Help with the tiny custom pantry of my dreams?

last month

Hi there,
Thanks everyone who shares their thoughts and expertise on this site, I've learned so much that has been helpful for our first renovation project - renovating our kitchen in our first home! After gleaning much useful information, one question remains: how do I fit the most I can in my modest reach-in pantry?

The plan is to have a carpenter fit out my 36" W x 24"D x 98"H pre-fab cabinet into a pantry that just stores food. (There are four doors, the lowers and uppers will be attached to each other.) However, the area I was planning to store my small kitchen appliances in is far too shallow (9" shelves) so now I need this cabinet to work for both!

My initial idea was to create a pantry like on the starcraft custom builders website, a batwing pantry with 8" deep shelves on the door and 14" deep shelves in the cabinet, a counter, and two drawers below the counter. But now I need to fit my appliances in there. How can I do that? What could I ask the carpenter to build?

I have a Kitchenaid mixer, a Vitamix blender, a Cuisinart food processor, an Instant Pot, a 10"x8" x6" juicer, a toaster, and an airfyer that is a bit smaller than the instant pot. And I was hoping to finally have enough room for a proper rice cooker but we shall see!

Regarding food, I have a lot of small bags grains and flours, cans, boxes of tea, a lot of packaged snacks, potatoes, onions, garlic etc. Currently fitting in 3 cabinets with dimensions 21" W x 29" H x 11" D.

An initial idea included maybe a rollout shelf below one drawer, counter, and keep the batwing doors and shallow shelves idea?

What do you all think? As I said we are new to the whole renovation world, so any insights or basic things we are not thinking about would be helpful too. Thank you in advance!

the whole kitchen:

The deeper pantry cabinet:

The shallow cabinet that won't fit appliances:

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Comments (4)

darbuka
last month
My reach in pantry has uniform 12” shelving. 12” fits a plethora of different sized jars, cans, and bags. And, it’s easy to see and reach everything in there. Small appliances fit without issue...my son’s rice cooker was stored there, until he moved.

I would never want to be lifting and carrying my KitchenAid mixer any distance! Too heavy! I keep mine in a lower cabinet in the baking area. The Vitamix is also kept in a cabinet in the baking area.

As for the toaster oven…since it’s used nearly every day, it sits on the counter.
Mrs Pete
last month
You have a wonderful blank canvas here, and you have the opportunity to make it something really functional /attractive. Have you looked at images on Pinterest, etc.? So many ideas you can copy. My thoughts:

Appliances

- Are those shelves built-in or adjustable? If they're adjustable, I'd start by adjusting a shelf just tall enough for the InstaPot, etc. I'd place them on the top shelf in the bottom half.

- I'd keep the KitchenAid mixer on the countertop -- I know, you don't want to keep too much "out", as it becomes cluttery, but the KitchenAid is just too heavy to move around.

Top cabinet

- I'd make the most convenient, easiest to reach shelf into a grains-etc. work space. I'd buy square /rectangular clear containers that'd stack nicely, and I'd store all my flour, sugar, rice, couscous, etc. in those -- place them against the back wall. Make this shelf a little tall so you can work /measure out your dry goods. It'd be nice if spices could fit on the sides (or on a turn table) in this same area.

- On next shelf up, I'd store canned goods. You'll still be able to reach these things.

- The next shelf up, I'd fill with Lazy Susans (just plastic ones bought from Amazon) for glass jars and bottles. This shelf is getting a little hard to reach, but the Lazy Susans will "bring things to the front".

- You'll probably have one more shelf up tip-tip-top, which won't be easily reachable. Use it to store things you don't use all that often -- Christmas cookie stuff, large serving platters, cake plates.

Bottom cabinet

- I'd find baskets -- I'm thinking about the Y-Weave plastic baskets at Target, which are good quality and reasonably priced -- and FILL that whole space. These shelves are pretty deep, and those baskets will allow you to "pull out" what you need. Divide your things and label the baskets; I'm thinking pastas, baking items, chips, bread, condiments.
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Yvonne Martin
last month
I agree with keeping the Kitchen Aid on the counter top. To make it more pleasant I bought a colored bowl that compliments the kitchen decor. I also bought a slider to put under the mixer so that I can keep it under the upper cabinets but move it forward when I use it.
C E
Original Author
last month
Thank you all! And thanks Mrs Pete for the detailed advice!