The Key to a Clean Kitchen
Keeping an organized kitchen doesn’t have to be a chore. Not only will organization help you with being a better and more efficient cook, it will also help reduce overall clutter in the house, keeping a cleaner atmosphere with minimal work. Simple tips like wiping down the sink or washing a cutting board after each use can keep things clean, but these tips will help you focus on the food, not the mess. Our friends at Maids in a Minute offers house cleaning in Farmington Hills and gave us these house cleaning tips.

Get rid of clutter
One easy tip is to hang your towels rather than keeping them folded – it will help them dry faster and also keep your counter space clear for other needs. Lazy Susans aren’t just at home on the dinner table; try them in cabinets or on countertops to organize spices, dishes, or an assortment of items, and cut down on the messy work of dusting or wiping out cabinets.

Efficiency is key
So you’ve inherited your mother’s cookbook collection, but with pages everywhere and an unruly stack, what good is the information if you cant find it? It can be tempting to haphazardly pull out and replace cookbooks, but having a system of organization will help you find information faster and keep things looking neat.

The way you set-up your kitchen will also help with usability and reduce the amount of items you need to rearrange or look through to find what you need. Keep the items you use most – whether they are dishes or spices – in lower shelves closer to your preparation area. That way everything you need is where you need it. Similarly, store similar items together; you don’t want to pull out all of your pots just to get to the aluminum foil.

Channel your inner librarian when planning where things go in your kitchen and you’ll cut down on tons of later work in cleaning and while cooking.

Just toss it
It’s easy to forget about fridge organization when the mess is hidden behind closed doors, but rather than wait until things start growing hair, toss items within a week to avoid later (disgusting) cleanup. Keep perishable items towards the front of your fridge so you’re constantly reminded of their existence – this way you will know when you’re out of milk and you can keep an eye on expiration dates.

The same goes for the pantry – buying new items can hide those that have expired and are just taking up space. If you organize contents by meal type or another system, you’ll know when and where the things that you need are. If a monthly survey is out of the question, try putting new items behind old ones, this forces you to use up what is there – eliminating waste – and can be an easier way to mind expiration dates than digging around or chance.

With a few changes in your kitchen you’ll be on your way from slob to organized in no time. Not only will this reduce your overall cleaning times, but you’ll also get to focus your kitchen energy where it should be: cooking.