A Spicey Story

One of the delectations in my life is designing cooking and cabinet spaces in a kitchen.  I could literally spend all day looking at kitchen plans.  I've been fortunate to have been able to design three kitchens for Lovey and myself.  This last one I worked on four to five years.

See this rectangular panel to the left of the drawers?  I've often seen these as fabulous pull-out cabinets holding herbs and spices.  I love the idea of utilizing every bit of space, but I didn't particularly want my spices so close to the heat the range-top was going to emit.  I decided to house my spices in a drawer that is in the island, directly behind me when I'm standing at the stove.  I can simply turn around, open the drawer and grab what I need.



 
When we moved in I dumped my existing spice containers in the drawer and it worked fine except it was always messy, the round containers took up lots of space and I never really knew what I had in the drawer. Now that herbs and spices are available in bulk at several markets I frequent I only need to buy small amounts each time.  I can keep my spices fresh by buying smaller quantities. 

I needed to start by finding containers that were consistent, small and space saving.  I selected these tins I found at Specialty Bottle.  They are 2.5" high and about 1.8" across.  Resolving to keep the tiniest amounts possible of each herb and spice, these small containers would be perfect.

I made my labels, transferred everything to their new little homes and officially declared this project done.




I am still toying around with what to do with these spaces on both sides of the range-top.  The empty space back in there is just waiting to be used for something specific  One day an idea will pop into my mind.  I'll grab my graph paper, draw it up and visit the same cabinet man who built all the cabinets in this kitchen.  We'll go through our song and dance of "that won't work", and "you can't do that", but he'll figure it out because he knows what he's doing, we've been through this before with my drawings for this kitchen, and because of that, he gets me.  But there's no rush.  The space isn't going anywhere.  Any ideas?