HOW TO ORGANIZE DRY GOODS

… including beans, grains, and legumes

One of the things I think many find most admirable in those Pinterest-perfect and Instagram-worthy pantries is the dry good storage. All those beautiful jars with their perfect labels may fill your eyes with envy. However, some who attempt to create the same setup in their own homes find that it just is not realistic for them to keep up with. I find that their are two reasons for this. The first is that you are immediately decanting these dry goods before you even need to consume them. And, the second, is that you are purchasing a jar for every single dry good. I share all about how to overcome these hindrances to properly keeping your dry goods fresh and organized. And, did you know, you can also organize your spaces according to your organizing style? You can find out what your organizing style is here.

Before organizing your dry goods, you must purge the expired ones and the ones you do not like. Be ruthless and purge the excess so you can more easily store what you do use.

In my freebie library here, I include guides which help walk you through the organizing process and help you decide what to purge and keep. I also include my declutter and organizing challenge calendars and guides to help direct you through each area of your home. These guides ensure you get through every nook and cranny and finally get to the other side of clutter … an organized and functional space!

In this post, we focus on how to organize your dry goods including beans, grains, and legumes. Below, I share ideas on how to properly organize these dry goods with different types of organizing solutions that will work for your organizing styles and spaces. (The proper storage and organization of other dry goods including baking ingredients, cereal, and pasta are linked as noted.)

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How to Properly Contain Beans, Grains, & Legumes

STOP! Before you decant those dry goods into those beautiful jars, are you going to consume them right now? Dry goods need to stay in their original packaging until you are ready to consume them. Only after you open the package, if you are not going to cook or consume the entire package, is when you can decant the rest of the goods into a container. The container you use must have a proper gasket around the edge of the lid to help keep it air tight. This is important for keeping pantry moths away. If you have ever experienced having pantry moths, you know how very important it is to keep these dry goods sealed. Once those critters invade, all that food must be thrown away and your entire pantry must be deep-cleaned. Let me save you the trouble now. I share all about what to look for in pantry jars and canisters here. The good old classic mason jar has many benefits including one being that they are air tight. Also, you don’t have to worry about matching any jar or canister sets as you can purchase just the size jar you need and as many of that size as you need whether now or later as your pantry grows (you can find these hars below here).

How to Organize Beans, Grains, & Legumes

Knowing now that your dry goods must stay in their original packaging until opened to consume, here is how to properly organize them. It really is simple. Depending on how deep your kitchen cabinets or pantry shelves are, you can choose one of two options:

Store Unopened Packages Behind Their Designated Jars

Deeper pantry shelves may allow you to have space to store your unopened bags and boxes or beans, grains, and legumes behind your jars and canisters. The size of jars and canisters you use will depend on three things:

• One is how large the packages of beans, grains, and legumes are that you typically purchase.
• Two is how much of the package is typically remaining after you remove what you cook or consume from the original packaging.
• Three is how tall your cabinet or pantry space is between shelves.

Once you decide on what size jars make sense for you, you can then decide if you also have the space to contain the unopened packages behind your jars and/or canisters. And, within that space, you can decide if you need to also use a bin or basket to contain the unopened packages behind (like the bins and baskets below. Also note, it’s a good idea to use glass jars or clear containers when containing packages behind as this will allow you to see what you have back there at a glance when it’s grocery shopping day and you are checking your pantry for what you need. Like these acrylic bins (found here):

Or these baskets (found here):

Store Unopened Packages in a Bin or Basket Near Their Designated Jars

If your cabinets or pantry shelves are not deep enough to store your unopened packages behind your jars and canisters, bins or baskets nearby are helpful. You may not even need them as you can store your packaged dry goods directly on your shelves if you prefer to have them all visible at a glance. Depending on the configuration of your pantry, you can either have a basket or a few high up or down low adjacent to where you store their containers. You can label these baskets as back stock or beans, grains, and legumes. Rolling baskets like these are great to store on the floor of your pantry (found here):

Or, if you store your unopened packages on a shelf above your jars, you will just need to measure the depth of your shelves and use a basket with a handle like this (found here) as it makes it a little easier to grab from up high:

For the dry goods you purchase regularly, you can label the jars and canisters with the specific bean, grain, or legume names. If you change out what dry goods you consume often, you can give them a general label. Or, you can leave them unlabeled and cut a piece of the packaging with the preparation instructions and store these instructions within the jar along with the grains you just decanted.

If you have a large family and/ or consume a lot of these dry goods in general so you purchase your dry goods in bulk (i.e. Asian households who purchase 50 lb bags of rice), you can use containers like these to keep pests out (found here):

I hope you found some ideas for how to organize your dry goods for your organizing style and/or the space that you have! In my next post, I share ideas on how to organize your baking ingredients. Don’t forget to grab my free resources from my freebie library here. Let’s get to the other side of clutter … an organized and functional space!

Happy Organizing!