Australian home cooks share pictures of their perfectly arranged utensils

Home cooks have shared pictures of their perfectly arranged kitchen utensils – complete with drawer dividers, storage containers and categorised items.

A woman prompted a discussion on social media after she asked fellow Australians to share the best ways to store utensils such as wooden spoons, tongs, pizza cutter, rolling pin, whisks, scissors, spatulas, can openers, peelers and potato mashers.

‘Help I’m going crazy. How does everyone organise their utensils drawer?’ she asked in a Facebook group, along with a picture of her cluttered drawer, filled to the brim with utensils.

Her post was quickly met with hundreds of suggestions, with many people sharing pictures of their perfectly organised utensils.

‘Firstly cull the stuff you don’t use or haven’t used in the last six months. If you don’t want to get rid of it, put it in a container on top on the fridge,’ one woman suggested.

Dozens of people revealed they arranged the utensils based on categories and types of material such as wood, metal, and plastic.

‘I had the utensils lined up according to the type – plastic/wood etc,’ one said.

Many used bamboo boxes – including $4.50 wide or $5.50 narrow boxes from Kmart, or a set of six boxes from IKEA for $29.99.

‘Use the bamboo boxes from Kmart, you can mix and match to fit exactly what you need,’ one wrote, while another said: ‘I bought bamboo drawer boxes from Kmart. Works great.’

Another woman added: ‘IKEA has great cheap organisers, that’s what I use but make sure you measure before you buy.’

Dozens of shoppers said they swear by expandable drawer dividers, which cost $6 for a pack of two from Kmart or aluminium versions at Bunnings from $27.51.

‘Bunnings have a system that you can customise to suit your drawers,’ one wrote, along with a picture of her drawer dividers from the warehouse store.

Others got creative by hanging all their mostly used utensils on a wall near a stove top that’s in reaching distance to make cooking a breeze.

Some thrifty Aussies used old biscuits containers to store their utensils neatly in the drawer, while others opted for cardboard boxes.

‘I just used some old biscuit tins,’ one woman said, while another wrote: ‘I use a cardboard box that I got from Aldi from when they were selling kitchen utensils.’

And a third woman added: ‘You take everything out and put in a cardboard box and take out what you need in the next two weeks. Those other items, you can store away in a cupboard or cull.’

While others got creative by hanging all their mostly used utensils on a wall.

‘I have a magnet block with matching utensils by the oven on the wall and a can of spares on top of fridge,’ one wrote.

Another added: ‘Hang the most frequently used items and then you can also find the remaining drawer items more easily as well.’

Earlier this year, a father-of-three sparked debate over the ‘right’ way to arrange your kitchen drawers after sharing a labelled photo of his layout online. 

Jordan Watson, the New Zealand creator of the ‘How to Dad‘ Facebook account, shared a photo of his drawers in April and said if his followers’ drawers weren’t ordered the same way they needed to ‘sort their lives out’.

The father had the cutlery drawer first, followed by the utensils, tea towels and miscellaneous products at the bottom.

‘A few people are arguing tea towels should be in the bottom drawer,’ he said in a separate post. ‘I’ll let you in on a DadHack here. Babies will moan at your feet as you try and cook three meat and vegetables for dinner. 

‘That is unless you have the bottom (baby accessible) wonderland of randomness drawer open for them to entertain themselves. Obviously remove the pointy things from the big random mess drawer first.’ 

Many agreed with the arrangement, saying that it was ‘spooky’ how everyone seems to have their drawers set up in this way.

But others said they had drawers dedicated to plastic rubbish bags, baking paper and Cling Wrap as well.

‘We have one cutlery drawer mess and then three big random mess drawers. And don’t get my husband started on the plastic nightmare cupboard,’ one woman said. 

‘Ours goes utensils, baking paper/foil/random bits, cutlery then tea towels. Gets almost every one that the cutlery isn’t at the top, but that way our two-year-old can help set the table without assistance,’ said another. 

Mr Watson previously declared that knives must be laid on the left, forks in the centre and spoons on the right of the cutlery drawer. 

More than 9,000 people weighed in on the photo, the vast majority of whom disagreed with the depicted layout.

They saw storing knives on the left as confusing and counter-intuitive because you always eat with a knife in your right hand.

Most said drawers should be arranged the same as you set a dinner table, starting with forks on the left, followed by knives and spoons on the right, with a small section for teaspoons running horizontally across the bottom of the tray.

‘Why would you put the knives on the left in the drawer when at the table you hold your knife with your RIGHT hand?’ a mother from Dunedin on New Zealand’s South Island said. 

‘Put the knife and fork in the drawer as you would lay them on the table…then spoons go to the side. Honestly, I despair for mankind. I had no idea so many people were getting this simple concept so wrong!’

An Israeli woman agreed, saying drawers should always be arranged with forks on the left, knives in the centre and dessert and soup spoons on the right. 

But not everyone accepted the standard table setting pattern.

‘This is all wrong, it’s messing with my head. It’s forks, spoons, then knives,’ a man said. 

A Queensland father responded that only ‘psychopaths’ stack spoons in the middle of the tray.

One particularly passionate Auckland woman demanded to know why spoons would ever come between forks and knives.

‘Where is the logic?!’ she asked.

She said the layout should run forks followed by knives, dessert spoons and soup spoons, with teaspoons along the bottom.

‘And heaven help anyone who has their teaspoons facing in different directions!’ she said.

A woman from New Zealand’s North Island said the only way to store cutlery is with spoons on the left, forks in the middle and knives on the right.

‘I’ve always put it that way, and it drives me mad when the other half puts them in a different order. It’s just not right any other way,’ she said.

Her approach was supported by a Wellington man, who said spoons should always be on the left because they are ‘first out for cereal’ at breakfast time.