phillippa says: I'm hoping that by taking part in The Kitchn Cure I'm going to achieve two things: a reorganised kitchen that actually stays organised after being used, and greater variety and creativity in my everyday cooking. Cheers!
Welcome, everyone! Happy first day of spring, and first day of the first ever Kitchn Cure. There are over 200 of you signed up. Wow! This week we want to get you set-up by taking a very quick survey (after the jump), get you going on our Flickr page, and start you on the path of cleaning out your kitchen. We'll be borrowing from Week Two of the home sites' Cure, since that is when they usually tackle the kitchen.
Haven't joined yet? We'll keep the sign-up open for one more week (closing Thursday, March 27).
Already signed up and ready to go? Read on for this week's assignments.
This Week's Assignments
• Take the quick survey, below.
• Check out The Kitchn Cure Flickr Page and upload your "before" photos. Open those cupboards and refrigerator doors and dare to show us the state of things. If you want to highlight your pics, put your link in with your comments. This will allow us all to talk about one and learn from one another's project.
• Go through your refrigerator, cupboards, counter-tops and pantry and clean up your food clutter. The foods we have in our kitchens should be fresh and replenished frequently. Take a long hard look at that tin of wasabi powder you got on your trip to Japan three years ago. Re-consider the jar of preserved lemons you got as a wedding favor five years ago. It's brown, you have no idea how to use it, and it takes up energetic space in your kitchen. Toss it. Here are the basic guidelines for de-cluttering your food:
• if it has expired
• if it has not been used in the last 6-12 months
• if it has duplicates (combine containers if possible)
• Take all of what remains and wipe it down with a warm, moist cloth. For containers of oil, for example, that may have a film, you might need to use a cleanser (something earth-friendly diluted with warm water) to cut through the grease.
Here is the survey. Please, only take this survey if you've already officially signed up for the Cure.
All The Info
• All Kitchn Spring Cure 2008 Posts
• The Kitchn Cure Flickr Page
Basic Info:
Welcome to The Kitchn's first ever Cure.
It's time, yes? The home sites have been doing Cures for a few seasons, and we're following their lead with this fancy new sign-up form, which will help us stay in touch with you and send you a diploma at the end of the process.
Just think, in eight weeks your kitchen will be clean, healthy and organized, and your cooking will be even more nourishing and delicious. Good luck and welcome to the Cure.
Best,
(The image above is from Jessica's Blue and Silver Flair, an entry in our Small Cool Kitchen 2007 contest.)
How to Bake a Potato: Three Easy Methods
How To Cook Tender, Chewy Wheat Berries on the Stovetop
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
Straw Mat from The ...
Must-See Small Cool Homes: Week Two
Beth's Romantic & Retro Residence
I'm so excited!
Oh how I need this!! Thanks Sara Kate!!
this is great. i'm moving into a new place in three weeks, and i'm looking forward to reading all the advice so i can START all cured up. :)
Heh, guess it helps that I just re-organized a bit in my kitchen.
I am curious- with the 6-12 month scenario... those of us who keep a food store for our household for a year or more, I'm assuming are exempt from this with the storage foods? Or perhaps I'm the only one who does that here...
Ether, tell us more about the food you keep for over a year...
I'm so excited also! My kitchen needs this.
Looking forward to this!
(Unfortunately, the form won't go through. It is giving me a db error).
Classic Cook, that makes me feel better... I thought I must be doing something wrong.
(I'm excited. I have had a hard time getting OUT of my kitchen lately, and anything I can do to make it more efficient or to improve my cooking skills is welcome!)
@Sara
Well, it's not all over a year old, but I keep a years supply on hand, and rotate through it. I put by enough food every autumn that if need be we could live off it for a full year, and then when I do the next batch of storage food that goes in behind and we use the older stuff first. It's primarily home-canned items, and jars of flour/sugar/salt/pasta/grains with oxygen absorbers in them to prevent spoilage. Allows us to buy in bulk and when the price is good, and then work off that for a long period of time. So yeah- there's the jars of drygoods which are still perfectly fine despite being around a year old now.
Guess I am the only urban-homesteader/food storage person here eh?
I'm excited to start. My kitchen is in need of a good cure! Plus I didn't quite make it through the fall cure so hopefully keeping to one room will make it a bit easier so I can actually follow through!
I buy in bulk but store in smaller containers so that the food is rotated fairly often ensuring freshness (natural foods spoil so quickly).
@aubrey
If you have problems with spoiling of drygoods, you might look into vacuum sealing and using oxygen absorbers. They really help and allow me to store grains, flour, sugar, and the like for much longer than I initially thought possible.
in the February issue of Natural Health magazine there was a wonderful article on pantry organization, here is the link, hope it helps!
Squeee!!! A quote!!! :-)
Well, taking before photographs has brought me down to earth with a thud. The photographic proof shows I'm far more disorganised than I imagine myself to be. I'm more disorganised than the people in my life who I critisise for being disorganised. I feel ashamed about that. :-(
I can tidy up but I need to know how to keep it that way.
See the awful truth here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/poplarsavenuekitchen
I also blog, at: http://poplarsavenuekitchen.wordpress.com
Oh, I'm excited about The Cure, too... :-)
Who else is out there with a teeny, tiny kitchen? My floor space is about 3x5 feet, with two nearly inaccessible corner counters. Luckily, there's a small pantry closet in the dining room!
Flickr set
@Ether Maiden, what do you use for an oxygen absorber? I've heard of them, but never ran into anyone who used them.
RebeccaCT, I thought my kitchen was tiny but I think you have me beat! I have very little counter space, also (three small chunks, each about two feet wide, one in a corner) but I have a fantastic island dividing my kitchen and living room areas. That's a lifesaver. It's probably four feet long, and really the highlight of the kitchen for me.
Here's my kitchen: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dixiemedley/tags/kitchen/
Hello all! I am very excited about this too, it's great to have the sun finally shining in my kitchen but it seems to be highlighting the messiness as well!
One question, if we are officially registered for the Kitchen Cure should we be receiving email or anything? Just checking because I have not received anything and I wasn't sure if the registration worked?
Thanks again!!
i am also registered and haven't received any email.
WOW! Before photos taken and uploaded... cleaning next.
I love to cook... mostly vegetarian but mostly I haven't the foggiest idea what lurks in the back of my fridge... and the freezer is a black hole.
I'm starting there!
I've started! Cleaned out a lot of food today, and uploaded some after shots to the flickr group. I'm looking forward to getting onto the cooking part of the cure, and I probably need to do a bit more scrubbing - much less fun than throwing stuff out.
I didn't receive email either.
Carla-Jean, I love your kitchen and your island!
i'm actually opening my refrigerator door with too much force now because all of the condiments are gone. definitely needed to do this! will one of the upcoming weeks cover rearranging cabinet storage?
i found this pretty good slashfood post about shelf life of pantry items, and it also links to an informative washington post article about the same topic. not sure how accurate the numbers really are, but it seems like a good starting reference.
CT, another tiny kitchen person here. If you've ever seen a renovated Stuyvesant Town kitchen, you've seen mine (they're all the same). I have one fairly large corner cabinet that requires a sort of yoga move to access. I'm 5'4" and weigh 120 pounds. I honestly wonder if I could use that cupboard if I was much bigger. My husband just leaves items to be put away there on the counter above and I do the swivel move required. Actually, I've got a lot of storage over all, but it's mostly very high up (step stool, and sometimes I need the ladder).
Esther, are you a Mormon? I recall they have a tradition of keeping a one-year food supply on hand, but I don't know anyone pulling that off in NYC. I'm shooting for 2 weeks.
i took my before photos and posted them http://www.flickr.com/photos/24975065@N03/sets/72157604227056262/
now i just need to start cleaning...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/angryrobot17/sets/72157604174869314/
Got my before photos up, unfortunately my kitchen has a lot of old food that i actually just *moved into* it last month. So I need to purge yet again and wipe everything down.
Cooked a nice breakfast of eggs soft - scrambled with feta, green olives, spring garlic and herbs from our little garden, pork maple sausage and english muffins yesterday. Then we ate it outside in the sunshine :)
I posted my before photos. It was scary. Mine is the pink kitchen.
I just went through my bulk food and purged and organized. I belong to the Park Slope Food Coop, so I had a bunch of dried fruits and grains in plastic bags with twist-ties. I got rid of the currants I bought last January, nuts of unknown purchase date and a very small amount of brown lentils that was pretty much unusable. Then I snagged two plastic containers that don't get used much and separated the dried fruits from the grains. I no longer have an annoying and unsightly carpet of plastic bags on the first level of my pantry closet. Hot diggity dog.
I also ditched the bluberry apple pie spread somebody gave us for our wedding 3.5 years ago. I could not fathom using it and it has been long enough to feel like the statute of limitations for hanging on to a wedding present had been reached.
The pantry feels a little sweeter for the space that has been opened up.
taking/posting these before photos really made me realize how badly i need this "cure." yikes!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lucyre/sets/72157604233748268/
How do I post my pictures on flickr? Just give it a tag of "The Kitchn Cure"?
Heather Lauren,
Just go to our Kitchn Cure page and upload from there.
I'm having problems with uploading pictures (corrupted files or some such), but I got started with the pantry and the fridge today. I'm working through the freezer and trying to use up what I can before I toss anything from there.
I did forget to go through the fridge door until I read some of your posts, so that will be tonight's purge. That and I have to give some thought to spices - not sure how old some of them really are! I'll see if I can at least get before pictures of those areas tonight too!
domestigeek--thanks! I love my little kitchen. It's tiny, so my big challenge is utilizing the space (you may have noticed I don't actually have a pantry). But it's efficient, and I actually have space to spare.
phoneill--random, but my sister lives in Park Slope. :) A friend and I just joined a local co-op last week... tomorrow is my first pick up. SO excited.
I've uploaded my pictures - its amazing how looking at the pictures provides a new perspective - hmmm nothing on the top shelves - of course I need a step stool.
Tomorrow I want to declutter, and also group together the little tupperware containers for taking stuff like almonds, carrots, etc. to work. I start a new job next week and I want to use the Kitchn cure to help me get organized to bring my lunch more often.
I actually went ahead and started a blog. I need to declutter my whole house and having the progress posted is a good incentive to keep going. Here's a link for any and all to see. :)
http://apathwithobstacles.blogspot.com/