The kitchen is the center of the house, the heart and gut of the organism called “home”. In my opinion, the kitchen should get the most attention when it comes to layout and equipment. It matters how the food is prepared, both in its nutritional components and the energy with which it is cooked. It matters how organized and clean this space is, but also how aesthetic it is, so that you feel good when you cook.
My kitchen
When I renovated my kitchen, 2 years ago, I did not realize how important this gesture was. I also organized the old kitchen, but I felt that I no longer resonated with it, I felt a pinch when I went in there, and I tried to shorten the time I spent cooking as much as possible. The stove kept breaking down and I spent a lot of money fixing it. I could no longer maintain order and cleanliness as I would have liked, no matter how much time I spent trying to do so. So I took heart and went ahead with the renovation, although I was scared of the mess it would make and the money spent.
And things went smoothly, as they do when it is their turn to be done. A friend offered to make the furniture bodies for me and together we thought about the functionality of each drawer, shelf, handle, leg of the cabinets, everything. I chose materials with the best quality-price ratio, appliances as well, and my husband built me drawer dividers to my “precious” directions, so now I have a bright and organized kitchen that I can easily clean, find anything even in the dark, and everything is at arm’s length when I’m cooking. Since I got the new kitchen I spend hours here, cooking goodies, creating new recipes, and my inspiration is at its maximum. I have the kitchen open to the rest of the house, because I consider that the smells of food are something natural, in any home people cook and eat. And the cook (that is me 😊) is not a slave kept in a closed space, but the mistress of the house, who can communicate with anyone and watch everything that happens in the house when she cooks.
How do we organize ourselves in the kitchen?
When you keep finding excuses that you don’t have time or don’t like to cook, think about whether the kitchen space is arranged in such a way that it delights your heart. And that it’s clean and organized, that you have the appliances, pans, pots and other utensils you need to cook healthy, those and not extras that clutter you up and take up precious space. Keep the worktop free so that you are tempted to use it. Don’t fill it with the espresso machine, the microwave oven, dishes left to dry, boxes, cutlery and other objects that have no business there, objects that cut off any desire to roll out a pie sheet or have to huddle in a corner table to clean vegetables for a soup.
The fridge should be close at hand, not in another room, so that we get out of the flow state of being annoyed that we have to open 3 doors to get an egg from the fridge or that it slips on the floor from our wet or oiled hand. The pantry should be organized ergonomically, let’s not sit there for whole minutes looking for the jar of buckwheat. And yes, seeds, legumes, nuts, raisins and other small, slippery things should be taken out of the bag they were bought in and stored in labeled boxes or jars so that we don’t have existential questions in front of a jar: these would be soy beans or chickpea? Would it be sesame seeds or quinoa?
Every object, from the smallest, like those rubber bands we put on everything, to the biggest, like the bowl mixer, must have its place. We take the object, use it, wash it and put it back. Cutlery should be arranged nicely, in a drawer with dividers, so we don’t get angry that we can’t find a certain spoon or cut ourselves with a knife blade when we rummage around the drawer. The 178 spices should be placed in labeled containers, and the containers placed in such a way that they can be easily accessed.
Thus our energy will flow naturally and beautifully when we cook, without being distracted by anything other than the ingredients in front of us, and the food will contain the goodness and beauty of the person who cooked, but also of the space in which it was cooked.
