How to store heavy pantry items in drawer/pantry pullouts
vdinli
9 years ago
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Comments (9)
sjhockeyfan325
9 years agoRelated Discussions
Thoughts on Pantry Pull-Out Cabinets
Comments (33)I had a huge wide open space and opted for one 15" tall pullout. I keep bulk baking items under the baking area in a 36" deep drawer, and a spice drawer. Cereal is above the frige. This maximized countertop for me - what I wanted. I do not do bulk warehouse shopping so this works well. I also have about 15 cu ft storage in mudroom for bulk when our favorite cereal or coffee goes on sale because those are the most expensive items we buy - otherwise we use little to no prepared items. If you want all these items in you pantry, I estimate you will need at least two 15" wide units. If you buy lots of prepared items, or do warehouse shopping this may not be enough food storage - think about the way your family lives. I had 24" wide pullouts two houses ago and things were hard to find in the huge drawer - this may not be an issue for someone who is more organized than me....See MorePantry Cupboard or Closet? Drawers or Pullouts? Elevations posted
Comments (4)Mominator, I'm posting the link to your elevations below so that it doesn't have to be cut and pasted. We have a 36" pantry cupboard with drawers on the bottom and pull out shelves and fixed shelves on top. We also have a 24" cabinet we use as a baking cabinet with a center drawer and pull outs on the bottom and pull outs and fixed shelves on the top. I like them equally well. I keep a couple of small appliances on the bottom roll out of the baking cabinet. I like having appliances on roll outs instead of drawers because there is more room around the appliance for grabbing (instead of snaking my entire hand and lower arm down between the appliance and drawer side I can just snake my fingers between the shallow side of the roll out and the appliance.) I feel the same way about stock pots. I like the drawers in our pantry for holding items that don't stay put on shelves very well. The bottom drawer holds boxes and bags of pasta and overflow items. The middle drawer holds bagged items--snacks, cereals, loose granola bars, etc. The shallow top drawer has silverware (the pantry is next to our table.) The advantage of roll outs over drawers is that they are adjustable in height. You can figure out the storage in your kitchen and then adjust the roll outs so that they just clear the items below. You might find that you can squeeze in an extra shelf if you need the extra storage. Drawers are fixed in height. I've found it tricky to match items to drawer height--I often find I'm wasting vertical space because the drawers are too deep or I'm not able to store something in the area I want to because it's too big for a drawer. On the other hand, I do like having deep drawers in our pantry for corralling the items that don't sit on shelves well. Since the items are lightweight, they can be piled on top of each other and I can completely fill the deep drawer without feeling like I'm losing valuable space. As far as 2 motions required for using pull out shelves, I found I keep my most used items in the front (much like I used to when I had items on a fixed shelf). Usually I just have to open one door and grab. I only have to roll out the shelves once in a while when I'm hunting for lesser used items (i.e. grabbing a new jar of pickles, jam, or salad dressing for the fridge.) I'll caution you about your 2nd and 3rd drawings. Unless you have an island or peninsula near the fridge that isn't shown in the drawings, you're not leaving yourself much landing room for items from the fridge. Here is a link that might be useful: Mominator's Elevations...See MoreWalk-in Pantry vs. Pull-out Pantry-- Which to do?
Comments (7)Definitely walk in if you have the space in your floorplan (especially for new construction). With the walkin or reduced depth pantries with doors everything is visible and you can plan space for brooms, infrequently used appliances, and bulk storage. Walkin pantries have standard household doors which will last for decades. Downsides of pullouts are that they can move abruptly, which can cause items to shift or tip over. They are also are more fragile since the glides bear a lot of weight even with reinforcement. I can certainly imagine restless kids or grandkids slamming the pullout pantry closed or trying to climb up the shelves like a ladder....See MoreIs anyone using actual drawers for pantry items?
Comments (9)We have a pull-out for oils, vinegars etc which is one of my favorite parts of the kitchen. But sounds like that may not be an option. We do store pantry items in both drawers and pull-out shelves. Both work well, but it depends on how you actually function in the kitchen. We have a box to corral snacks (nuts, seaweed etc) on a roll-out shelf--we moved it there from a drawer, which worked equally well. I could see literally getting your boxes of pasta and laying them out to see what would work. You need to see at a glance what you're looking for. So you could lay your typical pasta and cracker stock out on their sides so that you can read the labels. If you try it before purchasing, you can figure out what depth of drawer will work. Same with cans. How many, say, tomato soup cans do you normally keep on hand? If you have them lined up right sides up, can you tell what they are? Or would all your cans need to be on their sides? That would be a much shallower drawer. Another option is to transfer all the dry goods into tins/containers; then you can label the lids of the tins. We actually keep canned beans, tomatoes etc in a static upper cabinet, which works because I always keep several cans of chickpeas in a line front to back, next to black beans in a line, etc. If you're pretty organized, it would work OK in a drawer if you knew that chickpeas were always on the right, or if you partitioned off the drawers (IKEA has great dividers) and had little labels on the drawer edge. Just remember that pullouts will steal more space than drawers. It can be worth it if you'll function better....See Moreajc71
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