Have you ever been making bakery products and you forgot to get one of your ingredients out when prepping? You have hands full of flour, you’re trying to rummage to the back of the cupboard for the baking powder and then a whole load of other ingredients fall all over the floor needing to be cleaned up. Yup! Me too, it’s not ideal. For this reason, I decided enough is enough, I had to figure out a way in which I could easily access all my ingredients if this happened again. In this article, we will go through some tips on how to organise your pantry so that you can easily access your ingredients when you bake.
Empty All Ingredients And Do A Stock Check
This is where you realise that you have more than you think in your cupboards/drawers/shelves. This is a great opportunity to give them a good clean because you know just as well as I know, you are guaranteed to have flour, sugar, colouring or anything else fine that ends up on the shelf and under the packets.
Make a list of everything you have in your cupboards and check what you may need for future bakes like biscuit selections etc. This will then help you to organise your cupboards later on in the next steps. A great way of keeping your ingredients organised is by having a blackboard and having things that I’m running out of so I know to pick them up when I’m next shopping. If you need help identifying what you need for staple baking ingredients, check out this article.
Group Your Ingredients Together
This is a great tip for saving time when trying to get something done quickly. Once you have cleaned the surfaces of your draws, cupboard or shelves, there is no point just putting them back how they were as this is just not going to work. The best way to organise your ingredients by grouping ingredients together.
Grouped Ingredients:
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Flours
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Sugars
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Natural Sweeteners
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Leaveners
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Flavourings
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Chocolate
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Fried Fruit and Nuts
Storage Jars
So the cupboards are clean, you have organised your ingredients and have picked up the other staple ingredients you need. Now for the satisfying part, storing everything. It is clearly an important factor in keeping an organised pantry. Choose a clear container that you can put your ingredients into. Having them in clear containers is much better as you know what you’re picking up quickly as well as you can tell when something is running out.
Storage Ideas:
There are three great storage container ideas that can be sustainable and make your pantry look great.
Glass Clip Jars – These are great for larger items like flours and sugar, they can be Kilner jars or you can look for cheaper ones elsewhere. Either way, they look great, and they are sustainable.
Plastic Containers – These are a great way of cutting costs but they are still plastic. A great way of building up your plastic containers is by keeping your takeaway boxes and reusing them,
Recycled Jars – If you have used a pasta sauce jar, or jam jar, instead of putting them in the recycle bin, why not clean them and re-use them for something else. This is then a free container whilst also being sustainable.
Label Your Jars
Once you have found relevant containers for all your ingredients, it is best to have them labelled so you know what is what. You don’t want to mix self-raising flour with cornflour, you will be making a very dense powdery cake. There are plenty of options out there.
Ideas for Labeling:
Hand Written – You can handwrite on some sticky labels if you have neat handwriting.
Chalkboard Label – I think these look great, you can reuse them for different ingredients and they look a bit rustic.
Label Maker – they are easy and they also look great. If you have a label maker, you should use that as it is super easy.
Once you have done this, you can then start to put things neatly away where you can put them. If you can’t fit all your jars in the pantry, why not make some long shelves to go over the room so you can fit them on. If you are renting, you could ask if you could have some extra storage.