How do you organize lids?

[ohmyganache]

How do you organize lids at your restaurant/bakery? We've got all sorts of containers.. pints, quarts, lexans of various sizes, etc... I try to not have too wide of a variety of containers, so that there are not too many different lids, but there's still a bunch.

We have them all in a plastic milk crate, but it's always overflowing and seems more jumbled than it could be. I'm curious... how do you keep all your lids organized?

[Timh]

In bus tubs, with drain holes poked in the bottom. Sort by size, metal/plastic, and keep the tubs organized and labeled.

[Kent Wang]

Alphabetically.

[Fat Guy]

This is probably the number one unaddressed organizational challenge in my home kitchen. I'm eager to hear of good solutions.

[andiesenji]

I use the super-sized Zip-lock and Hefty storage bags - blue, clear so they are see-through.

I have a lot of the Cambro containers, from 1 qt to 22 qt and keep the lids separated into appropriately sized bags which are hung from hooks on the ends of the industrial wire shelves in the pantry.

I also keep various sized lids for Tupperware and similar containers the same way in smaller bags.

This keeps them clean, dust-free and easy to find.

[Michaeltheonion]

I have cambros which are used to store all soups stocks and anything that takes up allot of volume. For general storage I have clean see through plastic containers that are cylindrical and hold 1literch. All sauces and mise is stored in these. Everything is labeled on the sides of the containers. If something is not labeled it goes in the bin. you can stack the containers so everything that is older is placed on the top of the new prep. I make sure the fridges are organized at the beginning and end of the day. Oh yes everything must have a lid on it or it is tossed as well. It seems wasteful but it makes the cooks more aware of the organization I require. We originally kept all the sauces in various sized hotel pans with cling film covering them, but it was terribly inefficient. You could never see what was in a given sauce and the fridge was just piled deep with random containers. We also store all the meats and fish in cryovac bags. They are all labeled and kept on ice. There is nothing sexier than a well organized fridge.

[maggiethecat]

My husband made custom cabinets for us, which include a couple of deep drawers for lids and such.

In Real World, we just shove them in the drawers and scrabble about for the lids and pray we'll find them. Usually, we do.

At least they're in one of two drawers. I'm not capable of better organization.

[Country]

In my (small) home kitchen I have one drawer for all the plastic containers and their lids, as well as all the lids for All Clad, etc. pots and pans. After a few years of this seeming mess, it's become easy to deal with. It looks completely chaotic but, with time, is easy to navigate.

[Panosmex]

In my (small) home kitchen I have one drawer for all the plastic containers and their lids, as well as all the lids for All Clad, etc. pots and pans. After a few years of this seeming mess, it's become easy to deal with. It looks completely chaotic but, with time, is easy to navigate.

←

This issue used to drive me nuts in my bakery, especially when my well-meaning employees would bring in empty whipped margarine and Cool-Whip containers for us to use. There were unique lids and containers all over the place. Sometimes it would take 5 minutes to find the lid to a specific container. Eventually, I upgraded to Cambros and got rid of the home containers (by the way, they were also in violation of our local Health Dept. rules.)

Now retired, our collection of containers and lids is thus: we have a large, metal basket which contains all the small to medium containers. I stack them whenever possible. The lids are roughly organized, standing on edge, to the sides of the basket.

Very small containers, 1 cup or less, and odd items are stored in a covered plastic bin atop the fridge. None of this is ideal, but it's functional.

Dry grains, nuts and seeds for cooking and baking are stored either in cambros or used, plastic salted nut jars from Costco. They are store on their own three shelf unit in our spacious hallway. I just upgraded that shelving to a more capacious one yesterday. (I feel so proud!)