Ask Lemmy

We have a space for that in our cutlery drawer, as well as a basket of miscellanea in a shelf where it doesn't matter if they get dusty.

We had one when I grew up. Now that I'm living elsewhere with my own family we don't; we have two.

Only if you have extra drawer space to waste. Most beneficial would be to give a dedicated space to the scale

We don't have one.

If something isn't important enough to have a specific place, it isn't important enough to own.

We have essentially the same drawer but with no scale and more ladies, measuring spoons, etc.

I'd probably put that scale somewhere else since it's a precision device, and it can't be too healthy for it to live like that.

I have this drawer.

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

Yes everyone has this drawer

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.

This is very common. If you really must "solve" it, the solution world be a shadow box layout. You empty it, lay stuff down where you want it, then take a picture or trace the shapes onto paper. Then model and 3d print an insert to give everything a dedicated cutout or cut it from foam or mill it from wood. This is what folks do in workshops. I've never seen it for a kitchen large utensil drawer, but that's what to do if you must.

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.

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).

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’d say that every house has a junk drawer, but I wouldn’t call this a junk drawer. It mostly looks like random kitchen tools. I guess you’re both right, in a way.

Maybe what you need is a wall-mounted rack to hold some of your other stuff without taking up valuable counter space. For example, I’ve heard people swear by magnetic knife holders. You can probably find magnetic tool holders at a hardware store for less than you’d find knife holders at a store that specializes in kitchen stuff.

Or maybe just get some hooks. Perhaps some little shelves. Whatever. The point is, make the stuff you use most often more accessible, and use the freed-up space in other drawers to clean out this drawer. Then turn it into a proper junk drawer, with shit like loose rubber bands, half~dried superglue, an awkwardly shaped pen from a real estate salesperson, and a tape measure that’s branded with the logo of an NFL team for some reason.

In Yorkshire they call this a rammel drawer

Proud junk drawer owner checking in.

Consider a spring loaded drawer divider. Keeping everything from sloshing around can make a surprising amount of space.

My drawer in the image used to be a nightmare. Everything used to move around and it would jam when opening sometimes. Adding dividers got it organized enough to leave a third of it free, which is now the rightmost section that's filled with tea.

It's been over a year and I still feel a small sense of joy when I open it sometimes. There's still messes of junk in the back left and right, but they stay put.

I lack the space for a drawer like this, instead this exists as a plastic tub in the kitchen cabinet under the sink.

We have that drawer, plus a bowl in a cabinet full of stuff like that.

every family has a drawer like that, mine has two

At my parents' place, EVERY drawer is like that!

I see enough squish things tools to designate it the squishing drawer.

I am proud to say that I don't have this drawer. I grew up in a house with this drawer and always hated it. Nothing new is added to the kitchen without considering the actual need and anything that goes unused for any length of time is getting reevaluated.

Could you un max out other areas? Eliminate duplicates elsewhere so things in this drawer could be moved to the newly made space?

Yes/no. We dont have a designated junk drawer, but theres one specific drawer we happen to throw random things into. I clean it out maybe twice a year during one of my adhd fueled hyper cleaning sessions.

Nobody has this drawer. They're all lying to you, it's some big in-joke like that reddit thread where that person was asking how to switch from Spanish to English and everybody replied in Spanish. You should stand your ground and tell your wi--I can't even joke about the level of gaslighting that would entail. Everybody has this drawer.

I'll be honest though, the scales are a poor fit and probably make it way more cramped. You can stand those up sideways at the edge of a cupboard or in whatever place that you keep cutting boards, because they're a similar shape.

Depending on how often each thing is used, you could optimise by figuring out a hanging solution for some of them. That's quite a common thing, hanging under cupboards or on the backsplash part of the wall. Your wife might appreciate something like that as long as it's agreed on. You'll never totally get rid of this though.

Every family without a gigantic kitchen has that drawer.

I have the contents of that drawer in about 4 drawers and 2 cabinets. I have so many cabinets, I don't even have things in some of them and I have instant pots, a tortilla maker and sourdough proofing tools

However, I do have an oversized drawer that has a l lot of stuff in there like the funnels and tenderizer, but it has no sharps in it, and no scale.