles would migrate over. The other cabinet held mostly baking spices that I would reach for on special occasions, like nutmeg, ginger, and cardamom. It wasn’t perfect, but it worked for me.
Then I moved in with my partner, who had his own collection of spices and his own system for organizing them. The consolidation of our kitchens made us to reassess our spices and our organization system — and to come up with the spice storage solution of my dreams: a spice drawer.
I know spice drawers aren’t anything new, but they are new to me and I was (and still am) astonished by how much joy mine sparks. And all I needed to create this superior spice system was this YouCopia drawer liner, which I bought for $17 on Amazon. Well, that and a whole wall of IKEA cabinets.
Our rental kitchen had a shortage of drawers — just two narrow drawers in which to fit all of our utensils and kitchen tools. Even after donating and tossing few boxes full of gear, we knew we were going to need more drawer space. And even though it’s a rental, we both decided it would be worth it to add an entire wall of SEKTION cabinets from IKEA. The cabinets themselves cost around $700 for three narrow units, each with three drawers, and we did the installation ourselves.
Our new abundance of drawers meant that I could dedicate an entire drawer to spices — a dream! I just needed a way to keep them from rolling around in there. Enter: the YouCopia drawer liner. I cut sections of the 10-foot roll to line a drawer, and managed to store 30 bottles of spices and keep them from clanking around every time I pulled the drawer open.
We still have a back-up spice storage area for overflow and large containers that don’t fit in in the grooves, but having the spices right beneath our prep space and clearly visible makes me happy every time I reach for the red pepper flakes.
Plus, since we don’t have to be so discriminating about which spices get the prime spot, I’m also more likely to try new spices and blends.
Your turn: How do you store your spices?
Geraldine Campbell
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