While he was out: a cabinet makeover

I don't know if you're familiar with the shows Clean Sweep or While You Were Out, but Eric and I have a good bachelor friend who I've been wanting to clean sweep for a long time! He is a wonderful person, and has many amazing domestic skills: the man makes yogurt and bread and even paper! However, organization and cleanliness are not his strong suits, and I wanted to give him a little help.

Earlier this fall, I surprised him by re-organizing his small and crowded pantry. I didn't want to stop there, so I asked him what other areas of his kitchen I could work on. He said his biggest issue was spices--he could never find what he needed, and thus would go out and buy another one. Upon beginning the project, I quickly saw what he meant:

Although I wanted to take absolutely everything out of the cabinet and start over, I only had a couple hours and needed to focus on the task at hand: the spices. Do you see them way up there on the top shelf? That was obviously a problem--no wonder he couldn't see what he had! I took down all the containers and counted them--there were over a hundred spice jars, not including things like extracts and flavorings! Here's a pic of them all spread out (some are even stacked on top of each other):As I started sorting them, I noticed quite a few duplicates. It was rather humorous to me at times. I've never even used allspice, and I think he had three containers of it! Whenever I could, I combined like spices to eliminate extra packaging. I set up a spice shelf near his cooking area and placed what I guessed were his most used spices on the shelf for easy access. After combining spices, if he still had more than two containers of the same spice, I set those jars aside so they wouldn't go back in the cabinet.

Next I grouped things together. He had a lot of flavorings as well as many spice blends for grilling, etc., so a friend and I labeled shoeboxes to contain those groupings accordingly:

I had a lot of fun working on this project, and have plans for dealing with those stacks of dishes in the next month or so. Our friend was quite pleased with the changes, and I hope it's helped him be able to find and use what he needs!

If you're wondering what I did with the remaining spices, I asked my friend if we could have a potluck centered around his "pantry excess." When cleaning out his pantry earlier, I'd come across quite a few staples and mixes that he said he would never use. About eight of us gathered for a very random dinner--each person was given a couple ingredients from the friend's pantry and asked to make a dish containing those items. It was a delicious meal, and a fun way to clear out our friend's shelves and have fellowship at the same time!

Note to real life friends: If you know/recognize the makeover recipient--please don't disclose his name in the comments. Thanks!