Apantry is a room or cupboard wherebeverages,food, (sometimes) dishes, household cleaning products, linens or provisions are stored within a home or office. Food and beverage pantries serve in an ancillary capacity to thekitchen.
The word "pantry" derives from the same source as theOld French termpaneterie; that is frompain, theFrench form of theLatinpanis, "bread".[1]
In alatemedievalhall, there were separate rooms for the various service functions andfood storage. The pantry was a dry room wherebread was kept and food preparation was done. The head of the office who is responsible for this room is referred to as apantler. There were similar rooms for cooler storage ofmeats and lard/butter (larder),alcoholic beverages (buttery, known for the "butts", or barrels, stored there), and cooking (kitchen).
_-_8.jpg)
In theUnited States, pantries evolved from earlyColonial American "butteries", built in a cold north corner of a colonial home (more commonly referred to and spelled as "butt'ry"), into a variety of pantries in self-sufficientfarmsteads. Butler's pantries, or China pantries, were built between the dining room and kitchen of a middle-class English or American home, especially in the latter part of the 19th into the early 20th centuries. Great estates, such as theBiltmore Estate inAsheville, North Carolina orStan Hywet Hall inAkron, Ohio, had many pantries and other domestic "offices", echoing their British "great house" counterparts.
By theVictorian era, large houses and estates in Britain maintained the use of separate rooms, each one dedicated to distinct stages of food preparation and cleanup. The kitchen was for cooking, while food was stored in a storeroom, pantry or cellar. Meat preparation was done in alarder as game would come in undressed, fish unfilleted, and meat in half or quarter carcasses. Vegetable cleaning and preparation would be done in thescullery. Dishwashing was done in a scullery or butler's pantry, "depending on the type of dish and level of dirt".[2]
Since the scullery was the room with running water with a sink, it was where the messiest food preparation took place, such as cleaning fish and cutting raw meat. The pantry was wheretableware was stored, such as China,glassware, andsilverware. If the pantry had a sink for washing tableware, it was a wooden sink lined with lead to prevent chipping the China and glassware while they were being washed. In some middle-class houses, the larder, pantry, and storeroom might simply be large wooden cupboards, each with its exclusive purpose.[3]
Traditionally, kitchens inAsia[where?] have been more open format than those of the West. The function of the pantry was generally served by wooden cabinetry. For example, inJapan, a kitchen cabinet is called a "mizuya tansu". A substantial tradition of woodworking and cabinetry in general developed in Japan, especially throughout theTokugawa period. A huge number of designs fortansu (chests or cabinets) were made, each tailored towards one specific purpose or another.
The idea is very similar to that of theHoosier cabinet, with a wide variety of functions being served by specific design innovations.
Abutler's pantry orserving pantry is a utility room in a large house, primarily used to store serving items, rather than food. Traditionally, a butler's pantry was used for cleaning, counting, and storage of silver. European butlers often slept in the pantry, as their job was to keep the silver under lock and key. The merchant's account books and wine log may also have been kept in there. The room would be used by the butler and other domestic staff. Even in households where there is no butler, it is often called a butler's pantry.[4][5]
In modern houses, butler's pantries are usually located in transitional spaces between kitchens and dining rooms and are used as staging areas for serving meals. They commonly containcountertops, as well as storage for candles, serving pieces, table linens, tableware, wine, and other dining room articles. More elaborate versions may includedishwashers,refrigerators, or sinks.[4]
Butler's pantries have become popular in recent times.[6]
 | This sectiondoes notcite anysources. Please helpimprove this section byadding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged andremoved.(February 2016) (Learn how and when to remove this message) |
Certain foods, such asbutter,eggs, andmilk, need to be kept cool.[7] Before modern refrigeration was available,iceboxes were popular.[8] However, the problem with an icebox was that the cabinet housing was large, but the actual refrigerated space was relatively small. A clever and innovative solution was invented, the "cold pantry", sometimes called a "California cooler."[9] The cold pantry usually consisted of a cabinet or cupboard with wooden-slat shelves for air circulation. An opening near the top vented to the outside, either through the roof or high out the wall. A second opening near the bottom vented also to the outside, but low near the ground and usually on the north side of the house, where the air was cooler. As the air in the pantry warmed, it rose, escaping through the upper vent. This in turn drew cooler air in from the lower vent, providing constant circulation of cooler air. In the summertime, the temperature in the cold pantry would usually hover several degrees lower than the ambient temperature in the house, while in the wintertime, the temperature in the cold pantry would be considerably lower than that in the house.
A cold pantry was the perfect place to keep food stocks that did not necessarily need to be kept refrigerated. Breads, butter, cheesecakes, eggs, pastries, and pie were the common food stocks kept in a cold pantry. Vegetables could be brought up from theroot cellar in smaller amounts and stored in the cold pantry until ready to use. With space in the icebox at a premium, the cold pantry was a great place to store fresh berries and fruit.
First developed in the early 1900s by theHoosier Manufacturing Company inNew Castle, Indiana, and popular into the 1930s, theHoosier cabinet and its many imitators soon became an essential fixture in American kitchens. Often billed as a "pantry and kitchen in one", the Hoosier brought the ease and readiness of a pantry, with its many storage spaces and working counter, right into the kitchen. It was sold in catalogues and through a unique sales program geared towards farm wives. Today, the Hoosier cabinet is a much sought-after domestic icon and widely reproduced.[citation needed]
Literature from the late 19th and early 20th centuries often reflected the cultural and domestic importance of the pantry in household management. During the era of domestic science and home economics, instructional texts frequently included guidance on how to furnish, maintain, and utilize a pantry. InThe American Woman’s Home (1869),Catharine E. Beecher andHarriet Beecher Stowe recommended eliminating the separate pantry by incorporating its shelving and cabinetry directly into the kitchen.[10] While this design concept did not gain widespread adoption until the late 20th century, the traditional pantry remained a fixture in American homes for decades.[11]
During theVictorian era and continuing untilWorld War II, pantries were common in most American households. This was largely due to the utilitarian nature of kitchens at the time, which were typically small and separated from other living spaces. As a result, pantries served as essential auxiliary work areas, featuring built-in shelving, cabinetry, and countertops for food preparation and storage.[12]
In literature, pantries occasionally appear as significant domestic spaces. In the final chapter ofThese Happy Golden Years, Laura Ingalls Wilder provides a detailed description of the pantry built byAlmanzo Wilder in their first home inDe Smet, South Dakota, portraying its role in daily life on a late 19th-century homestead.[13][14]
Pantry raids were often common themes inchildren's literature and early 20th century advertising. Perhaps the most famous pantry incident in literature was whenMark Twain'sTom Sawyer had to do penance for getting into his Aunt Polly's jam in her pantry: as punishment, he had to whitewash her fence.[15]
| Shared rooms | |
|---|---|
| Private rooms | |
| Spaces | |
| Technical,utility andstorage | |
| Great house areas | |
| Other | |
| Architectural elements | |
| Related | |
