I'd surmise at the time, a table for "working" was front and center in kitchens and this was placed off to the side....then there was a stove/fridge and sink,basically. People had cellars for canned and "put up"goods. I can remember fetching stuff from both grandma's cellars-they didn't buy so many canned goods or frozen stuff either.We became suburbanites with counters/cabs built in efficient runs. I'd take airtight canisters sitting in a pantry cabinet, or a wall cabinet with a door, any day.

Most people don't cook anymore, and they especially don't bake. Christmas cookies and the occasional Nigella Lawson experiment don't count. Eighty or ninety years ago, mom baked bread, rolls, biscuits and pies and cakes for every meal plus snacks. Efficiency really mattered. Today, most kitchens are stage sets for a fake display of domestic life, and are used for homework, "entertaining," etc. more so than cooking. Out in the real world, it is very rare to find somebody remodeling a kitchen who puts as much effort into analyzing cooking or baking function as a GWebber.

Hard to clean attached bins and potential problems with infestation. The original Tupperware probably had a lot to do with the disappearance of cabinets with built-in bins.

True about the problems. But it's interesting that the original concept didn't evolve. There was that video everyone likes about kitchen efficiency, but even built-in cabinet solutions didn't really stick around. A kitchen just isn't a production room like it was, not for most people. I think that's why GW exists, frankly--those who are interested in efficiency have a tougher time finding off-the-rack solutions.

marcolo - laughing! My counter is currently covered in a partially finished quilt.

Even in the days when the flour bin was used on a daily basis, there would have been a problem storing flour in a built-in bin. You've got to use up the flour all the way the bottom and clean the bin or eventually it gets bad. This is especially true if you use whole wheat flour which gets rancid. Totally gross.

Another consideration would be containment. Flour has a way of pouffing out when you're measuring it - flour pouffs here, there, and everywhere. From a bin those pouffs would be all over the floor and the adjacent cabinetry. From your Tupperware (or the bag), those pouffs are more likely end up on your working surface and your person where they are easy to clean.

The Hoosier cabinets dispensed flour and sugar from the bottom of the bin. At least mine does. So, the oldest stock was always being used first.

And, if you really think about it, the Hoosier was the original factory built cabinet. Fell out of favor when kitchens started being integrated, stick built-in-place. Now, we've come full circle and far more kitchens are assembled with factory-built cabs than are being built in place.

BTW, you can buy reproduction Hoosier bins.

Here is a link that might be useful: Reproduction Hoosier bins

I'm amazed that a lot of those replacement bins are labeled not food safe. I mean, what the heck are they for?

Your tennis shoes?

I also find it interesting that so many, including me, are building cabinet layouts with a hutch, hoosier, or credenza look and feel. I realize they're all different. I guess I"m referring to the built-in furniture piece look.

How come no one has mentioned weevils? ICICIICIkkkkkkk

Yeah, bugs. I thought seriously about installing Hoosier-type flour bins and such in my cabs. There aren't any solutions that are both convenient and airtight. I find that if I freeze flour for a while after I bring it home, most of the bugs go away (just deal with the fact that you're eating insect eggs). But still, I don't want exposure to air.

ETA:
Holy cow! The flour bin listed above is food-grade, and comes with a tight-fitting lid. Great, the last thing I need is more cool options to think about!!

This post was edited by marcolo on Mon, Jan 28, 13 at 14:35

marcolo- not sure I agree about how folks use kitchens- a quick look at the last 3 dozen I've done- 3 or 4 don't cook, 8 or 9 don't bake- that said all 36 are set up to allow serious cooking, convenience of storage and good work flow. That relationship would be consistent over the last 10 years some 200 plus kitchens.
Have done 2 with real Hoosiers too :)

I'm talking about national statistics. Way lower numbers of meals prepared at home. Plus, supermarkets full of MW food, prepared "fresh" food and fake cooking food (Trader Joe's). Cooking from scratch on a regular basis is a thing of the past for most people.

I have this hoosier which we bought an auction some 15 or so years ago. It needed restoring then, and still does. Recently I spent a couch potato day searching old newspaper ads researching Hoosiers to find mine's maker and was tickled to discover this ad from 1928, and the fact that this hoosier in my kitchen had a secret to me feature --the pull-out table.

My theory is that built-in kitchens and supermarkets were the end of hoosiers. It would be interesting to follow the disappearance of the hoosier ads in newspapers and see what other ads start to appear.

How come no one has mentioned weevils?

Prolly because back in the day, down on the farm, those tin Hoosier bins kept the rodents out of the flour & sugar and, in the case of my great grandmother, feeding thirteen kids, I don't think a 25# sack of flour stayed around long enough for bugs to be a big problem. Just in case they were, the Hoosier bins had built-in sifters to catch the weevils before they got into the bread dough.

That & I doubt folks living thru times like the Depression got all hinky about a few bugs in the flour. They were probably just glad to see some food on the table.

onedoggie, you bring up a good point. We're talking about two separate issues here.
- Built-in tools and storage bins
- Standalone workstations

For the second point, the answer is, yes, the Hoosier itself started passing out of popularity in the late '20s and 1930s as built-in cabinetry really took over. That is exactly what the advertising showed. In fact Hoosier introduced its own line of built-in cabinetry featuring a choice of monel or wood countertops to compete.

Onedogedie- Napanee Dutch Kitchenets are still around, or at least were recently, The Coppes Company in Napanee, Indiana.

I own three Hoosier style cabinets, all from Indiana, one company was founded about 40 minutes from my home. I love them and use them, but none of them are used for food storage any longer. In our prior home, I used one of them in the kitchen as a pantry, and it worked well. It held my canning supplies, I used the flour and sugar bins, and kept it full of mason jars and canisters. Here I have more space, a separate pantry, and a bigger kitchen, that all serve my needs better than one cabinet ever could.

@Marcolo - I think your statements about people not cooking as they did in the past is a significant issue. I used to read a short story with my high school students. The protagonist used a sifter to bake a cake with her grandmother - over the several years I read that story, I never once did a student know what a sifter was; I rarely had a student who'd baked from scratch - ever - they thought baking from scratch meant refrigerated rolls or tubs of dough or powder in a box.

More recently, I read an article about kitchen remodeling on Yahoo news that discussed the glitz and glamour of kitchens with no focus on functionality with the idea that the looks are what's important. I also read a comment you made about galley kitchens - same thing - nationally, people do not cook; they might make meals, but they do not cook much because every part of a meal can be purchased already prepared.

Wow, I had no idea there are people that have never made things from scratch. Not even cookies? Such a shame. My grandmother died from cancer when I was only 8. The only things of hers I have are 2 rings and her cookie jar. We spent so many days baking cookies together. That jar and those memories are more valuable to me than the rings.

Deskilling (de-skilling) is a major force in the food business on both sides of the food counter. There's a lot of talk about it right now. Deskilling on the production end has been a key goal of agribusiness for decades, replacing skilled workers (like certain kinds of butchers) with unskilled labor or automation, to maximize the share of profit that goes to corporate. Food businesses have also focused heavily on de-skilling consumers, specifically targeting women with marketing, etc. to make sure they do not have the skills to cook from basic staples and so need to purchase more prepared and partially prepared food. "Convenience" is just the marketing angle.

This post was edited by marcolo on Tue, Jan 29, 13 at 0:40

Geez you guys are depressing me.

The only reason I don't bake more is because most of what I want to bake is so fattening! ;)

My kids made me choc-choc-caramel-chip cookies for my birthday. DH ate most of them, but better that all of them do the eating than me (the kids are massively energetic; I am not)! ;) I was amused that the kids haven't the experience/finesse to realize it is actually possible to put too much chocolate into a cookie. But I was proud of myself for staying so hands off.

Turns out we "modern" parents really do have a problem with letting kids just have at it and even sink sometimes. It's hard when life is *so* busy that any given experience is so rare that its failure won't be the basis of repeated practice that will result in success, it'll just be ... failure.

It is a wonder that humans remain human at all given the preponderance of the non-food they eat nowadays.

But I'm with several above who love the concept of the hoosier and its at-ready flour bins, but are grossed out at the prospect of using them today. I agree the volume of most's cooking/baking just wouldn't make the tradeoff in bug habitation. I can go through a #25 sack of flour in a month if I'm on a roll (so to speak). But I bet the more typical throughput back in the day was a matter of days (though those bins only hold #5 or so).

Things change; life changes. That "deskilling" disquisition is interesting, but these pressures on women and society in general are a constant force probably since the dawn of fire. I am as happy as the next to lay all blame at the doorstep of BigBizness, but the forces that have booted women from out of the kitchen are myriad and long-term. Not to mention that got them into it in the first place.

In the meantime I have a cousin who owns -- and uses -- one of those hoosiers. I try to stay positive and not wonder too much about the makeup of protein she serves us. ;)

Um, what is a Hoosier cabinet exactly? I saw the drawing but I am still wondering.

Hun,
Your grain and flour stuff, (including corn meal) does not have to be on the floor to get bugs.

Lots of time the aforementioned eggs are in the product.

I had hand ground cornmean, some whole wheat flour, and regular flour in the canning jar type containers, with the rubber gaskets. Some time later? Bugggggggggsssss.

Thought I was gonna yak.