It's easy to assume that many of the items in our kitchens are necessities. But a closer look almost always reveals that the heart of our home could use some paring down. The rewards of stripping down to the actual necessities are especially great when done in this highly utilitarian room because you'll reap the benefits of a much more efficient food prep space.

Here are some items to extricate from your valuable kitchen storage space that — I promise — you'll never miss.

29 Things in Your Kitchen You Can Get Rid Of

1. Takeout menus
2. Sugar packets
3. Parmesan cheese and red pepper packets from pizza deliveries
4. Decorative bottles of herb-infused olive oil
5. Duplicate salad tongs
6. All but one each of large, medium, and small spatulas
7. Half-used candles
8. Magnets you're intending to fix
9. Advertising magnets
10. Kids' meal toys, including character cups
11. Extra napkins you picked up from the burger joint
12. Ketchup packets
13. Chipped mugs
14. Aunt Jane's highball glasses that you never, ever get down from the top shelf
15. The George Foreman grill you've used twice in the history of your decade-long marriage
16. Anything more than four hot pads
17. Stained or holey dish towels
18. All but five of the nice glass jar food containers and lids you've been hoarding
19. The serving platter that you never liked but kept because it was a gift
20. Takeout chopsticks
21. Extra whisks
22. Duplicate ice cream scoops
23. The cheese slicer
24. Old water bottles that you never reach for
25. Tupperware without lids
26. Lids without tupperware
27. Duplicate can openers.
28. Duplicate garlic presses
29. Baby utensils you no longer need

Any of these things hanging out in your kitchen right now? If you felt inspired to slim down stuff in your kitchen, get to it — then, come back and tell us what you got rid of.