Spice Cabinet Organization + Tour: Tips For Getting Your Spices Under Control!

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I love to be organized, so the spice cabinet has been a sore subject in our household for as long as I can remember. Even though Brian does most of the recipe development, I do actually cook quite a bit (mostly following recipes), and I also help him out as a “sous-chef.”

Although Brian claims there was some method to the madness of his spice cabinet, every time I would go into the kitchen to make a recipe, I felt like I spent half of the time just trying to dig out the spices. And you know Brian LOVES using a ton of them in his recipes.

Back in August, I’d had enough, and since we’ve been home with plenty of extra time on our hands, I finally decided to do something about it! I ordered several products to help me get everything organized, and then proceeded to let them sit around while I worked up the energy to actually tackle this project. 😅

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Now that everything is organized, I thought I would share my process with you in hopes that I can inspire you to take on your own spice cabinet, drawer, etc. I wish I had done this a long time ago! The spice drawer is now my happy place, and it definitely makes me want to help out in the kitchen more!

PLEASE NOTE: If you choose to purchase any products through links in this post, we receive a small commission from each sale at NO extra cost to you. All proceeds go back into making more content.

Step 1: Deciding How To Organize

I think the most stressful part of this entire process for me (and the reason I put it off for so long) was just trying to figure out HOW I wanted to organize everything. I’m pretty picky when it comes to most things (shocker!) and I had a certain “vision” in my head of how I wanted everything to look. I’ve been browsing on Amazon off and on over the years and saving a list of products I thought might be useful. I like to go through the product reviews and see photos of how other people have used the products. You can get a lot of good, practical inspiration there!

We decided that having a drawer for our spices would be the best route to go, especially since we have a nice large drawer on our kitchen island just across from the stove where Brian does most of his cooking. I bought a few rolls of this really cool spice drawer liner that can be easily cut and customized to any size drawer.

Next, I fell in love with these super clean white labels. I love how large the font is, and I knew I wanted to use those on the sides of the jars. The same company also makes matching labels for your fridge & pantry, so might I have to get those next!

Finally, I purchased a set of 36 identical glass spice jars so that everything would be uniform. As a bonus, the set I purchased came with cute round labels that go on the lids of each jar, along with a funnel to help fill them up. I ended up purchasing an extra set of 24 jars as well, so now I have plenty of jars and labels for the future. Don’t worry, we recycled the old jars and actually ended up keeping a lot of the glass ones to use for storing other things!

Step 2: Removing Everything From The Cabinet!

The next step in my process was clearing out the old spice cabinet and doing a quick inventory of everything we had. In the past, no matter how many times I tried to organize this cabinet, I always got really stressed out trying to find things!

After I removed everything from the cabinet, I decided to organize them into groups to get a better idea of what we actually had on hand.

At this point I was also able to see how many duplicates we had out from those moments when we couldn’t find something, so we just opened a new one instead.

I’m not going to lie, these sat on our kitchen island for at least a week before I moved on to the next step. Part of the issue was I wanted to film all of the steps for the video, so I had to make sure we were set up to film each time I wanted to move on to a new step. Even thought I was super excited to get everything organized, I was also just lazy and a bit overwhelmed by the project ahead. 😅

Step 3: Measuring & Cutting Liner For Drawer

As I mentioned earlier, I bought two packages of this spice drawer liner. It is like a flexible foam and comes in a roll. They include a paper tape measure, so you can measure your drawer and cut it to the correct length.

You don’t need any fancy tools to cut it – a good pair of scissors works just fine.

Keep in mind, since it has been stored in a roll, it will take just a few minutes of laying flat with the weight of the spice jars on top for it to lay properly in your drawer.

Step 4: Labeling & Filling New Jars

After the drawer was lined and looking good, it was time for the fun part! I decided that I wanted all of the jars to be uniform, so I purchase a set of matching jars. They came with the round labels I used on the lids and another set of labels I ending up using on the spice drawer liner so we remember where everything goes.

The jars also came with a funnel, but I decided to use my old Tupperware funnel for this job. It was a little annoying trying to clean it out in between spices, but I used a dry washcloth to wipe anything that remained after tapping it over the sink. The key was not getting it wet, because then I had to make sure it was 100% dry before moving on.

I put the large white labels (purchased separately from the jars) on the sides of the jars.

Since the finished jars and labels look so pretty, I would love to be able to display some of them on our counter top using a rack similar to this one, but we just don’t really have the counter space right now.

Step 5: Organizing The New Drawer

My first thought was to organize these in the drawer alphabetically, so I did just that. However, after using them for a few weeks, Brian decided he would rather organize them into different “categories” based on use.

For me personally, alphabetical would still allow me to find things a bit faster, but I let Brian categorize them in a way that made sense to him, since he does most of the cooking. As a recipe developer, he likes to be able to look in the drawer to get inspiration for what to add to a dish, rather than just trying to locate what is listed on a recipe like I do as a recipe follower.

So we switched it up and organized them as follows, keeping them alphabetical within each category:

Group 1 (Peppers): Ancho Chili, Cayenne, Chili Powder, Chipotle Pepper, Paprika, Red Pepper, Smoked Paprika

Group 2: Coriander, Cumin, Fennel, Garam Masala, Garlic Powder, Onion Powder, Minced Onion

Group 3 (Baking Spices): Allspice, Cardamom, Cinnamon, Cloves, Ginger, Nutmeg

Group 4 (Herbs): Basil, Dill Weed, Italian Seasoning, Marjoram, Mint, Oregano, Rosemary, Sage, Thyme

Random Others: Ground Mustard Seed, Celery Seed, Turmeric, Poultry Seasoning, Bay Leaves, Chives, Parsley

We used the “random others” that didn’t necessarily fit into a category to fill out the sides in rows that weren’t full. Overall, I am really happy with how it turned out. One benefit of organizing this way is that they are a lot more color coordinated!

Another thing Brian realized as he started using the newly organized drawer was that he wished there were labels on the drawer liner itself to remind us where each spice goes. I was super excited about this idea because it will help make sure we keep everything nice and organized. The set of glass jars came with an extra set of labels that weren’t quite as pretty, but did just the trick when it came to adding labels under each jar!

But What About The Rest Of The Stuff?

Brian has a LOT more spices than just the basic 36 in the drawer, so I used this triple tier organizer I purchased years ago to organize a bunch of the salt-free seasoning blends. I used the space to the right for extra things that we don’t use as often.

I put the “overflow” spices in a separate box in our closet for now. In the future, we are going to purchase spices we use often in bulk so we don’t have to keep buying so many tiny bottles!

We hope this video has given you some inspiration to get your own kitchen organized. Please watch the video and be sure to comment if you’d like to see more of these kinds of videos!

Featured Products:

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Glass Spice Jars with Spice Labels – 4oz Empty Spice Bottles (36 Count)
Glass Spice Jars with Spice Labels – 4oz Empty Spice Bottles (24 Count)
YouCopia SpiceLiner Spice Drawer Liner, 10ft Roll, Gray
Talented Kitchen 134 White All Caps Spice Label Set
Spectrum Diversified Countertop 3-Tier Rack Kitchen Cabinet Organizer, 3 Spice Shelves
iDesign Linus Plastic Stadium Spice Rack, 3-Tiered Organizer
Andy Roo’s Salt-Free Red Bean Creole Seasoning, 4 Ounce Shaker
Andy Roo’s The Stuff With No Salt – Cajun Creole All Purpose Seasoning, 5 Ounce Shaker
Andy Roo’s Salt-Free Cajun Jambalaya Creole Seasoning, 4 Ounce Shaker
DAK’s Spices Best Sellers 6-Pack