Getting Organized for a LCHF Lifestyle – Part 3, Organizing

March 19, 2017 by Shannon Fennell 1 Comment

There was a lot to do and changes to make when I was switching over to a Low Carb High Fat way of life.  And it is a way of life, not a diet.

Aside from getting my blood sugar under control and the weight loss, my other issue of joint pain due to osteoarthritis has disappeared.  My knees used to give out on me every now and then, but no episodes since I cut out high carbohydrate food and sugar.  And my blood pressure is completely normal too.

In these five posts I will tell you how I got my kitchen, and myself, organized to fit my new LCHF lifestyle.

Part 3 – Organizing

After I cleared out all the high carb foods and sugar my cupboards were pretty empty.  I then culled excess cups, glassware, baking pans, storage containers, etc. that I would never use and took them to Goodwill.  Then I reorganized my small appliances and moved things around to be more efficient.  I sold some of the appliances I wasn’t expecting to use again which also freed up a lot of shelf space.

In the hall closet I have shelves and two of them are for the larger kitchen appliances – the crockpot, the convection oven, electric frying pan, and some of the lesser used baking pans.

The kitchen appliances that I have currently are: electric hand mixer, blender, food processor (it is very old and I only have the chopping blade but it works,) electric kettle, microwave, coffee maker, waffle iron, convection oven – electric portable, electric frying pan, crockpot, manual spiralizer, mandolin/slicer, and a kitchen scale.

I have a pantry shelf and large spice rack in the stairwell to my basement (which is beside the fridge) which is really convenient as if I take a step down I am eye level with all my spices!  I reorganized these, moving my spices from a kitchen cupboard to the spice rack (which used to hold soup and other canned items.)  It is much better than in the cupboard as I used to have to pull things out to search for what I wanted – now it is all in front of my face and I only need to touch the one that I need.  And the canned goods and unopened jars are on the pantry shelf.

I decided to use glass jars to store my dry goods as it is so easy to see what I have at a glance.  I use recycled jars, mason jars – any glass container with a proper sealing lid.  So I put all my nuts and seeds in jars, including my nut flours and nut “cereal mix” that I make.  I have tea bags in jars too.  I also recycle the jars spices come in and refill with my own mixes or bulk spices.

I have a freezer in my garage where I keep meat (I get my pork from a local producer so stock up in bulk) and frozen homemade stock.  I keep a fair amount of portion sized packages in the fridge freezer in the kitchen.

I keep things visible and organized so that I can see at a glance if I am running out of something.  With the space I’ve freed up by culling I now can put regularly used items (kitchen scale, mandolin, etc.) in the easily to reach kitchen cupboards.

I have baking sheets, muffin tins (regular and large), a mini loaf pan, a loaf pan, and the usual casserole dishes, roasting pans, wire cooling racks, colanders, a couple sets of measuring cups and spoons, etc.  Good knives, pizza cutter, tongs, etc. Pretty much what most people have in their kitchens.  I do have four different types of graters though – a box style, a flat one, one very fine one for hard cheese and the container with lid style from IKEA.

And lots of plastic storage containers for the leftovers – some are pretty old and I’ve been culling out cracked ones and the ones with no matching lids.

I moved things around in the cupboards to be more efficient – the coffee is above the coffee maker, the snacks are closest to the living room, generally put things where they would be used and easy to grab.

The whole project is a work in progress and I am still shifting things around, and continue to get rid of things I discover I am not using.

My other posts about food

Next: Part 4, Tips and Tricks

Go to Part 1