Kitchen Stadium in Reality

My three daughters and I are moving in with my long-time boyfriend, an event that trumps the royal wedding in our minds. As we jockey for “share” in the kitchen, I’ve gained a new appreciation for the different perspectives each person has on brand usage, product quality, nutrition, product “must haves” and product “must not haves”. A few examples include:

Condiments. He and I use the same brands of mayonnaise and diet cola, but on ketchup he deferred to my family’s passionate choice; he said it wasn’t worth the fight. He has a fridge of value brands of salad dressings while I favor premium and unique flavors. It’s interesting how brands play dissimilar roles for us across food categories.
Coffee. Probably the most important single item for me in my kitchen, the fuel for our busy lives. In my current home, I have a designated coffee station with fresh, premium whole beans, my grinder and multiple apparatus for brewing – French press, drip coffee maker, Italian-style percolator. He is not a coffee drinker. His coffee was a couple of years old and stuffed in the back of a top shelf in the cabinet. Coffee I would never dare drink or serve, he thought was fine. Clearly we have different definitions of “product quality”.
Pantry organization. We both organize our pantry like in a grocery store. The most important items are at eye level. Other less important things are relegated to the unseen top shelf or the back-wrenching bottom one. This is where our “must haves” vs. “must not haves” and views on “healthy” food diverged. At eye level on his shelves, he had an array of snacking items of all decadent kinds (candy and cookies primarily). On mine, I have snack items, but they are the more healthy variety such as crackers, granola bars, popcorn, etc. Items that do not require extreme portion control and willpower to resist… appropriate for kids to snack on.
Spices. One of the big watershed moments this past weekend was merging our spices. Surprisingly, in this case, we both were fairly like-minded regarding tastes, brands and quality. My daughter and I decided to do a sensory assessment of the freshness status of the spices there and figure out whether or not to replace or blend with mine or buy new. He thought his parsley flakes were just fine, but he doesn’t really use them and didn’t realize that they were supposed to be a lively shade of green, not a dull brown – mine went in. Otherwise, I was impressed that most of his spices were good to go, and had few replacements.

This kitchen negotiation is happening in kitchens throughout the country. I find it fascinating how we make purchase and placement decisions for our kitchens: what we’ve always bought, what our moms bought, what tastes great to us, what we’re willing to spend, what items are important to us, what the kids will eat, where the kids are in their life cycles. My situation highlights for me just how challenging it is to figure out what “average” families want in their kitchens. I tend to go back to my world for clues.

-Lucinda Wisniewski