The Sexy & The Practical About Storing Dry Goods

THE PROBLEM

Dry goods are a double-edged sword. On the one hand they are so easily put into beautiful containers and lined up like neat little soldiers. On the other, there's almost always leftover that doesn't fit into the container and accessing the content of those containers can be a struggle depending on the design.

THE SOLUTION

(In use for 5+ months at the time of this writing.)

First, a word on labels. I understand the organizational magic one feels that they possess while holding a label-maker. It's a powerful drug. But for some, an uncontrollable urge takes over and they find themselves with a compulsion to label anything and everything. I'm sure there's an applicable parable about a bird who built its own beautiful birdcage or something, but I'm here to beg you to just put down your label-maker. Women of the internet, raise your right hand and repeat after me: "I will only label when it is truly necessary. If I and everyone in my household is able to accurately discern what something is without a label, it is not necessary and I will not label it." Good. For now, I'll leave labeling where things belong to your own good discretion. But I'm watching and offenders will be held to account.

Now, with that off my chest let's talk about dry goods...and their assorted companions.

It feels like in recent months (years?) the internet has been taken over by pictures of tidy containers filled with all the things. And listen, I'm here to tell you that nobody loves a beautiful pantry more than me. NOBODY. Yet, I am often left wondering if the owners of those containers actually use the things in them. No matter how beautiful a container or how orderly it sits on a shelf, if it's difficult to use or maintain it just doesn't fly in my world. I demand containers that are not only attractive but practical. Will I be scooping something out of it? Then I better be able to get my scoop AND my hand (which ya know...does the scooping) in there. Will it hold one thing this week and something different the next? Then it had better be easy to clean and the seals better hold up. The number of products which fail to meet those criteria alone is staggering. And for my money, if in doubt then you can always consult the amazing folks of America's Test Kitchen who do downright incredible work product testing. I have never had one of their recommended products fail me. Ever.

So, how did I go about making my selections? Honestly...it's a bit embarrassing. It's embarrassing because if I tell you you're going to see how truly obsessive I can be about finding the right solution to the problem. I do a crazy amount of research. I do it because I enjoy it but also because I believe in buying quality once and not junk repeatedly. So since this is a safe space I'm going to tell you how I went about it.

The first thing I did was consult America's Test Kitchen (ATK) on their recommended storage solutions for food and dry goods. Their highest rated plastic storage is the Rubbermaid Brilliance line which comes in a wide range of sizes and configurations. They are stain and odor resistant and lightweight. Basically, if they were good enough for ATK then they were good enough for me. (Worth noting: I do NOT put these in the microwave or dishwasher. Maybe you can but I don't. I use the also ATK-recommended OXO Good Grips glass containers for food storage or things that will be microwaved ever since reading this: Study: You May Be Eating A Credit Card's Worth of Plastic Each Week. I report, you decide.)

Now that I knew what product I was shopping for, I needed to get real about what I was trying to store. And to be honest, I think a lot of us don't go about it this way. For example, we decide we need something to put flour into, we see a product that indicates it stores flour, we assume it will be a good solution, but then are surprised when our 5lb bag of flour DOES NOT ACTUALLY FIT into the container we have selected. And if you're like me, you then get annoyed because you suddenly need some place to put the extra flour and this feels like a step back instead of a step forward. So, we start with what actually needs to be stored. And because we're dealing with containers I started taking a look at the volume of the things I know our household keeps on hand. That includes the basic baking/cooking staples but also things like pretzel crisps, Triscuits, etc. I'd like to tell you that I took the time to figure out the volume of all of these things before I shopped for containers but even I'm not crazy enough for that.

What I did do is quickly realize that buying a set of these Rubbermaid Brilliance containers was a loosing proposition. It was for me (and very likely for you, too) far more economical to buy the sizes I truly needed individually than to buy a set littered with sizes I almost certainly wouldn't need and that would eat up valuable real estate in a cabinet somewhere. And to be completely candid, I'm not even sure I knew that was an option. It turns out that places like Bed Bath & Beyond, Target, etc. usually do sell a limited number of sizes individually in their stores. But more importantly (!) ALL the sizes are available online. And I do mean *ALL THE SIZES*. Ask me how I know. Go ahead. Ask. This is where it gets embarrassing...

With only a handful of exceptions (mostly the really small containers I knew there was no way would meet my needs) I ordered them. All of them. On Amazon. To be fair, I was living in Manhattan at that time and walking into a store in the middle of a pandemic, just to peruse containers wasn't really an option. At least that's what I tell myself.

And THAT is how I figured out that a 16C container is what's required to hold a 5 lb. bag of flour. And before you go and say that I could have Googled how many cups of flour are in a 5 lb. bag (the answer is 15), I actually did do that. The problem is that while that works for flour, it doesn't work for nearly anything else... like pasta and pretzel chips, and you know... anything else in my house.

If being an organizational freak has taught me anything it's that most great solutions have emerged from trial and error. So you won't be surprised to learn that I ordered multiples of tons of different sizes, figured out what worked, and returned what didn't (and was unused...obviously). If it's helpful, I'm leaving a cheat sheet below under RESOURCES of what container I used for what. The best part? We've been using this set-up for 5+ months and its working so so well. Things interchange easily, wash up well, and it has made pantry staples a breeze.

A FINAL WORD ON THE OTHER THINGS SHOWN

I wanted to write about dry goods storage but let me quickly address the other things you see in the pictures.

- The two white bins on the top shelves store what I would loosely call "backstock". No, there's not messy half bags of flour but there are on-line spares (which I wrote about recently) and tangential supplies like the oils and waxes for cutting boards which are stored nearby. (All Boos, all day by the way!)

- The lazy susans in my upper cabinets are all 9". A standard upper cabinet is 12" deep but once you account for the trim and space for the turntable to spin, a 9" size is what fits most comfortably.

- I keep my cooking oils in individual bottles, each is 24 oz. and labeled with what they are and their smoke point. (That's the temperature you see listed.)

RESOURCES

America' Test Kitchen (Equipment Reviews)

Rubbermaid Brilliance (Plastic)

OXO Good Grips (Glass)

White Bins

9" Lazy Susan

Oil Bottles

Boos Cutting Board Oil

SIZE GUIDE

19.9C/4.7L (2) Boxes of Shells Pasta, (2) Boxes of Farfalle Pasta

16C/ 3.7L 5 lb. of Flour, 8 lb. of Sugar, (1) Bag of Tortilla Chips

12C/ 2.8L 4 lb. of Almonds, 14oz (1 Party Size Bag) of Pretzel Crisps,

8.1C/ 1.9L (2) Boxes of Spaghetti

7.8C/ 1.8L 1lb.(1 Box) of Brown Sugar with Room to Spare, 2 lb. of Confectioner's Sugar

6.6C/ 1.5L (1) Box of Crackers, (1) Box of Triscuits, (1) Large Bag of Granola