EXTRA! EXTRA! This is a new regular post from skgr.
My kitchen is implausibly small, so every bit of extra space and beauty helps.
I begrudge having to fit packages of food designed for suburban kitchen pantries onto my minuscule Manhattan-size kitchen shelves. And since my little shelves have no doors, whatever sits on them is visible at all times – who wants to look at all that packaging? I’d rather put the beauty of the food out to see than hide it away in a cabinet.
So I store all my pastas, cereals, rice, flours, beans and even some spices in glass jars. If there is an important set of instructions from the original packaging, I slip them out and tape to the inside of the lid. Another advantage of using jars for your dried foods is that it keeps out the grain moths, those annoying little white critters that take over the pantry, ruining your food. To prevent slipping between stacked jars, stick three or four adhesive rubber dots (sold at framing supply stores) to the bottom of each top jar.
Here are four good sources for Jars. My favorite might be the ones from Kmart, although you can only buy them in the stores. The budget option is to begin saving jars from peanut butter and pickles, for example. Soak off the labels with soap and hot water.
Martha Stewart Jars from Kmart come in three sizes
Ikea Burken Jars – (41oz size is most useful)
Ball Canning Jars (hardware stores, Broadway panhandler) half gallon and quart are best for grains, half-pint for spices.
For spices, the Container Store has a very nice series of small glass jars with white metal tops.
SKGR
© 2009 Apartment Therapy
I use spaggetti sauce jars - If I remember correctly (I am at work at the moment) good ol' Paul Newman uses Atlas canning jars which IMHO look good, although they do say "ATLAS" on the side of them. They may not be space-shuttle sealed, but the metal lid that comes with them usually has an embedded rubber seal in it. Plus when you're moving you can throw them in the glass recycling bin and buy new spaggetti sauce when you arrive. The lid does have Pauley's mug on it, but if you're looking at the side, or they are stacked, you shouldn't be able to see him.
What a great idea. You can also bypass the original packaging altogether by buying dry foods in bulk, something most health food stores let you do. Put it in reusable plastic bags and bring it home... if you get in the habit, you'll save a bit of space in the landfills. And the world will be a slightly lovelier place.
I, too, showcase beans and grains in glass containers. When moving, however, I move the contents to tupperware and wrap the glass separately. Too often pantry staples go to waste due to broken glass.
I also have open cabinets and put lots of grains, pasta, rice in good old fashioned Mason jars, which I love. Didn't have the same luck with the Ikea Burken jars -- if they're still constructed in the same way as those I had a few years ago, the seal is not airtight. Learned this the hard way, through a flour moths invasion.
Alessi makes cute airtight jars in different sizes, with cute little plastic men hanging down from the inside of the lid into your beans or flour or whatever -- they're named "Gianni." A little pricier than Ikea, but if you're going to be looking at them all the time, it's worth the investment.
A company called Lee Valley in Canada makes great little containers for spices. They're called watchmakers' cases (I have to credit Real Simple for this suggestions) www.leevalley.com go to gifts, then Perennial Favorites.
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