After weeks of sitting in boxes and blocking access to the pantry, I finally got Hubby to finish cutting the shelves to expand the metal shelving units to accommodate more jars. I wish I’d thought to take before pictures of the 20+ boxes of canned goods that sat on the floor, but hindsight is always 20/20.
The pantry is now organized exactly the way I want it — today. Tomorrow might be a different story, but for now, everything has a place and there is a place for everything.
This shelving unit has vegetables: Beets, beans, pickles, peppers, and tomatoes.
This shelving unit is full of jams, jellies, preserves, and spreads.
This shelving unit has all syrups and canned fruit.
This unit, which needs another shelf added to the top, has all pie filling.
This unit, the only one not full yet, contains juice and concentrates.
Can you believe someone was throwing this bin out? Found it in the garbage a week ago and knew it’d be perfect for my potatoes.
These two units hold any store-bought stock as well as home-canned dehydrated food, relishes, sauces for cooking, granola, canned cakes and stewed tomatoes.
With all the jars organized and put on their respective shelves, it makes using them all that much easier. Today I used home-canned jalapenos, green chili peppers, and cut tomatoes to make some salsa. I found them quickly and easily. Four empty jars to add to the ever accumulating surplus of jars out in the garage. That’s my next project — organize all the jars and make them accessible.
I am still going to need at least one more shelving unit for sweet potatoes, more pickles, more peppers, more tomatoes, pumpkin, and whatever else fall brings. When I find that unit, hopefully in someone’s trash, I’ll no doubt have to reorganize again, but for now, the pantry is up-to-date.
Being organized is a great thing. It leaves me feeling accomplished and for this I am — Simply Grateful.
Simply Grateful Housewife 
I love that set up, and by the way, I want your address in case of a Zoombies apocalypse. Haha! That is what my daughters say about places with well stocked pantries.
I think about that too! We laugh, but I often think about the story of the ant and grasshopper and wonder how I would react should something happen. We share lots of our pantry goods with neighbors and family and even get requests for more when they’ve gone through their favorites. I love to share the bounty which is easy to say when there aren’t any zombies walking around.
Great, I usually share the produce before the canning work. I just seem to have lost my desire to do the work this year. Maybe next week it will come back.
Wow! What a well organised pantry. For a moment i thought it must be a restaurant’s kitchen store.
If only it were…It’s taken me years to finally get it to a point where I can actually find what I’m looking for without having to go through every shelf. It saves lots of time when preparing meals. Plus when heading out to the store, I can easily see what I have and don’t have so shopping lists are a breeze.
But how do you manage to keep a tab on their expiry dates. Must be difficult?
I don’t have to worry about expiration dates because nothing seems to be around that long.