Tic Tac Hack...Hack

As another holiday is behind us, it's time to turn my attention to THE holiday.  The one I've been looking forward to since last Christmas.  One of the things I pinned was how to reuse Tic Tac containers as travel spice containers.  (Google it...50,000 posts will come up.)  That was genius but I needed a little something extra for mine when we travel for yuletide merriment.  I use garlic powder in pretty much anything.  While I could gently shake and hope for no "half the box dumped out onto the chicken" situation or dump it in my hand and pinch it into the dish...smelling like Dracula's worst nightmare wasn't topping my to do list.  I remembered I kept the old plastic colander I had forever when I got a good stainless steel one for a gift.  Eureka!

Here's what you'll need:

Garlic powder (or other powdery spice like ground ginger, cloves, etc)
Plastic strainer (Dollar store if you don't have one)
Scissors/shears
NON-MINTY Tic Tac container  (Get orange, strawberry, fruit mix, etc.  No spearmint and the like unless you like minty freshness infused into your spices!)
Tape
Glue (optional)

Empty your Tic Tac box any way you deem appropriate.  I won't judge.

Remove the wrapper, which peels off very easily.

Pop off the lid.

Put the lid on the strainer and cut a little wider than the lid size.

Like so.

Depending on the stiffness of your strainer, you may be able to pop it inside the lid and be done!

Funnel in your spice.

I was able to get 20g in or I think about 20 servings according to the bag.  (10 servings according to me!)

If you aren't having luck with the mesh staying on it's own, you can cut some way wider than the opening and try to place the lid back in place.  Mine was too thick so it was a no go for me.

You could also put a dab of glue on the inside front and back of the lid.  It will never touch the spices.

Clamp one side down whilst it dries and be more patient with the other side because there will be nothing to clamp to so it's you bonding with your lid...hopefully not literally.

If the thought of glue skeeves you out, just run some clear tape around the edges.  Because you'll be popping it back in the container, it'll hold just fine.

Worked like a charm!

See?  But if you're a little irritated at the look of the tape and want to cover that up, no worries.

Nothing a little washi tape can't cover.  ;-)

If you're an uber nerd like me, you can head over to Picmonkey.com and make a fun little label to tape to the top so you can easily see at a glance what you're looking at.

Just trim the tape along the side of the pop up lid so it doesn't keep lifting off with every use.

Oh yeah babe...many a good meals will be made with this and a few other spices I'm bringing along!

Make sure you keep the lid free of caked on spices as you use them (especially over steam as it can cake easily).  These lids aren't necessarily air tight and you want them to close properly.  For the car ride, I'm rubber banding the lids and sticking them all in a sandwich bag as a precaution.

I don't want a spice blowout!  Then I suppose I could call it a "rub" and all would be good anyway.

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