Kitchen

[On It]

As cooking styles, technology, and convenience now drive decisions about kitchen design, I was remembering a feature in my aunt's kitchen that is now never seen. She had a cabinet bin that pulled open where flour was stored. It would hold a huge amount of flour (the amount in a flour sack) and tilted open so that it could be easily accessed.

Do you have memories of what was once included in the kitchen cabinetry of a home but is no longer necessary?

[Puppy Lips]

My mother in law had a trash compacter in one of her kitchens, long ago.  Do they even make those anymore?

[spumoni99]

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@Puppy Lips wrote:

My mother in law had a trash compacter in one of her kitchens, long ago.  Do they even make those anymore?

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Yes my sister has one I think or she use to.

[Desertdi]

Yup......had an aunt with a whole separate CANNING kitchen & pantry!

My grandma had a pantry with all kinds of "bins"......I remember the flour bin, but don't know what the others were.

[On It]

@Puppy Lips I did a search. Lowe's listed a built-in trash compactor from Whirlpool. They could be making a comeback. Some cities limit the amount of garbage that can be placed for pick up on a given day.

[loriqvc]

@Puppy Lips - I have an older home that was flipped just before I moved into it, and they made the lovely decision to remove most of the bottom cabinets on one side of the kitchen to replace it with a "breakfast bar" setup (even though the dining table is right next to that side)—but they kept the trash compactor! I ended up redoing the entire kitchen six months after I moved in; fortunately, back then, the overall price I paid didn't make that as much of a burden.

[Kachina624]

Remember those huge tin-lined drawers that were for bread storage and we're supposed to keep it fresh?

[loriqvc]

A kitchen cabinet feature we had when I was growing up was a pull-out cutting board above the drawers right next to the sink. A lot of the homes in my neighborhood had this, but I think my mother was one of the only people who used it—she's a bit short and found it very handy.

[meallen616]

@Kachina624,

My Mom's kitchen had that huge tin bread draw. She kept bread, muffins, bagels and  her frito's corn chips in there!

[ValuSkr]

One of my cabinets had a built-in flour sifter; it was in a cabinet over the counter so you could sift into a bowl on the countertop.

I never used it; the woman who owned the house before me might have been a big baker.  The house was built in 1920-30.

The house also incorporated a milk box (double-doored so the milkman could access it from outside and I could access it from inside), mail slot in the front door, and a laundry chute from the second floor to the basement.