To ask what the ruddy hell you'd use this for? And kitchen questions.

[Welshmaenad]

So I'm about 24 hours away from the end of a kitchen fit. You'll have to forgive the stupid questions but my brain is fried from work stress and three weeks of tripping over Bags For Life full of my crockery and half eaten packs of biscuits. Usually in the same bag.

Firstly, I have this pull out thing that the nice kitchen designer put in for me, it's very snazzy, but what the fuck do people actually put in these things to be useful?? It's next to my hob, if that helps.

Secondly, and this is really boring, but how do you organise your kitchen? The layout is quite different from my skanky old one, which I never really settled with anyway as we only moved in in April last year, and it always felt really disorganised and chaotic and when I packed it up I found five packs of arborio rice. How can I be one of those streamlined, efficient tidy people I hear tell of??

Scuse the mess and plywood floor. It will look nice at some point!!!

I've got the very same 'thing' in my kitchen next the the oven as well. We keep condiments, stock cubes, oils and jars of gravy granules and spices. Really useful!

That's a lovely kitchen you have op. Given the news about the shortage you could hide courgettes in there! I really did love my kitchen all brand new! I have two special corner cupboards that I kept opening and closing just to look at the mechanism!

Oooh we are going to get one in that colour op. Aibu to ask who you got it from and what the service was like? And what swung the wood worktop for you? I love the look.but worried it will be difficult to look after, esp round the sink

DO NOT put anything heavy in it such as tins. The weight will pull it down, bend the metal runners and eventually, it'll stop sliding properly

nut it's the Tiverton kitchen in slate from Wickes. Can't fault the service from initial enquiry onwards really, the designer guy came out and measured up and designed it all for me after I told him what basics I wanted. They organised the fitter as I've had bad luck with choosing tradesmen and he's been absolutely spot on. I had the bathroom done at the same time (it's next to the kitchen) and had the same fitter for both.

I've been warned not to let water stand on the wood worktop, and to use trivets etc, it will also need revealing after three months then annually but the fitter is leaving me with stuff to do that.

Resealing not revealing!

I went with wood as I wanted something to add a bit of warmth - tiles are quite bold grey Moroccan style and flooring us going to be Welsh slate Amtico so I wanted to break up the monochrome a bit.

loona13, cleaning stuff, such as things like bleach, oven cleaner, furniture polish, giant bottle of vinegar for cleaning glass / mirrors and descaling, extra bottles of washing up liquid.

I have a very narrow cupboard near my cooker, I keep the tin foil, bakewell paper, cling film in.

Welshmaenad, sounds like your kitchen is going to be gorgeous. Hope you're v happy with it when it's done.

'Both my parents have passed away recently and I am incredibly lucky that they left me the money to make such improvements to mine and the kids' new home, I think my mum in particular would have been very excited about our new kitchen'. Ahem. I seem to have a speck of dust in my eye. I'm guessing that your Mum would have indeed been excited and delighted about your new kitchen. I hope you have lots of happy times in it!

Same as kittens, cleaning things like spare scourers, Pledge, dusters, bleach wipes, Milton tablets etc.

P.S. OP your kitchen looks gorgeous! Love the colour and style of the units and worktop!

we've got two in the totally impractical kitchen we moved into

one has cat stuff in, so food sachets, biscuits, flea stuff etc
the other has tall bottles of oil and vinegar that won't fit in the cupboards and dishwasher tablets

I've got plastic boxes for stuff to sit in so it doesn't fall through the gaps

Post its are your friend here.

I spent months in a static caravan whilst we did the house up - so I had oodles of time to plan what went where. My tip on how to tackle it (and prevent endless actual physical rearranging of tins, boxes etc) it the humble post-it note.

Write every category on a post it note. Such as

Baking stuff
Herbs and spices
plastic tubs
kitchen scales
tins (savoury)
tins (dessert/custard)
dried rice/pasta
Non-fridge veggies
cleaning stuff
tea towels
oils & vinegars
Tea/coffee/sugar
cereals
glasses
cups
plates
bowls
eating cutlery
cooking cutlery
saucepans
baking tins
electrical gadgets

Try and remember where stuff was before - just so you don't forget something and end up not giving it a place to go.

Then play. Get a rough drawing of your kitchen and put the post its in various places. See what works. Imagine yourself in your kitchen - where do you want to find the colander? Do you mind walking to get your tins out - but want herbs within easy reach. Maybe put several categories together. Or split them. Work out where you want stuff (so for us the dining area side of the island was best for cereal so we could pop on the table v easily every morning). Did you always hate having the coffee the opposite side of the kitchen to the cups - then plan for them to be together.

I am aware this may totally shows how sad I am - but it really helped.

Since we finished the kitchen 5 years ago I have not had to rearrange anything in my cupboards

Your mum would be thrilled.

Tea coffee and cups near the kettle. Kettle near the sink.

twenty this is genius logic, I'm going to do exactly that!!!

As it's your kitchen I assume you chose the units (that you've paid for?) therefore you should know what it's for .....jus a thought

Ours slidey out rack thingy (technical term) is quite narrow but is great for oils, soy sauce etc. Easy to grab when you are cooking.

We got the Tiverton kitchen for Mum, with the same wooden work top!

Didn't get the pull out cupboard, Wickes quoted £300 for it!

lapsed it was put in to fill a gap because we moved the oven to be more accessible for me. I didn't give a great deal of consideration to what I'd use it for till it was...there.

Do you have young children?

If so, fill it with plastic crap so that they have 'their' cupboard and don't mess up the ones you're about to beautifully organise.

No? Just my kids who think sieves, bowls and the turny-cupboard-thing (technical term) are more fun than actually toys?

I agree with kittens
I'd stuff it full of washing up liquid, kitchen spray and all of the other junk that crowds my sink area
And then I would just stand back and admire it for days

Wooden worktops,keep a lemon in your fridge as the juice will remove most stains,even tumeric with a few applications or leaving a squeezed slice on overnight.

Oh I know this one!

It's where you hide the really good food

I can't really see how wide it is from the photo but if it is the same as mine - I have three! One is next to the dishwasher and contains the dishwasher tablets, dishwasher cleaner, spare washing up liquid and other cleaners. One has chopping boards in the top layer and bottles of squash etc in the bottom layer, and the other has oven trays in the top layer and other bottles in the bottom layer. It saves LOADS of space elsewhere.

I have one of those but next to dishwasher washing machine area.
I use mine for sandwich bags foil bin caddy bags black bags baking paper cling film etc.
They're a brilliant use of space at the end of a row for us
Love your kitchen. We did ours last year and have the b&q one that's pretty much same door shapes and handles etc with wooden work tops aswell.
It's a brilliant kitchen. We designed exactly how we wanted it and managed to build in a pantry area with worktop space on the other smaller side of the kitchen and it works brilliantly

Enjoy your kitchen