A messy, unmanageable kitchen can cause a lot of stress. Clutter makes cooking difficult and it looks bad. No one knows better than a professional chef that the functionality of a kitchen is just as important (if not more so) than its interior design.
Keeping your kitchen organized and usable for you and your family can be an incredibly daunting task. Knowing where to start is already half the battle. Kitchen brillianceEllen Marie Bennett's latest show is packed with handy tips to transform your everyday kitchen with stylish design and clever organisation.
Ellen, founder of luxury kitchenware brand Hedley & Bennett and a former professional chef, Homes and Gardens She shares her tips for organizing and streamlining your kitchen. These are her seven most useful insights, honed throughout her illustrious career.
1. Start by tidying up
(Image courtesy of Tastemade)
“A lot of people don't realise you can make a big difference without a lot of money,” Ellen says. H&G Families featured on the show. Kitchen brillianceEllen started with something very simple: a thorough tidying of the kitchen.
“If you take everything out of the cabinet, line it up, and group like things together, you’ll see that there are actually nine things. [pieces of] “Tupperware that's missing lids, missing tops, mismatched pieces – you could throw it all out and reset, but if you don't look at it and don't stare at its pesky presence, you could just let it sit in the drawer,” Ellen says.
Over the years, we accumulate things that we don't really need, and often never use. Emptying all of your kitchen cabinets and drawers, deciding what to keep, and throwing out the rest (or donating or recycling depending on condition) will help you achieve a neater, less cluttered kitchen.
This will make cooking meals in your kitchen just that little bit easier, and with less clutter, you'll be able to see which items you actually use every day.
“We realised that we all have way more rubbish than we need, and often double, triple or quadruple it,” says Ellen. “So organising is something that's cheap and anyone can do if they have the time.”
2. Store your pots and pans creatively
(Image courtesy of Tastemade)
Pots and pans are often the trickiest kitchen tools to store. They're big and bulky, and sometimes don't fit neatly into standard kitchen cabinets. To solve this storage problem, Ellen has a few clever tricks. Following her kitchen layout advice, she recommends keeping all your pots and pans right next to the stove, to start with.
“I like to hang pots and pans; it's as inexpensive as buying metal dowels to hang over your stove,” Ellen says, “or, if your kitchen layout doesn't allow for that, you can hang them in drawers and stack your pots and pans on top of each other. I like to store pans in one drawer and then pots in one drawer.”
As shown in the photo above, there is space to hang pots and pans. Kitchen brillianceis a kitchen storage hack that's both aesthetically pleasing and functional: Not only do you get to see everything you own at once, but you also don't have to dig through drawers to get to your pans or skillets. But if your culinary collection starts to get out of hand, Ellen says that storing items out in the open can also be a great convenience.
“I have a lot of cast iron skillets and Dutch ovens, so I have a bookshelf in my kitchen where I can see all of my Dutch ovens,” Ellen says. “I keep the bigger ones outside to save space in the drawers. And I always have one Dutch oven on the stove that I use for making beans and stews and stuff like that, so I keep it there. I also use it to boil water for pasta because it's handy and big and I have it there.”
3. Create a dedicated pantry space
(Image courtesy of deVOL Kitchens)
Not every kitchen has a built-in pantry, but that shouldn't stop you from creating a dedicated space for food storage, says Ellen. On her show, she helped families without a fancy walk-in pantry find a designated spot for dry goods.
This simple solution will make cooking much easier and take the stress out of searching for ingredients while you're cooking. Whether you have a drawer that you can convert into a makeshift pantry or a free-standing cabinet that still has its day, find a spot in your kitchen so all of your pantry essentials can fit together in that one space.
“A lot of people don't really have a pantry, and they end up spreading their peanut butter out in multiple cabinets all over the kitchen, and then they're like, 'I'm making pasta,' and they're like, 'Let me see the nine places I think I put pasta noodles.' So having all the food, like dry goods, in one zone and creating a cabinet for people was a pretty big thing,” Ellen says.
4. Consolidate your home appliance garage
(Image courtesy of deVOL)
Appliances are essential in any kitchen, but they can take up valuable counter space, which is where the appliance garage comes in. Ellen says that in many of the kitchens featured on her show, she's installed an appliance garage (with handy cord storage) to streamline the management of her appliances.
Instead of having to take the toaster out, plug it in and put it back in when breakfast is served, clients can now simply close the top when their food is done and use the toaster with ease. Out of sight, out of mind.
5. Expand the boundaries of your kitchen space
(Image courtesy of Tastemade)
Working in a small kitchen can be tough: With so much food and utensils that need to be stored, it can be very difficult to find a dedicated space for everything, which is why Ellen suggests extending the scope of your kitchen into an adjacent room or even a hallway.
Clever storage solutions can make your kitchen feel bigger without a full-scale renovation, she says. Kitchen brillianceEllen took advantage of the conveniently located hallway by installing built-in cabinets and a “Julia Childs-style pegboard” on the wall, rather than wasting any space in the hallway.
“We angled it so that when you stand at the stove in the kitchen, you can see the hallway right there, see all the pots hanging, and know what you need,” Ellen says. “Rather than expanding the kitchen, we've literally increased the square footage of it by adding to the adjacent area.”
To accommodate all of her kitchen needs, Ellen also created a large banquette and wet bar area in the dining room of the same home. “If your apartment is small and you're thinking, 'Oh no, this kitchen isn't big enough,' think about whether there's a space near the kitchen, almost right next to it, that you can expand in an elegant and lovely way,” Ellen continues.
6. Organize your cabinets and drawers
(Image courtesy of Tastemade)
Even after emptying and organizing your kitchen cabinets and drawers, clutter often ends up back in. According to Ellen, there's a simple solution to this: drawer dividers.
“They're like little xylophones. They're wooden inserts that are the same color as the custom drawers. They're light plywood, clean, and lacquered. They look like custom drawers, but they're not. I use them in all my houses, and they create dividers and barriers within the drawers in a way that's completely interchangeable if needed,” Ellen says.
Even if you think you've got your drawers organized, chances are your kitchen workflow will be a little different in a couple of years' time. Many of the drawer dividers on the market are easily adjustable and can be quickly replaced or moved around, meaning you won't be stuck with an inefficient storage solution for years to come. You'll be able to use your kitchen in a way that works for you.
Get the look
Large Luxury Bamboo Silverware Organizer
Bamboo Kitchen Drawer Dividers
kitchen spice drawer organizer
7. Make your kitchen kid-friendly
(Image courtesy of Marie Flanigan Interiors / Photo: Julie Soefler)
“If you have children and ideally have the space, even if it's just one cabinet, make it accessible so your child can use it on their own. They can open the cabinet, reach in and not have to go and beg you. Make sure your child is an independent user,” says Ellen.
Organizing your kitchen with safety in mind and kids in mind can make cooking and serving a little easier for the whole family. Think small drawers filled with plastic cups and bowls at kids' eye level, or a stepstool so they can reach kitchen essentials stored on upper shelves. Ellen says she's tried this method at home with great success.
“Speaking for my own home and for my child, I have stainless steel everything for him. Stainless steel bowls, stainless steel cups, stainless steel cutlery, and stainless steel plates that are like cafeteria platters with indentations for different types of food. And he just grabs it and throws it in the sink when he's done and nothing breaks. It's like bulletproof,” Ellen says.
Organization is everything in the kitchen. These 7 pro tips will put you on the path to culinary success. For more tips on organizing your kitchen, click here. The glow of the kitchen It's streaming on Tastemade and available on Roku, Google TV, YouTube TV and more.
