Other People's Pantries #54

From Kim, in South Pasadena, California:

Here is my pantry -- or should I say pantries. I live in an apartment that has three bedrooms.  One of the bedrooms is really just an additional room that sits right next to the kitchen and I simply made it into a prep/storage room.

In this room I keep my backup flour and additional canned goods that I don’t use all that often or stuff that I got on a killer sale. I also keep specialty pots and pans as you can see on the wall (notice the tagines). 



This room keeps pretty cool in the summer and gets quite cold in the winter.  In addition I have a small chest freezer (not shown).

In the kitchen proper I have four cupboards that I use. In this first picture the top two shelves are used for my canned goods, mostly beans and tomatoes (sauce, crushed, whole and chopped).

In these two cupboards I keep my spices in the left one and my dry goods, beans, rice, pasta and flours in the right.

 
The Last cupboard is where I store any additional flours, sugars, pastas and miscellaneous goods that I don’t use all that often. 

I know this seems like a lot for a single person, but in my defense my parents grew up during the depression, and I have never shaken off the habit of hoarding food. Also I live in Southern California, and here you can get any ingredient you can imagine for any type of food -- and I just can’t resist.

On Saturdays, we peek into Other People's Pantries.

Come on -- show us your pantry.

*Other People's Pantries will be ending to make way for a new Saturday feature. However, we'll keep peeking in pantries as long as you keep sending your pantry photos. So, please send your photos as soon as possible.

Here's how.

Comments

How lucky is Kim to have a whole room to double as a pantry?!

Holy cow, I want a whole room for MY pantry!!

I love this organized and orderly pantry! (And I have that much food for one person too, so don't feel bad about it at all.)

Hi,Joan & Camila - when I moved into the apt, at first could not think of what to do with that room, but it didn't take long to make it into a pantry.
Hi,Kalyn - Thanks so much for being a kindred spirit. I find that you don't spend so much on food in the end.

Looks like my place and, if you are anything like me, you eat less (and therefore maintain your weight and health) by knowing that virtually anything you desire is available if you are willing to take the time to prepare it.

Cheers,

Hi, Mare - I believe that you are correct. It's much easier to keep your weight in check, if you have a large variety of foods to choose from. I rarely if ever have snack foods and if I do I try and make sure that they are healthy version. Spelt pretzels as opposed to wheat.

Gadfry - an entire room given over to pantry! That is a marvel. One I'd love to enjoy.

My dream pantry and well organized...kudos.

Hi MyKitchenInHalfCups - the room also doubles as a prep room, which works great because my kitchen does not have a lot of counter space.

Hi Peter - Thanks, I feel more then a bit lucky to be able to have the pantry

Another single person here with a pantry/food storage fetish! I wondered about your "food prep" use of the room, then I realized I could use an extra room just for my bread making. Although my old (1910) kitchen is large enough, I still don't have the counter space that I would like.

Kudos to you, Kim!

In case of some sort of national disaster, I am making a bee-line for Kim's house. Talk about prepared!

wow, i wish i have your pantry, so well stocked

Hi, Teresa - When I first moved into this apt I was a bit bummed out because the previous apt had a much larger kitchen with a bunch of counter space. I kept putting odd stuff into the backroom and then it dawn on me to just use it as a pantry.

Hi, Lauren - My friends say the same thing and love to come to my place because they know no matter what they may want I usually have it.

Hi, Vivien - To be honest I think what makes it all possible is to have a storage system. In my case there is a store here called Smart and Final that caters to restaurant supply where I get all of my containers, which allows me to store food more efficiently.

Do you give a course to husbands on how to put things back where they found them and keep the pantry organized-not sure if your classes will succeed-but I know that I would buy the lessons for mine.

Hi Esme, I gotta laugh at this one. When my Husband was alive he was one of those people that had to have all the labels of the cans facing forward and like things that to be grouped together. We had quite a heated argument about the placement of dried beans he thought they should be next to the canned beans, while I wanted then to have a place of there own. I almost had to write a dissertation on why they would be better in their own location.
Even thought you did not mean to - thanks for jogging a good memory loose