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- Spice racks are available in all shapes and sizes, so finding one that fits your available space can be challenging.
- The adjustable and affordable Spicy Shelf Patented Spice Rack rules the market with its space-saving design.
- See more: The best spice grinder
Want to frustrate a cook in the shortest amount of time possible? Try rearranging his or her kitchen without permission. You'll be fortunate if all you receive is the threat of a frying pan upside the head. Cooks tend to be particular about how they organize their kitchens - and, yes, we know that's an understatement. The need to accommodate a personalized organizational system can make selecting the best spice racks a challenging process.
Fortunately, manufacturers of the top spice racks for your kitchen understand the needs of cooks. With their products, they create a nice balance between doing the job of organizing your spices, while also allowing for cooks to adjust the designs to fit cabinet space and personal tastes.
The best spice racks can make better use of your precious kitchen cabinet or countertop space. They're also one of the best tools you can add to your kitchen. And once you've picked the perfect spice rack for your needs, you can check out our list of the most useful kitchen ingredients to fill it up.
A good spice rack should go beyond organizing all your spice jars
If you think the only feature to consider with a spice rack is its ability to hold your jars of spices, think again. Spice racks have a variety of important features you'll want to consider, according to the Foodal website.
- Size and adjustability: A spice rack must be able to fit the space you have available, while also maximizing that space. If you have a really narrow, tall cabinet, you don't want your spice rack to waste the upper half of the space, for example. Adjustability in a spice rack's design can fix this problem.
- Design and look: Design considerations are key for spice racks, too. HGTV has collected a variety of spice rack ideas, some of which you can buy and some of which you can make yourself, depending on the look you want. If you'll store the spice rack inside a cabinet, you may not be as worried about its look. But if the spices will be displayed as part of your kitchen décor, you'll want a spice rack with a pleasing look.
- Capacity: Certainly, you want a spice rack that will accommodate all of the spices you own, but you also don't want to go crazy and buy a spice rack that will hold 50 spices if you only really use 15 spices regularly. So think about which spices you actually use a lot that you'll want quick and easy access to, and find a unit with that amount of space.
There are different types of spice racks for every need
You also need to consider exactly where the spice rack will fit in your kitchen. Home Stratosphere outlines the different types of spice racks, which we've summarized below:
- In-cabinet: An in-cabinet spice rack usually is adjustable in size - both horizontally and vertically - allowing it to fit many different sizes of cabinets. These spice racks also usually will accommodate the spice jars you buy at a store. In other words, you won't have to transfer the spices into other containers to fit an in-cabinet spice rack.
- In-drawer: A spice rack designed to fit inside a drawer will hold the spice bottles in a horizontal configuration. It often can use the spice bottles as they are without having to transfer the spices. But it doesn't work well for using different size spice jars.
- Wall-mounted or magnetic: Wall-mounted spice racks often are decorative units, as they will be visible at all times. Often, they'll use specific types of jars that ship with the spice rack, meaning you'll have to transfer the spices to the new containers.
- Free-standing: A free-standing spice rack may look a bit like a tiny bookshelf or wine rack. You'll slide spice jars into the shelves either horizontally or vertically. These designs sometimes can work with your current spice jars, or they sometimes ship with separate containers.
You can expect to pay anywhere from $10 to $50 for a spice rack. However, some spice racks that are decorative pieces can cost more than $100. Larger units that can hold dozens of jars will cost more than $100, too.
Here are the best spice racks to buy in 2019:
- The best spice rack overall: Spicy Shelf Patented Spice Rack
- The best small spice rack: Seville Classics 3-Tier Expandable Bamboo Spice Rack
- The best large spice rack: AllSpice Wooden Spice Rack
- The best stylish spice rack: Gneiss Spice DIY Magnetic Spice Rack
- The best free-standing spice rack: DecoBros Spice Rack Stand
- See more: The best spice grinder
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