Goal 34. Make a high efficiency, bright kitchen

Ok I'm back this week and ready to show you my kitchen!

Since I love cooking and kitchens and general kitchen-y "stuff" my kitchen is a constant work in progress. But one of the things that that is absolutely required is that it works much harder than me, and is relatively easy to clean up once I have finished destroying it with my latest culinary adventure. I cook like a tornado, and generally cook multiple things at one time. I also cook a lot. So here are my top 5 favourite things about my current kitchen.

1. DISHWASHER! - Absolutely no joke, I think this thing saved our marriage. And because its portable it has lived with us in several dingy apartments, allowing us to pay less on rent. Now Prince Charming doesn't spend 2-3 hours every night doing dishes, and can focus on more important things like hanging out with me, or you know, his homework. I actually also think it saved his academic career. And I love that our dish-drainer can be folded up and tucked away, to give me even more counter space when needed!

2. Act like a TV chef - have you ever really looked at a TV chef's kitchen? I guarantee you will see that they have a large (generally wooden) cutting board, and a selection of oil, salt and pepper, right in front of them, in the center of the set. Some have a ton of other stuff too. But they always have these basics. So I just stole this idea and made my own little chef station. Makes dinner prep go a lot faster and makes me look legit. Since my "set" hits a wall instead of a camera I took advantage of that space too and hung up my knives and my most used spices so that they're ready for action too.

3. Today's special - I love this little menu board I made for Prince Charming so he knows what he is supposed to be eating for breakfast and lunch. It's just a piece of scrapbook paper hung in a cheap frame, that I write one with a Dry-erase pen. We have weird schedules that often don't work well together, so he is on his own in the morning, and this lets him know what I have planned for him to put in his lunch and have for breakfast. Now he doesn't worry about accidentally eating something I was saving for a certain recipe, and I know that we have all the food he needs for lunch. These just get updated weekly and we eat the same thing for these meals each day.

4. Labels and bins - Ok, maybe I am slow but for a long time I didn't really embrace using smaller bins in the kitchen to corral little things. I mean yeah, I had a cutlery rack, but that was about it. Well once I got my first bin, I was absolutely sold. I use these bins all over the place, even in the fridge. And then I started to use mason jars as dry storage and quickly realized that lots of white powders look the same. So I just added a label using a sharpie on a bit of paper, which I cut down to size and tape on with scotch tape. Looks good enough to me, and really doesn't fall off.

5. Organized sink - This under the sink organizer might be the entire reason I love pinterest. For years I hated having a bunch of scubbing pads, dish brush and various cleaning utensils sitting in the bottom of the sink, but I couldn't think of a solution. I tried some organizers from discount stores, but they generally didn't fit well or didn't hold the things well, so eventually got tossed. But this idea is super genius. It is actually a piece of a shoe organizer that I just cut off and then hung on the door with command hooks (love these!). I cut a little "button-hole" in the top, and if you are fancy you could probably use your sewing machine to make it super strong, but for me I haven't had any issues yet. Currently I am using a vinegar & oil set from Ikea to store my hand soap and dishwashing soap, so I don't have ugly bottles everywhere. I am still working on a better solution for this, so if you have any good ideas send them my way!

What is your favourite thing about your kitchen?