As long as the plastic is not subjected to high heat or pressure, their "passive" use should not impact plant health (or your own). I would be more concerned about the plastics you use every day, such as the pour spout in your Coffee Maker, where heat can leach out bad things. Trash bag liners in your container should not be a worry. Raybo

Wow! I'm in good company! I'm probably most like TimberFrame4us. In our new kitchen, I've devoted TWO deep 33" drawers to the plastic containers AND the glass ones are in two 30" drawers in the baking area (along w/mixing bowls, casserole dishes, & soup tureens...by shape) as I can bake in them as well as use them for storage. The glass ones are all Pyrex; but in the plastic, I have a selection of Tupperware, Rubbermaid, and those disposable ones (Ziploc, Glad, etc.) in all sorts of shapes & sizes...rectangular, square, round and little condiment sizes, kiddie snack size, all the way to those big rectangular (great for Christmas cookies). Like Zelmar, I did get rid of all those "misc containers" when I packed up the kitchen for the remodel (a year ago...wow!) I use the disposable ones when I go places so I don't have to worry about getting my containers back. I have noticed that probably 75% of the others have not been used since we moved back into the kitchen...hmmmm...I guess that's telling me something! Time to get ruthless and get rid of (or maybe pack away for awhile) all those I don't use....I bet I can free up one drawer... As to the lids, I took one of the long rectangular Rubbermaid containers and stored all the small-to-medium sized lids. The larger lids that didn't fit sit underneath or stand next to their "mates".

Great ideas! Here is what works for me and what I have taught others. One idea that cannot be overstressed is to wrap extremely well any food item you want to store for many months...double wrapping is only effective if the correct materials and techniques are used. A magnetic strip holds "the inventory" list for each shelf's contents on the door of our upright freezer. When I add an unlisted item, I add to the inventory, and delete when all of an item is gone. My DH is "finding-challenged," LOL, so this saves time. He knows that baked goods are likely to be in 5# flour bags. Cinn rolls are almost always in coffee bean bags, etc. Each item is labeled. Like grainlady, I group similar items together in small baskets or bags. Usually, the ready to eat foods are on the top shelf, since this is the warmest area and the bottom shelf is the coldest. The chest freezer, downstairs, also has an inventory list. In the fall-winter, I remove the baskets, so I can cram in all the chickens, squash, onions, etc. In the bottom half, I store all the cartons of food (extremely well wrapped), in windbreaker fabric bags. The upper half has bagged food also. Liter and half gallon containers of distilled water fill any empty spaces. A long sheet of bubble wrap covers the contents. The inventory list is posted on the nearby bulletin board and is absolutely necessary to my sanity. Sometimes, I note on my list just how many containers of an item I have left, especially if I have combined several items in one bag. For example, I'll note 2 half gallons of raspberries and 1 half gallon of peaches with 3 half gallons of blueberries...in one bag. (These half gallon containers have 1-2 cup portions of fruits.) This helps when I am making jam in Feb. If any fruit or veg is left from the previous year, when the next crop is freezer ready, the "older" crop is moved to the upright freezer for use.

ITA with lazy_gardens. Over the past year or so I've been purging storage containers and limiting what we keep. During that time, someone in our household has been eating the same sandwich meat regularly- and it happens to come in one of those reusable containers. Now we have about 25 identical containers- probably about 2 cup size? I grab them for everything, even if it means we use 2 or 3 to put one particular type of foodstuff away. It's so convenient and the cabinet isn't a jumble anymore. We still have a few other, older containers, but as they wear out, I'm not replacing them. I bought a few larger of the inexpensive type, but in those bigger sizes we never need more than 2. We also use zipper bags more than we use to, realizing that our family tends to only have large quantities of leftovers a couple of times a year. If/when the sandwich meat containers wear out, I'll probably end up getting rid of them all and replacing them with about 10 identical, inexpensive containers.