Ask Lemmy

Yep, this is a junk drawer at its nascent stage.

My mother got into the pampered chef selling bulldonkey when I was young, and despite the dozens of items we got from them, only four really stood out, and she still has three of them. The ice cream scoop (how hard is it to make a shaped chunk of metal, after all), the kitchen shears (which were actually good quality), the slap-chop before there was a slap-chop brand (the one that is now missing/broken), and the kitchen organizer thing for the countertop: pic related. It was great for the longer shaped things, like some of what you have in the drawer. If the drawer bothers you that much, consider something that goes on the countertop or on the wall (or even a hanging pot organizer, which I love above a kitchen island.

I do not have that drawer. Mine is at least twice as full.

Sorry to say, your wife is right. Sorry to say, even if she is wrong she is right.

This is not a junk drawer. A junk drawer has flashlights, pocket knife, some tools, tape, bandaids, pens. This drawer doesn't have anything like that.

This is the food prep drawer.

I have three food utensil drawers. Dining, serving, and prep.

If you have a small kitchen, maybe you would combine serve and prep utensils into one drawer.

Can opener, cheese grater, scale, rolling pin, whisks, mixer parts, and cooking knives, all go into drawer. But like the bread knife and cake knife go into serve drawer, along with labels, and serving spoons, for example.

Remove the scale, electronics don't belong in the misc food prep and niche baking implements drawer. Once you do that you'll easily recognize it as the food prep and niche baking implements drawer. The scale goes on a shelf, or in a cabinet next to the mixer/food proc/salad spinner.

Every family has a misc. drawer. Staplers, pens, rubber bands, paper clips. Lots of office supplies usually but it often will broaden out to all kinds of random crap.

That one is not exactly what I’d expect in the misc drawer but it’s not totally out of bounds?

A messy drawer? There should be at least two: one for the kitchen and one for general.

Almost every home has a junk drawer or other junk container. Mine has multiple.

All that being said, I don't think I've seen a drawer as confusing as this.

My wife has serious ADHD, this is every drawer.

Yep. The "junk drawer". Even in my house with my diagnosed OCD mom had one of these.

That's essentially the "overflow" drawer. The only solution is to have less stuff... Or just live with it like i do lol

To say what others have said in a different way. Yes, in almost any categorisation system, you're gonna need to deal with some misc haha.

Where else could these things possibly go? (minus the scales, which in my opinion belong on some flat surface in a cupboard of countertop somewhere, since I use my scales all the time)

We have one of these drawers at home, also. I think your wife is right on this one friend.

A junk/misc. drawer? Yes.

We do not have that drawer. My kitchen is tiny and only has 2 drawers. As a result, our entire apartment is a mess

I have this drawer.

It's not a junk drawer.

It's an irregular kitchen items drawer.

It's just the cost of being someone who actually uses their kitchen. We have the garlic press, scissors, pizza cutter, bench scrapers, microplaners, thermometers, etc... in there. All useful things that fit poorly with other things, so they get a drawer all to themselves.

The junk drawer with batteries and twist ties is another drawer.

Pfft you call THAT an overstuffed drawer?

I bet you can open it without anything catching the backside of the cabinet, nerd.

Throw in birthday candles, rubber bands, and a few coins and you got yourself a proper junk drawer.

Dear OP, the only odd thing about your drawer is that your garlic press in in there (unless this is your backup garlic press of course). In our household, we have it in the main cutlery drawer.

BTW, we have several such drawers spread out over our home: one in the kitchen, one in the living room, one in the home office and several in the garage.

Of course, everyone has this drawer. It's called a junk drawer. Where else would you put this crap. What planet are you living on?

I have three small awkward necessary crap drawers, and my apple slicer doesn't fit into them. But my kitchen is so small, I call in the galley (facetiously, it's not actually on a boat).

Every family has this drawer.

Every single person does not have this drawer.

Every child has this for every drawer.

Every house have this. And yours is very neetly organised. Congrats. May you "tiroir à bazar" stay this empty of small non identified cluter.

Sorry OP, we've got two in our home.

Entropy wins.... always. You must free yourself and accept this. You cannot defeat entropy.

Every house has one. My mother with legit OCD had one... though she claimed it was a 'Miscellaneous' drawer and not a junk drawer. (To be fair, it was a well organized junk drawer at any rate.)

But yeah, your wife is right.

We have this drawer. Full of kitchen utensils that don't fit nicely into other drawers.

My parents did not have this drawer. Or at least, not nearly to this extent. Idk how they did it with a smaller kitchen than we have.

I have to sat that the additional of a scale to that drawer is a wild choice

Not only does everyone have one of these, they suffer from quantum entanglement.

If you already have a maxed out sharps drawer, then you probably don't actually need any of the knives in this drawer. Like how often do you actually use the pizza cutter? I just cut pizza with a chef knife. Or the egg cutter? How often is that used? Sometimes the answer is to go through all your drawers and see what can be tossed to make space for the things you actually do use.

That's not even a proper junk drawer, that's all kitchen gadgets, but okay... Yes, in my experience, most households have a junk drawer.

Well this backfired on OP

Yes, every household in the developed world has a drawer like this. It's for things that you hardly need or never need, but might do, one day, probably (not).

Why it bothers me: in a more sane world, this stuff would be shared. Every community would have a junk tool shed - not every household of 4 people, or 2 people, or (increasingly) one person. It's reminiscent of that drill statistic: the average electric drill is used for 7 minutes in its lifetime. This is madness. Our planet is overflowing with junk. As a species we need to be smarter.

The problem is not the organization or lack thereof, the problem is that someone in your household buys too many niche specialized single-purpose kitchen tools. Wtf is that thing with the green handle?

I try to donate any kitchen tool that I haven't used in a year or two.

We all have one . Mines right next to the oven so I have quick access to various things I use

I also don't have that drawer, but I have a box next to the toolbox labeled "useful crap that aren't tools"

Yeah it's a thing. I've made wood box type things to separate the drawer out and try to keep it slightly organised.

where's the sauce packets?

It's called a junk drawer and as far as I am aware it's an inevitability. However, I will say it's odd that you have utensils in there. Most junk drawers I've encountered are filled with random crap that rarely if ever gets used.

Ah yes, the "junk" drawer. I have three! :-)

Looks perfectly fine. Ours is the second drawer though. Top one is for cuttlery

Every family has this drawer