Simple Kitchen Utensil Drawer Organization
We all have those drawers in the kitchen that are just embarrassing right? For me it’s definitely our utensil drawer, so I’m sharing my no brainer kitchen utensil drawer organization method with you. Seriously, this method is stupid simple and doesn’t require a ton of time or ingenuity, just a few supplies from the dollar store!
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Welcome to the Drawer Organization Blog Hop! For the entire month of April, 12 bloggers will be sharing the process of cleaning and organizing one drawer in our homes each week. To kick off the first week, we’re focusing on drawers in our kitchen and dining rooms!
My Pinterventures • Intelligent Domestications
DIY Adulation • Domestically Creative • Cookies Coffee and Crafts
Domestic Deadline • Across the Boulevard • Michelle James Designs
Mom Home Guide • Centsably Creative
So for this first week in our month-long blog hop, we are tackling a drawer or drawers in the kitchen. I’ve already shared my tips on how to organize your junk drawers, so today I’m showing you our freshly organized utensil drawer. Let’s look at where I started, shall we?
I only wish I had a picture of what it was like before I had tried some semblance of organization with those three baskets. We just literally threw our utensils in the drawer and called it a day. Of course, then when I started cooking and needed one of them I had to dig and dig trying to find what I was looking for.
So several months ago I bought 3 long narrow baskets from Dollar Tree to store some of our most used utensils in. My thought was that they would then be front and center. In theory it sounds like a good idea right? Wrong. See, my husband likes to put things away in the wrong place all the time, and these kitchen utensils were no exception. I was finding myself rearranging them every few months, so I decided to take things a little bit further.
Tips for an organized kitchen utensil drawer
First things first with this EASY kitchen utensil drawer organization and that’s empty out the drawer completely. Give it a good wipe down, and get rid of all of the debris that tends to accumulate. I even use our little handheld vacuum to get all of those pesky crumbs that get into the corners.
Then, go through all of those utensils. Do you really need 5 different spatulas? Yes, I know some serve different purposes than others, but if you can part with any of those kitchen utensils then now is the time to do so! I ended up taking a few of our extra spatulas and spoons out and put them in our camper. Now I don’t have to remember to bring cooking utensils with me when we go on trips! I also keep our grill tongs and spatula hanging on a hook above our stove along with our meat thermometer. They take up a lot of room in the drawer so this way they are out of the way, yet accessible.
After the drawer is cleaned out and extra utensils dealt with, line the empty drawer with some contact paper from Dollar Tree. This makes the drawer have a nice clean look, and just makes the overall organized utensil drawer look better.
Then arranged the original baskets, along with a few more to give the drawer more division. Be sure to measure your drawers before deciding which baskets to buy.
Then I just simply put everything back in a neat manner, using the small square basket to house our pizza slicer, garlic press, grater and other shorter utensils.
The longer narrow baskets hold our beloved ikea spatula and tongs (seriously we love these!) and meat tenderizer. Those are the things I use the most. The next basket houses our soup ladle, sauce brushes, and pasta spoon.
Then finally the back basket houses our extra spoons and spatulas and potato masher we don’t use as often.
Organizing your kitchen utensil drawer doesn’t have to take a lot of work or effort, and you can do it with just a few dollars worth of items. Now let’s just see how long it stays this way!
More Kitchen Ideas:
- 25 Amazing Kitchen Organization Ideas
- 6 Weeks of Organization–Week 5–Kitchen Cabinets
- 10 Must Have Kitchen Gadgets
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For more kitchen and dining room drawer organization ideas, visit the other host blogs below.
I totally love your before picture with the utensils literally laying across the organizers you put in it. That made me laugh because I have so been there. Your drawer looks awesome now, though. It is so nice when everything has a place. Makes cooking dinner a thousand times easier!
Oh yes, that was my hubby’s doing lol. He just doesn’t get it!
It’s simple, indeed. I love these ideas that don’t require much effort, thanks for sharing!
Thank you Diana! Glad you stopped by!
Amanda, That is hands down, the neatest Kitchen drawer that I have ever seen! You must have nice size drawers! I love all the small trays together holding only a specific type of utensil in each! So orderly!
Jeannee
How sweet of you Jeannee!! I just hope it can stay that way.
I love it. It looks so pretty. We keep our main utensils in a container by the stove but still have a huge messy drawer full of more of them. I definitely need some of these dollar store containers. Your drawer looks amazing now.
We do keep our bamboo utensils which I use the most in a crock on the counter, but it’s amazing how many extra utensils we end up with!
I so need to clean out my kitchen drawers I love those little compartments
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Thank you Angie!
I’ve got all of my ladles and spoons in vertical holders. Love your idea though. Amazing how much organization some dividers can achieve! I do this with my stationery chest of drawers. But yes, first step is to purge what we no longer need!
Great meeting you Amanda! Here via Janice Wald’s Inspire me Monday hop. Have a great week!
We do keep some of ours in a crock on the counter too. It’s nice to be able to open and drawer and see everything at once rather than digging for ages. Thank you for stopping by Vidya!
I love how your organized drawer turned out. That was smart of you to remove extra utensils from your kitchen. I have to have fewer things in my kitchen – it’s tough to keep so much stuff organized!
It’s a challenge to keep a utensil drawer organized and having basket for everything does help. You made me laugh when you mentioned your hubby tossing in things willy nilly. My youngest son is on ‘put away’ dish duty and he does the same thing. Drives me nuts, so I labelled everything in our drawers…lol.
It’s so frustrating!! I wanted to add some vinyl to the baskets to say what utensil goes where but the vinyl wouldn’t stick to the rubber bottoms of the baskets. We will see how long this lasts!!
Stick it to the back sides of the basket like I did in my junk drawer or use the sides of the drawer itself to add labels. It’s working so far in my house. Forks and spoons have been found in their correct places…lol.
I did try sticking the vinyl to the back side, but maybe I’ll just use my label maker. That tape should stick just fine! So far he’s put the utensils in the right place so fingers crossed it stays that way for both of us!
OMG, my hubby also puts things in the wrong places! Is that a man thing? We have favorite spatula and tongs too, so funny! I am loving all of these Drawer Organization challenge ideas!
It must be a man thing! It’s so frustrating lol. Thanks for putting together this challenge. My home needed it!!
Your drawers look great. It is amazing how many utensils we accumulate. I wish I had seen those baskets at the dollar store.
Thanks Jenny! I love these baskets from Dollar Tree. They have little grippy feet and are nice and sturdy too!
Those Dollar Tree bins are great for organization. I used several, also. I was asking myself the same question about how many of a particular item do I really need. It makes for an easier time in the kitchen when we can find everything right where it’s supposed to be.
Yes, how do we accumulate so many utensils?! I’m so glad we’ve all got our kitchen drawers organized now!