McCormick futzes with its containers

OK, i gotta hear this.

(For some reason, I’m picturing the van Buren Boys episode of Seinfeld.)

3 Likes

We had a Folgers plant in KC.
When the breeze was right the whole city had a fresh coffee aroma.
When the breeze was from the other direction the whole city smelled like the stockyards, thankfully now extinct.

1 Like

The most 'fragrant" city I can remember is Tacoma back in the early 1970’s. The Tacoma Aroma was pungent and nearly constant in some neighborhoods. My Uncle Bob bought a place Tacoma near the school he taught at and he said that with his teachers pay he had a choice between a house in one of the Tacoma Aroma neighborhoods or under the approach for SeaTac. He chose the noise over the stench. I believe I agree with him.
I was surprised to find a similar stench in New York last year, almost like an industrial cleaner with a aftertaste of cat piss, but the people I talked to said it was because the wind was from the SW and that it would go away when the wind shifted. The next day the wind did shift from the SW to a coming from a little East of North and there was no smell. Not sure what is SW of Manhattan but it is pretty potent.
I would much rather have coffee scent!

Isn’t New Jersey SW of Manhattan?
:slight_smile:

3 Likes

Nothing as good, or funny, as a Seinfeld episode. Basically, I was part of a group that was working on a large project. The McCormick people never showed up, and contributed no work. The rest of us had to carry their load. Left a lasting impression.

3 Likes

The Union Stockyards had just about reached their end by the time I arrived in Chicago for school, but we were warned nevertheless about wafting fragrance when the wind was right.

I think we worried more about the air pollution from Gary, Indiana.

2 Likes

Newark, maybe? I don’t think Staten Island has huge industrial plants. Not sure.

1 Like

Elizabeth, most likely.

2 Likes

Exactly. The lovely stench coming off the refineries that line the Turnpike and which make people think that all of NJ is like that.

2 Likes

I almost never bother with those little overpriced jars of questionably-fresh herbs and spices. Ethnic markets (Indian, Mexican, Middle-Eastern, Asian) are almost always a better bet.

1 Like

(post deleted by author)

Not a bad price since the jars (not the new style, apparently) are included.

spice(s) storage and access is a big problem for the wide-ranging home cook . . . buckets of spices required . . .

I’m a big fan of “one deep, nothing hides” - my cellarway “pantry”

with a bit of ‘left over space’ at the counter end . . .
made a spice cabinet. same idea - one deep, no hiding
which kinda’ worked . . . left “install pix” right “Today”

I’ve become a serious fan of any spices in the Badia brand collection. always much more fresher . . . and hugely less expensive than ‘that big name’

8 Likes


Ima soooooooo stealin’ that!


(If my wife lets me)


Mine’s kind of a mess.

~ 30 year old wall-hanger, a wedding gift


Shoebox Bin #1, nicely catalogued for me by Daughter #2 who was tired of always guessing wrong.



Shoebox Bin #2 (ditto comment).

\

Overflow on lower shelf.



Mondo Hallowe’en candy bowl (nicknamed “SpiceBowlOrange”) with a bit more overflow of seldom-used stuff, plus extras of the stuff I go through a lot of. I go a bit crazy when Spice Islands, Simply Organic or the like are BOGO.

5 Likes

hee-hee. steal away!
one note, the bottom of the ‘rack’ is kicked out about 3/8" from the top - so that ‘house vibrations’ tend to make things move toward the wall, vs. moving out and falling on the steps . . . that’s the “reason” for the quarter round molding at the left upright - hides the top-to-bottom “gap”

I also screwed up on the shelf spacing for soups. measured two ‘nested’ cans - but neglected to account for the increased space needed to stack them - as pix’d - one has to pull out the bottom can, stack the top can, then re-shelf… nits, but an aggravating nit that could have been avoided with +5mm . . . . .

my “pasta selection” is outgrowing the available space, thinking to add a second shelving “unit” at the ‘stair landing’ - {{the stair is half-story, u-turn, second stair…}}
to handle pasta and stuff like flour-in-reserve 5# bags . . . bulk ‘noodles up-next’ etc . . .

Appreciate the tips - our stairs going down to basement are directly under the stairs going from main floor to upstairs (the fairly common arrangement, I suppose). So it’d get a lot of vibration from people tramping up to/down from bed, and I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have foreseen that and thought of your solution in advance.

Then, frustrated with stuff falling off, I’d probably have built a small lip or dam across the fronts of all the shelves… instead of just jacking the bottom out from the wall a bit. Doh!

1 Like

yup, same arrangement here - 2x half stair going down, in same “stair well”, 2x half stair going up…

as empty nesters, with a first floor master, there is uber-little traffic going upstairs.
regardless, the “geo-vibrations” are enough to make things “walk off the shelf”

1 Like

Yup, that’s what I was thinking. Even a half inch lip would help.

Check out shelves on ships/boats for how they deal with vibration/shaking.

That is exactly the spice rack that hung in my childhood kitchen. Mom probably obtained it circa 1957 (the year she and dad married). I think it currently resides in my garage with small bottles of nails, screws, etc. That rack will probably outlive us both.

And the @HappyOnion “cellarway pantry” is the spitting image of my childhood neighbor’s set-up. The twin house in the city basement steps were not directly beneath the stairs leading to the second floor. And their three children wouldn’t dare make enough of a ruckus to disturb Mrs. B’s perfect housekeeping (funny when I think about it as the oldest son went on to play linebacker at Penn State and the youngest son is a professional drummer).

2 Likes