Organizing the Spices of Life

Professional organizers will always cushion their advice with, "different organizational systems work for different people so you just have to find the one that is right for you." I will buy that nicety for SOME things but in some instances there are systems of keeping order that are superior to others. For instance, how DO you find your seasonings and spices if they are not in alphabetical order? This is one area in which friends enjoy poking fun at me but, really, HOW do you find your spices if they are not in order? I like mine stored on a lazy susan in alpha order. I have seen the various spice organizational mechanisms like the little shelves or the SPINEY counter-top things. Neither seems to be better than my simple lazy susan alpha system. If you put your spices on those little stair-like shelves you can see only the labels on the jars in the very front row and in the process of removing one to use it is nearly impossible to not knock down others. I don't get those shelves at all. The spice spinners that come with their own jars could work if they had space for ALL the spices but I have yet to see one that does. Whenever I pass anew spice spinner in a store I always stop to debunk it's usefulness by thinking of spices that are missing and/or would not have a place on it. (Yes, it's an obsession this organizing thing. It's what I do.) If you use only the spices that come with the spinners and you are not an adventurous cook and you know that you will never branch out to try a new spice such as tumeric, (which is almost never on one of those spinners), then I suppose it could work, but limiting your seasoning to 12 jars just sounds depressing to me. I had hope for those drawer spice organizers when they first came out but the most spice jars they can hold is 24 and you need to have a huge drawer for all 24 jars to fit. My kitchen does happen to have a gigantic drawer but if I used it for spices I would have to find somewhere else to put my knives and cooking utensils or silverware and even then my spice collection is 39 right now. So, even those drawer organizers would be limiting at some point. The 11” lazy susan fits in standard upper cupboards and will easily accommodate 13 spice jars side-by-side and if you have those little rectangle tins, more will fit. You can also stack the little short ones and store the refills in the middle of the circle. Wiggle room can be made by zig-zagging the jars, increasing the space for more than 13 jars on a susan making it expandable to grow as your culinary skills grow. It is clearly superior!