This weekend I cleaned out the refrigerator, nothing earth shattering about that except that it was way over due. Once I was finished with the fridge I moved on to the freezer. There was a lot of unidentifiable stuff in there that I had to throw out.
As I was cleaning out the freezer I thought about all the money I’m throwing away because I never know what I have. I go to the grocery store, fill the fridge and the freezer, the overflow goes into the freezer in the basement where I promptly forget about it.
I find myself buying meat that I find out later was in the freezer. Time to do something about that. I went through everything that is in the freezer and made a list then I made an excel sheet on the computer with what is in the freezer. This way I can delete something when I use it and add more when I shop.
Now, all I have to do is pull up that spreadsheet and I can see what’s in the freezer without walking to the basement. This will also help me remember what is in there. I made freezer jam at the beginning of the summer and still have two jars in there that I had completely forgotten about, we’ve been eating store bought jam when we could have had the good stuff.
I’m also going to start wrapping everything in freezer paper and labeling it. I usually just throw meat in the freezer in the package it came from the store in, this is a death sentence for most meat. If you don’t use it within a few days freezer burn sets in because of the poor packaging. Right now I need to save money where ever I can so I’m going to wrap the meat better when I get it home so it will last long enough for us to actually use it.
I grabbed some plastic bins that I had to organized the freezer downstairs. It’s a chest freezer and things quickly get lost. I have a bin for beef, chicken, pork, seafood and one for breakfast items. There is also a bin for all the miscellaneous stuff that doesn’t fit into one of those categories.
Organizing your freezer is the first step to putting together a meal plan so you can make sure you always have the ingredients for quick and easy dinners on those days when you just don’t have the time or energy to cook a big meal.