My Mom’s Free Kitchen Storage Hack Is So Brilliant, I Had to Steal It

I live in a studio apartment with a teeny-tiny kitchen, so I have very limited storage space. My cabinets and drawers are filled to the brim, and making room for any new items can be a challenge. So when I bought a pair of silicone baking mats a few years ago, figuring out the best way to store them was tricky. 

Fortunately, my mom had already come up with a great hack for storing her silicone baking mats — and when she showed me, I immediately stole her idea. The best part? It was totally free to do! 

My mom’s storage trick for silicone baking mats is simple: She rolls them up and keeps each one its own empty parchment paper box. Brilliant! 

Silicone baking mats can be stored flat, but they take up a lot of room this way — especially if you want to avoid storing anything on top of them. If you have minimal storage space, you may be tempted to fold them; however, you should actually never fold your silicone baking mats, as this can tear them and wear out the coating, according to The Cookist. (And companies that make silicone mats say the same.)

Instead, roll up your mats to store them. That said, if you just roll them up and plop them in a drawer, you better believe they’re going to unfurl themselves. Not to mention, these mats tend to remain eternally slightly greasy (or is that just me?) so storing them loose in your pantry can spread grease onto the rest of your cookware. Plus, because silicone mats are reversible you might want to keep both sides clean and dust-free. 

So instead of storing your mats loose, just roll up each mat and put it in an empty parchment paper box. Then, slide each box wherever you have space. I keep mine standing up on the bottom shelf of a freestanding cupboard, but you could also put them in a kitchen drawer.

With this upcycling method, you don’t need to buy anything new — so not only is it eco-friendly, but it also doesn’t cost any money. You can simply wait until you finish your current box of parchment paper, wax paper, aluminum foil, or cling wrap, and then you have a free storage box for your silicone baking mat.

I try to keep my kitchen as zero-waste as possible, and so I don’t buy any of the above single-use items. If you’re in the same boat, or if you’re just nowhere close to finishing a box, ask some friends to save their empty boxes for you next time they finish a roll of parchment paper or the like. You could even post in your local Buy Nothing group on Facebook, and ask your community members for empty boxes.

That said, before repurposing your boxes, make sure to carefully cut off any sharp blades designed for ripping foil, paper, or cling wrap. My mom’s favorite boxes for storing mats are the If You Care Parchment Baking Paper boxes — the slicing edge is just ridged cardboard, and doesn’t need to be cut off.