#6 Get It Together

#6-In the kitchen, group the food items in your cabinets by how YOU use them and not necessarily by what they are.  It might make the most sense for you to group your baking spices together and keep them separate from all of the other cooking spices.  Baby food comes in a glass jar but it might not make sense to keep it with the other items your store in glass jars like fruit or pasta sauce.  Put all the baby food together, whether it's a cracker or peaches in a jar and you'll end up saving time when you're looking for things to give that kid.  If you're so far past the baby stage that those last two sentences both scared and confused you then maybe you should be thinking about Foodie food.  It is most efficient to group ingredients by ethic cooking needs instead of by type.  For example, in my pantry, I have rice noodles and lasagna noodles, but they are not stored together.  I keep my rice noodles with other Asian cuisine items like brown rice and chili sauce and the lasagna noodles on a separate shelf with risotto rice and Italian sauces.  My dad likes to make fun of my Mexican zone which houses things like black beans, salsas and peppers.  The same is true for canned goods.  It is not always efficient to store them all together as a group.  Diced tomatoes, creamed corn and artichokes are not used the same way so it may make more sense for you to store them with their component ingredients so you'll know which items are missing when you are ready to prepare a dish.  You'll also save time hunting through your cabinets.  The only time I ever use roasted red peppers in a bottle is when I make hummus, so in my pantry you'll always find the peppers next to the garbanzo beans. 

My point.  When you're deciding how to group items in your cabinets, store them based on how you use them not by the type of food that they are.