“The kitchen is the castle. This is where we spend our happiest moments and find the joy of being family.” – Mario Batali
There is something entirely refreshing and life-giving about a clean, uncluttered kitchen counter. In fact, it is one of my favorite benefits of minimalist living. It sets the tone and culture for the home. It communicates calm and order. It promotes opportunity and possibility (who enjoys cooking in a cluttered kitchen?). It saves time and promotes cleanliness.
Yet kitchen counter organization is one of the most difficult things to get started with. There are, of course, several reasons maintaining a minimalist kitchen is so hard:
- The kitchen is hard-wired as a natural gathering place for the family.
- The kitchen is physically located in a high traffic area of the home.
- The purpose of the room requires messes to be made during its use.
- The kitchen is often used as a collection area for various odds and ends (mail, etc.).
While kitchen counter organization is difficult, it is completely achievable. We have made it an important feature of our house and you can accomplish it in yours as well.
Decluttering Tips For Keeping Your Kitchen Counter Organized:
1. Remove the unnecessary.
One of the biggest causes of clutter in our homes is our tendency to put too much stuff in too little of a space. When we do, it becomes difficult to store things, find things, and access them. As a result, we dread putting things away and it becomes convenient to leave things on the counter.
Typically, the kitchen is full of this clutter. We have cupboards and shelves and drawers full of cooking utensils, gadgets, things we thought we needed, and items we purchased for one-time use.
If keeping your kitchen counters uncluttered is a problem in your home, this is the most important step you can take. Remove completely any item you no longer use. And store items used less than 3 times/year elsewhere.
2. Relocate anything that does not belong.
Kitchens are notorious for becoming collection areas for all various odds and ends. Unintentionally, they become the storing place for many of them: mail, kids’ homework, purses, keys, almost everything in your junk drawer.
Identify a new proper home for each. Then, change the culture in your home that allows them to stay there. Think of your kitchen as a Department Store Customer Service Area – items may enter there, but rarely stay. You can also extend this thinking to items you already store in your kitchen: televisions, radios, telephone books, etc.
3. Give every item a proper home.
One of the most essential steps in organizing and keeping a home clutter-free is to find a proper home for every item. Designate drawers for silverware and cookware; cupboards for plates, containers, and small appliances; and closets/shelves for food and larger, less-used appliances. After taking steps #1 and #2, you’ll find this easier than you think.
4. Store daily use appliances out of sight.
If your counters are routinely cluttered, there is a good chance you are storing many daily-use items there (toasters, coffee makers, teapots, can openers, spice racks, etc.).They are often stored on countertops for convenience’s sake.
But in reality, these items spend far more time as clutter than they do as needed instruments for food preparation. For example, if you make toast every morning for breakfast, it’ll take roughly 3 minutes to toast your bread. After that, the toaster will sit unused for the next 23 hours and 57 minutes. You use it far less than you think you do.
Rather than allowing these appliances to take up counter space and cause distraction, find a home in an easily-accessed area. In our current home, we store the toaster, coffee-maker, and teapot in a cupboard right next to the outlet. In our previous home, they were stored in an appliance garage.
5. Change your “counter is convenient” mentality.
The fallacy of convenience is a big reason our kitchen counters stay cluttered. We tend to keep things in plain sight because we believe it makes our kitchen more convenient. As a result, our counters fill up with baking ingredients, knife racks, cutting boards, and coffee mugs.
And while it may be more convenient to readily grab those items when needed, we rarely notice the other conveniences we are sacrificing by storing them there. We move them every time we wipe the counters. We sacrifice precious prep space when we cook. And they subtly fight for our attention whenever we enter the room.
6. Finish unfinished jobs completely.
When a counter is clear and tidy, it becomes a motivation to put things away. But a cluttered counter attracts clutter… and unfinished jobs are a clutter.
Granted, some projects take more time than others, but many kitchen jobs (washing the dishes, wiping the counters, returning used items, etc.) can be completed right away before ever leaving the kitchen in the first place. For best results, if a job can be finished in less than 2 minutes, do it. Finishing tasks will do wonders for your attitude the next time you walk in.
7. Reset each evening.
If you are lucky, your kitchen gets used every day. And any room that gets used daily will need to be reset daily. That’s why it has been on my evening checklist for a number of years.
We live our lives and often get too used to them. As a result, we get used to our cluttered kitchen counters and don’t realize how freeing it can be to keep them clear. We may be reminded when we walk into a friend’s house or see a photo of a simple kitchen, but we’ve become so accustomed to the current state of ours we forget we can change.
You don’t need to live with a cluttered kitchen countertop. The solution to your kitchen’s countertop organization is indeed simpler than you think.
Image: Yasu’s Photo
AlexM says
And another great bonus to keeping counters clear, is that they are safer! There is a food handling component to the clean kitchen theory too. One area I struggle with, is my pantry stock. But for counters, being able to fully wipe them down after preparing a meal means there are less germs to cause a potential problem. Trying to cook on a cluttered counter top also means an increased chance of injury — you need room to chop, a safe place to put down a hot/heavy pan, etc.
O+ says
This post made we wonder about your philosophy on food itself and your consumption of it. :) Is your fridge full or is it minimalist also?
Keep up the good work!
Fiona Malone says
A friend read a tip in a book, which was basically a zero tolerance approach to Things on Flat Surfaces. The idea was that if you’re inclined to be messy, don’t put ANYTHING on a flat surface, the absolute opposite of what happens in decorating magazines. Because once one thing is allowed there, it will grow friends: the flowers attract the keys, which attract the phone, which attract the bag, which attract the pens…
I tried it. I removed everything from my kitchen table and bench. I found everything a new home (including the bin). And now I do not leave the room while there is stuff on the surfaces. When I’m done in there, the surfaces are clear.
It’s been several months. I still have clear benches.
(Except for the gingerbread house that was an awesome idea but badly planned, because I have no idea where it should live. I think we need to eat it soon.)
Lorraine says
Right after I read this post, I rearranged some things in the cabinets and made space for my coffee maker. The toaster oven is just too big to hide away, but now it is the only item left on the counters. I’m loving it!
Thia May says
Oddly enough, this is my least problem area, mostly because my kitchen is in the back of the house (not a high traffic area) and I have a home office with a bin for mail. However, I have the toaster and coffee pot out. I can’t remember the last time I actually had toast. Need to move those now. And as always, LOVE, LOVE, LOVE your blog. Thank you!!!
Cait says
Okay, okay! I’ll dismantle my spice rack tonight and re-gift the rice cooker to the neighbors. Thanks for the motivation, Joshua. Kitchen clutter has been quite the 9:30 pm argument ignitor. Let’s put a stop to that!
Lisa says
As for kitchen gadgets & clutter: get rid of single use gadgets. A toaster oven is a multiple use item (save a lot of $ to use a small toaster oven than heat the whole large oven for small baking) and replaces the toaster. A rice cooker is nice, but just one more item and doesn’t actually reduce the amount of dishes to be done. All the little gadgets we buy are usually easily replaced by a couple of good knives (and learning how to use them).
Have a gadget that you haven’t used in a year? Get rid of it :-).
The Maui Taoist says
Thanks again Joshua,
If we all could just master the kitchen first, it will help keep the whole house clutter free. The kitchen is our first and best place to start. We can set an example for all the other rooms. I know most of us know this…. but that is why I SUBSCRIBE to your blog. It is great to get these reminders to keep on our path. You are so right on… get the kitchen done and keep it done and you will be empowered to clone that clutter free feeling to the other areas of you life.
Thanks again for the gentle reminder!
swalia says
We follow most of the above mentioned points in our kitchen except for having a separate storage for kitchen appliances. Half of the kitchen shelf is occupied with the appliances which have limited use daily. Implementing this advice is going to make a big difference. Thank you for sharing!
Dan Garner says
‘Change your “counter is convenient” mentality’
Nice point. I’ve recently discovered that a cluttered surface ( or room, or desk ) brings about stress as compared to a clean counter top. Nice clean lines tend to calm.
Dan @ ZenPresence
Rebecca says
I find that clutter also creates a sense of unease with me too.. yet surprisingly so does the emptiness. I don’t like clutter but it follows me.. I guess I need to do some EFT on that feeling of emptiness.