This Elegant Dollar Tree Find Takes Your Kitchen Countertops Straight To Italy (It's Dirt Cheap)

If you dream of living under the Tuscan sun but in reality are working with, say, a suburban American kitchen, you'll be excited to know you can still transport that kitchen to Italy. With the right decor, you'll be living "la dolce vita" every time you whip up breakfast or sit down to dinner. And that decor doesn't have to be pricey — it can even help with your storage needs, too. Sounds too good to be true? Then it's time you head to your local Dollar Tree.

Rustic clear glass bottles with corks are the latest of the greatest Dollar Tree items you didn't even know you needed for kitchen decor. These bottles look exactly like what you'd see at some enchanting trattoria or osteria in an Italian village, so they'll bring instant Mediterranean charm to your kitchen. They're nice and sturdy, and so a solid storage vessel for your olive oil or other oils — in that way, they're also one of Dollar Tree's best kitchen organization staples, as they'll cut down on the clutter of different branded bottles and provide an elegant, cohesive look. Perhaps best of all, they're only $1.50 per bottle. Go ahead and stock up, transferring all your various liquid kitchen ingredients into these kitchen essentials that double as decor. You can even pepper in a couple extra with as vases for single, striking flowers as accent pieces. 

These Dollar Tree bottles are handy, especially if your go-to olive oil comes in a plastic bottle. Plastic is more permeable than glass. Oxygen can make its way into the olive oil and begin to spoil all of its beautiful flavor compounds, and higher temperatures can cause the oil to start taking in the plastic's own compounds — no one wants plasticky olive oil. 

Keep in mind that olive oil actually thrives for longer periods of time in darkly tinted glass bottles, because too much exposure to light can break the oil's antioxidants and good aroma compounds down, leading to poor-tasting and even unsafe results. When using a Dollar Tree glass bottle, do so for oil you know you'll be using within a shorter amount of time, and keep bottles in cooler, less light-exposed areas of your kitchen. Wrap them in pretty fabrics for a decorative touch that also blocks light. You can even swap the cork for something more airtight, like a wine bottle stopper — another decor opportunity.

The Dollar Tree rustic glass bottles are also great for vinegar, and perfect if you like infusing your own oil to embrace flavors like lemon, rosemary, basil, ginger, thyme, red pepper, garlic, etc. — these ingredients need to sit in the oil for weeks, and they'll look lovely doing so in this kind of bottle. Similarly, if you like flavoring your own simple syrups, you can store them in these bottles to give your home bar an Italian-chic boost.