Episode 54: Organizing Your Kitchen & Letting Go of Perfectionism
Podcast
Episode 54: Organizing Your Kitchen & Letting Go of Perfectionism
“Nourishing yourself doesn’t have to be draining or exhausting.” — Carla Contreras
This podcast episode is about organizing your kitchen and letting go of perfectionism. It was inspired by an article that I was interviewed for on Apartment Therapy, “9 Things in Your Kitchen a Chef Wants You to Get Rid of Before 2021 Ends,” written by my friend Ashely Abramson.
You may or may not be in the space to clean right now. However, this is the perfect podcast to save for spring cleaning! Here is part of the article below. Read the full article here
1. Perfectionism
As motivated as you may be to meet your goals in 2022, be realistic with what you can accomplish and don’t compromise your mental health just to keep up with routines. “It’s OK to have shortcuts like pre-washed greens, canned beans, pre-cut veggies, dried sauces, or frozen meals,” says Contreras. “Nourishing yourself doesn’t have to be draining or exhausting.”
2. Food you won’t (or can’t) use
If you’re having a hard time keeping your fridge or pantry organized, or you want to cook more in general, start by going through your pantry, fridge, and freezer. Contreras recommends taking everything out, donating any non-perishables you know you won’t use, and tossing anything that’s expired. In general, she says items are good in the freezer for about three months, so either make a plan to use that frozen soup you made or toss it. “To make that easier, create a list on your fridge with items you need to use up in the freezer,” she says.
3. Broken gadgets
Duplicate or broken kitchen utensils, tools, and gadgets hog valuable kitchen storage space and make it hard to find what you need in a pinch. That’s why Contreras recommends sorting through them and making a plan to keep, toss, or donate what you don’t use. If you’re not sure about getting rid of a duplicate, designate a duplicate box or bin to keep outside your kitchen, then grab another spatula or can opener when your existing one is past its prime. “While you’re at it, make a list of items that your kitchen is missing or that you would like to have,” Contreras says.
4. Damaged pots and pans
Those beat-up pots and pans you’ve been holding onto just in case you need a backup? Now’s a great time to decide what to do with them, says Contreras. Do you need to get rid of the scratched non-stick pan that keeps getting food stuck in it? Is there a baking sheet that is so caked with grease, no amount of scrubbing will get it clean? “Consider what would make cooking easier, even if that means getting rid of an old one and investing in a new one,” she says.
5. Your junk drawer
If your kitchen junk drawer isn’t as functional as you think it is — for example, if it’s full of stuff you don’t need or items that belong somewhere else — consider using it for something else. “I know it’s controversial, but that space could be better used,” says Contreras. “Give the items inside of it a home and start using the junk drawer space for spices or your favorite teas.” If you want to keep your junk drawer around, go through everything and keep it organized.
6. Dull knives
Take a look at your knives. Have they seen better days? If so, the end of the year is a great time to take action by trading them out for new ones or getting them sharpened. In general, Contreras recommends home cooks get their knives professionally sharpened at least once a year. Just be careful with how you dispose of your knives. If you can’t donate them or if there is no knife disposal spot near you, wrap each knife in a few layers of newspaper and a layer of folded cardboard, then securely tape it shut and put it in a small cardboard box or another garbage-safe container before throwing it away.
7. Your beat-up cutting board
While you’re at it, check out your cutting board. If it’s cracked or beat-up, consider swapping it out for a new one, given that bacteria can grow in those grooves and knife marks. Contreras recommends a non-slip option. “If you’re not using a non-slip cutting board, now is the time, or maybe place a non-slip mat underneath yours when you use it,” she says. To keep her board from moving around when she’s chopping, she cut down a grippy, non-adhesive shelf liner to fit beneath it.
8. Unusable cleaning supplies
Once you tackle your food and cooking supplies, go through your cleaning gear. “Toss moldy sponges, the broken soap dispenser, and turn those dish towels that are badly stained or ripped into rags for cleaning,” Contreras suggests. Bonus: Clean under your sink and use up or toss the items that are hanging out down there. Always remember to dispose of chemicals responsibly. (Check online or with your local garbage collection service if you’re not sure.)
9. Dry hands
You’ll be way more likely to spend time on habits when you don’t dread them. One simple way to make cleaning your kitchen more bearable? Invest in some dish gloves and use them whenever you hand wash dishes or clean with chemicals. And keep lotion nearby, too, since washing hands a lot can dry them out. Contreras has a super-smart tip for keeping hands soft: “Add lotion on your hands while they are still damp, but not soaking wet, and then rub it in to seal the moisture.”
I am excited to hear your thoughts! Purchase the items I mention in the podcast here Get my courses here
Listen on ITUNES + Spotify Please tag me @chefcarlacontreras on Instagram so I can continue the conversation with you. Use the hashtag #showupfullypodcast
Eat Well,
xo Chef Carla
PS: Is your Pantry a mess and stressing you out? Get the Pantry Refresh
About Chef Carla Contreras
For the last 24 + years, I’ve worked as a trained chef in: Restaurants, hotels, as a chef instructor at three culinary schools, and personal chef in New York City.
Since 2013, I have been sharing my gift of content creation with publications and brands like Better Homes and Gardens, The Wall Street Journal, Shape Magazine, justBobbi.com, Nutritious Life, Well + Good.
In my personal brand, I not only show up for the hard things, I own them and then share them with the world, like my $38,000 lesson I learned in my business and evolution of a Digital Entrepreneur over the last ten years.
In my online courses, I bring my years of experience as a trained chef, content creator, health and life coach, and meditation teacher to help you with you shift mindset around cooking & the content creation process. Learn more here
Find + Work With Carla:
Online Courses & Book: Learn more here
Instagram: @chefcarlacontreras
Full Transcript:
00:00.00
Hey, it's chef Carla and welcome to Show Up Fully. This is a podcast where I share what it's like to show up for your real life if you don't know me. I'm a food stylist, photographer and health coach. I'm also a content creator for food and wellness brands. You can find me atshaf carla underscore c on Instagram. And more information in today's show notes this episode is about what to leave behind in your kitchen for 2021. This article was featured in apartment therapy. It was written by my friend Ashley Abramson and there are nine tips in there. That you can use any time of the year so whenever you're listening to this episode. It's the perfect time if you are listening to this in the winter of twenty twenty one and you're like I am just not into cleaning right now I'm gonna save this for the. Bring save it then and you can set even you know, save it in your podcast app or wherever you're listening to this or send yourself an email and maybe you want to send it to a friend so I'm gonna go directly into the tips and I'm gonna also preference this that. I am a person that has a major year-end cleanup and I'm talking about like I have you know the veterans are Booked. They're gonna do a pickup on 12/31.
I'm cleaning, the pantry the fridge, the freezer my kitchen cabinets I'm cleaning the closet I'm clean like it's just it's part of my ritual and it's been my ritual for a long time I have a virgo north node and if you don't know what what that means is that i. Love and I want to say that again. Love a clean home. I love an organized home. It helps me because I am a person that does so many different things. I do food styling, I do photography, I have my online courses. I have this podcast. There's constantly moving parts. I'm also a mother and a partner like there's a lot of things going on in my life and knowing that my home in my kitchen is organized gives me such comfort. So these tips. Are going to be applicable year -round and some of them might be a little controversial to you so I'm excited to hear your thoughts all right first is food that you won't or can't use now I like to do this in steps.
02:50.31
I like to do this one drawer, one cabinet, one shelf of my fridge at a time and I'll pull everything out. I also have a mini course called the Pantry Refresh that teaches you how to do all of this. I'll put the link in the show notes and. So for the fridge, for the freezer, for the pantry, I like to pull all the things out and there's basically categories. There's food that needs to get used up and maybe you want to put a list on the fridge again. I have this in the pantry refresh of how to really keep yourself. Organize what things need to get used up and how you can shop from your pantry fridge or freezer. Um, what needs to get rid of and maybe you have condiments from like 2010 that need to go um and also ditching that guilt of letting things go and possibly. Donating things that you know that are still good. But you're not going to use and for me I actually have a large amount of things this year from food styling that I've decided that I'm going to donate to my local.
Food pantry because there's just way too many things and I'm not going to get to them and I will say this that as a food stylist I get a lot of things from Brands. And I use a ton of them. I also give them to my neighbors to my friends to my family but they're still things that I want to make sure that they get used up all right? So broken gadgets is another hot topic. Like maybe you have a rusted can opener and that's a common thing. Um the best way to take care of the can opener is to wash it and to let it dry opened up so that it doesn't rust. Um I also saw that you can. Run it through wax paper which is really cool because it gets the food that's stuck out of there. Um, so here's the thing: I also have a lot of kitchen tools because of what I do for a living. So maybe you have a duplicate I don't know spatula maybe you have like 10 spatulas and 1 of them. Broken and has like a bit missing out of it. Get rid of those things so this is another thing where you're like okay I can keep this I can use this maybe I can donate this or maybe it does need to be trash so you need to figure out those things for yourself all right.
05:33.58
The next thing is damaged pots or pans and this is huge because I actually was resisting this myself. I had a ceramic nonstick pan that ended up really just getting scratched and you know my kids throw dishes in the sink. It takes chips out of it like it was a hot mess. Eggs were literally stuck in the pan. Um, and I knew that I had to get rid of the pan. So that's something I can't donate. I really need to trash that and I'm not sure how to recycle. If you know how to recycle that please let me know and. These are other things like maybe you have I don't know a sheet pan or a cookie sheen that really is just caked on Grease. Can you clean it up. Do you want to clean it up? That's another question all right junk drawer oh my gosh this is such a hot topic I am not a fan of the junk drawer and hello virgo north node we already established that I like order I like things to go where they go and so there is not a junk drawer. In my kitchen.
There is a drawer where I have the computers and my laptop. My daughter's laptop and aprons which used to be a drunk drawer and I got rid of it because. I want to be able to use that space for something that's important for me. It's important to have my aprons, my kids aprons and the computers enough safe space. Where they are not exposed to the elements of my kitchen. So. That's my junk drawer and whatever you want to do with your junk drawer. You know you could put teas in there. You could put spices actually. That's another thing that I did with 1 of the drawers I put all of my so. Spices in drawers in order to see everything that I have by the way spices are usually best within a year and I know that I have spices way longer than that but they do lose potency so I'm going to put that out. There. All right dull knives. This is a dangerous thing. Having a dull knife is dangerous, so either learn how to sharpen it yourself which in Cook + Chop my online cooking course I will teach you the basics of nice skills I teach you how to sharpen.
08:21.32
And maintain your knife and a very easy way if you're not interested in sharpening knives yourself, you can always take them to be professionally sharpened and you can call even I feel like Bed Bath and Beyond and like even big stores. But I would really try to support local stores that are in your area, local kitchen stores, excuse me, local kitchen stores, local sharpening. I know that my sister gets her shears sharpened for her Salon. So I feel like there is a truck like going around her town that's sharpening scissors, sharpening knives etc. So this is a thing google is your friend look it up all right moving on your beat up cutting board. Oh my goodness. So this is. Huge 1 and this is kind of a pet peeve of mine when I go to people's homes and cook and either they have I've seen glass cutting boards, a terrible idea by the way that's not good for knives. And I feel like it's also a hazard.
I really like a silicone board. I like a nonslip board. Usually the 1 in boards I save I save those for food styling and those are ones that I have to salt and those are ones that I have to put coconut oil in and those are ones that I sand down like there's a whole process involved with the wooden boards. I save those for food styling. So what do your cutting boards look like? What shape are you in? Do you need a new one and for me at home I have one that's dedicated and I teach us to cook and chop dedicated onions, garlic ginger, the pungent things and I do everything else on other cutting boards some people like. Different cutting boards for raw Meats. You can do that as well. So there's a whole bunch of options when it comes to cutting boards. Okay, next cleaning supplies. Oh my goodness. These are huge moldy sponges. Oh my goodness. So we started to use a scrub daddy and I'm not you know, sponsored by them. Um, but I was given 1 when I did a photo shoot for Bobby Brown for her brand EV_18. She gave me a couple of scrub daddies.
11:13.70
I am definitely a scrub daddy convert. I love them and I also love a brush like I love a brush that I'm gonna clean things up with and those are the tools that I use to clean. We also have you know it's interesting. We have 2 different soaps. Ed, my partner loves dawn and I use organic costco 1 so I like to use things that I'm going to use up and I think that this is important for you. What chemicals and what cleaning solutions. Do you have any? Do you need to dispose of any that have been there for like 10 years so this is another thing like the junk drawer like can you go under that kitchen sink. And clean out. Whatever is lurking under there. Um, and for me in New York city my goodness it was probably full of cockroaches all right moving on dry hands. This is huge because we are still in 2021. In a pandemic we're washing our hands constantly on a good day even pre pandemic I was washing my hands like 25 times a day because of what I do for a living so I'm gonna give you a simple solution.
My other sister Jessica actually. Owns a nail studio and she taught me this tip of when your hands are still moist and people might not like that word, but this is the reality. They're moist. They're wet but not soaking wet. You're going to put lotion on and that is the tip from a person who does nails for a living that you're going to seal in in your lock in that moisture if you don't have lotion in your kitchen. Another easy tip is olive oil or avocado oil. Coconut oil and just putting a dab like you probably need like a quart of a teaspoon for your hands and I use olive oil a lot and that's actually 1 of my tips is using olive oil and I do it like all day long like when I'm roasting vegetables. I don't wash my hands after that, you know, tossing the vegetables with olive oil, salt and pepper. What I'll do is I'll rinse my hands. They'll have a nice olive oil coating on it. A rinse off to salt in the pepper and there I go I have nice moisturized hands.
14:01.10
chefcarla_77
It's a really amazing thing. So I'd love to know if you try this out all right. The last thing is perfectionism and if there is anything to let go of in 2021 moving into 2022. It's perfectionism and this is really a huge lesson for me in 2021 is that I realized that I have all of the responsibilities that we talked about earlier and I still want to. Nourish myself and nourish my family without spending hours on end in the kitchen. I know that this is gonna sound you know like what like she's a chef like doesn't doesn't she live in the kitchen and the answer is no i. Don't want to live in the kitchen in terms of making food for myself or making food for my family now when I'm professionally food styling or creating content or creating recipes for a brand that's totally different that's work and. I often say this to my sisters who do nails and cut hair that they don't want to do on their day off and finally it was like a light bulb went off when I said that it was like oh yeah, so for me I want to make things.
Easy and for me things that are easy are purchasing bone broth. I literally have this in my shop. I buy broto because it's easy. It's delicious and it's something that I don't have to think about literally. Blend the bone broth with spinach and coconut milk and maybe some fresh ginger and salten pepper and I'm done. That's it I have like a five minute meal and it's something that nourishes me or this year I've ordered the car meals and that's another thing in my shop. I have twenty percent off and I also use Haven's kitchen sauces. That's another thing that's in the shop. I've added all these things to the shop and. Will say on this podcast that I do receive a small percentage of the sales and I do appreciate your support of my small business but I add these things because I love them. They support me in my goals of eating.
16:46.30
A delicious meal that doesn't take a lot of time and yes I buy greens from the hydroponic farm that I just have to literally snip them. They're already done. Maybe you buy box greens. Maybe you buy cans of beans. Maybe you buy jarred sauces. You know. Whatever your version of this is how can you create ease in the kitchen and it's interesting because cook and chop my online cooking school was filmed in 2018 and I feel like I'm leaning on those habits even harder at the end of 2021 than even I was doing back then because what I really wanted to do with cook and chop is create ease in the kitchen.
And a lot of what I teach you is to cut veggies because I feel like I feel my best when I'm eating veggies when my kids are eating veggies too. You know when my partner Ed is eating veggies. We feel Better. You know we don't get sick as much x y and z and we're really nourishing and taking care of ourselves through food and this is how I'm gonna end this podcast is that cooking is the highest form of self-care. This is literally. The best thing that you can do for your health. Overall it impacts every single relationship and aspect and your work in the world. Everything revolves around your health. And I feel like I said these things a very long time ago, but they're really hitting home as I end this year.
I really appreciate you taking the time if you've made us to the end of this podcast. I definitely need a dm on Instagram and. I would appreciate it if you share this podcast. If this message resonates with you, share it and send it to someone you love because that's how you support me and my work in the world I'm sending you so much. Love bye.
