'Don't Organize Your Kitchen in an Aspirational Way' – Antoni Porowski Shares His Most Surprising Kitchen Storage Tips

As any loyal Queer Eye fan knows, Antoni Porowski thrives when proper mise en place is ensured. The television personality, chef, and author is renowned for giving replicable advice on his Netflix show, so, ahead of entertaining's busiest season, Homes & Gardens sat down with the icon to get his top tips for organizing a kitchen.

As luck would have it, we met Antoni at the perfect time. He just purchased his first country home outside of New York City, so he and his partner have been spending lots of time travelling back and forth and figuring out how to make kitchen storage work at two different-sized properties. In each case, Antoni likes to start with a completely fresh canvas.

He tells Homes & Gardens: 'I'm good at asking for help in terms of the cleaning, but the kitchen is my number 1 territory where my type A thrives, and I have to be in charge. I clean it every single day. Every single night before going to bed, it needs to be clean, whether it's just for me and my partner and our dog, or when guests come.'

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His top tip in this regard is to stop messes before they begin, with preventative measures like setting Zevo's flying insect traps in his kitchen for background maintenance. Antoni explains: 'It's something that I get to just plug in. I don't think anybody wants to have bugs or gnats in or around their food. The idea just gives me the ick, and so it's great to have something that does all the work for you because I can control what I can control and what I can see, but there's plenty that I can't, and that's all the stuff that's airborne.'

Unsurprisingly, then, given Antoni's focus on practicality and thought-free solutions, his approach to organizing a kitchen prioritizes function. His core philosophy is: 'Don't organise your things in an aspirational way where it's like I might use this. Just be realistic and honest with yourself about the things that you actually use on a daily basis, and how to make your current life more efficient.'

Shop Antoni's Kitchen Essentials

What are the items Antoni actually uses and wants to keep within arms reach you ask? Look no further than the following, a curated edit of items he mentioned during our interview, many of which have been tested by our experts.

Like most things in life, Antoni believes the perfect kitchen setup begins with thoughtful planning. 'It sounds like a really simple thing, but starting with determining what your needs are based on whether you're left or right-handed in terms of where everything is accessible is a great first step. Because when I'm cooking, especially if I'm doing multiple things at the same time and trying to focus, I want my tools to be easily accessible.'

He continues: 'For example, all of my spatulas and all of the hand tools and the wooden spoons that I use on the regular, I keep in a drawer to the left of my stove and of the flat top of my range so that I have access to them, and I also try to organize everything.'

'I'm not a big appliances guy, but I like to have them whenever the time comes, like an air fryer, an immersion blender, things that I don't use really often, but I'm really grateful they're there when I need them. Those I actually keep in the hallway leading to my bedroom closet because I don't have as many clothes, and so I'm able to substitute it with a lot of kitchen appliances that I don't necessarily use every day. And then, nicer serving dishes and things that are more for special occasions, I store way up top, and I probably like I need a little step ladder to get to them. So I really try to only have the things that I use every day out, so that they don't collect dust and they don't take up any unnecessary space.'

However, Antoni's kitchen countertops aren't completely Spartan. He explains: 'The kitchen appliances I leave out are, first, my espresso machine, even though I'm typically more of a cold brew guy. Because people are constantly coming over. If I'm getting ready for an event and I have a groomer coming or a friend popping by, it's always nice to have espresso handy, and that's a big clunky machine that I keep out. Also, I keep out my Vitami blender, cause I use it on the daily for smoothies and different sauces.'

With handheld tools, Antoni tends to be a bit less ruthless with the decluttering. He tells Homes & Gardens: 'I have one decorative bowl from an old candle that I keep like 30 wooden spoons in, because it just looks cute. I have my old IKEA spoons from when I was a student, because they're so nostalgic and I remember exactly where I was in my life when I had them. Then I keep the spoons that I use every single day that I have all in a drawer, and it's flat wooden spoons. This is my little pro tip: curved wooden spoons are fine for certain things, but everyone should have a flat wooden spoon. It's a lot easier to scrape on the bottom of an enamelled, cast iron or even stainless steel pan without messing up the surface and scratching it. So I have about 3 or 4 of those.'

He laughs: 'You probably just need one if you're a normal person, but I'm not.'

In terms of other kitchen essentials, Antoni swears by the trick of multiple microplanes. He advises: 'I have 2 microplanes in case I'm grating ginger and garlic. I don't want flavors to compete, and I don't want it to have to wash it. I have a lot of microplanes, but 2 that I keep on standby.'

His well-organized knife drawer is another point of pride. Antoni explains: 'In my knife drawer, I always have a short paring knife, I have a small serrated knife that's really good for cutting tomatoes and baguette and smaller breads. Then I have a large chef's knife, and then recently, because I'm so obsessed with Baked by Melissa on TikTok and she uses this crazy cleaver for everything, I finally got one, and it's changed my life for chopping vegetables and things like that. So it's really just 4 knives that I keep in the drawer underneath, because when I'm cooking really quickly and my hand is a little dirty, and I open the drawer, I want to be able to just grab one thing and not have to shuffle through everything because it all adds up really quickly.'

Antoni's final tip was an innovative trick for organizing pots and pans. He recommends holding on to old linens, towels, and bedsheets. 'Put those [old linens] in between each pot and pan. They're going to clang less, you're gonna have fewer scratches. It makes it a lot easier to slide them out, and then I keep my lids on the other side so that it's just easy to grab. Then the irregular-sized pots and pans that I don't use as often, I keep way in back, and I just stack them up.'

Practical solutions and thoughtful planning go a long way in keeping your kitchen well-organized and highly functional. These are just a few ways to think through the process.

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