A disorganized fridge can swiftly become a big problem. A messy fridge can threaten your health and budget, from forgotten leftovers to missing ingredients. The good thing is that you can suitably evade these nuisances by using a few effective but simple organizational strategies. Keeping your fridge organized makes the most of your available space and keeps everything fresh and ready to eat.
Clean and Sort
The first step to organizing a fridge is cleaning and sorting all your items. Get everything out of the refrigerator, investigating for expiration dates, mold, or other signs of spoiled food as you go. Clear anything that is past the expiration date or looks yucky. For leftovers or food in plastic storage containers, if you’re not positive how long it has been in there, throw it out. In terms of your food, it’s appropriate to err on the side of caution.
With everything out of the fridge, take the time to clean its interiors attentively. Wash and dry all surfaces, including inside drawers and bins, making use of hot, soapy water or a mild bleach solution. That way, you will get started with a clean fridge for your new organization system.
Label Everything
The next step to an organized fridge is to keep an inventory of how long your food has been there. Though a number of pre-packaged foods will come with an expiration or sell-by date on them, for fruits and veggies or food that you bring home or that is leftover from meals, you must have a system to keep track of when it was added to the fridge and when it will need to be thrown out.
One beneficial tip is to use a dry-erase marker to write the dates of meals and takeout on the container. You could complete the same thing for other perishables inside of your fridge. By noting both when you brought them home and when they need to be used, you can warrant that you are using up the groceries you buy before they spoil and avoid eating leftovers that can make you sick.
Use Containers
Keeping loose items tidy in a fridge, specifically fruits, vegetables, and even small condiment jars, can be taxing. Ponder on using clear storage bins to group loose items together to prevent clutter and make sure you have everything you’re in search of. Moreover, look into having quality reusable food storage containers with tight-fitting lids. This can help you store food safely and reduce waste by reusing your containers more than once.
You can additionally use a dry-erase marker on the bins and storage containers to keep track of the date things were bought. Using bins and storage containers in your fridge will free up space for more oversized items elsewhere and make tracking the expiration dates of perishable foods simpler.
Develop a System
As you set out to replace items, it’s essential to develop a system for storing everything. This has two benefits: first, you will constantly know where things are, and second, it can make your food last longer and be safer. As an example, take into consideration that particular items should be kept in certain places.
Meat should consistently be kept on the lowest shelf to avoid dripping and contaminating other food. Likewise, never store milk in the fridge door – it can spoil immediately when exposed to warm air very often. You can, in addition, separate your fruits and vegetables and use trays for rather messy items to prevent spills.
Plan Ahead
Supposing your fridge is clean and organized, the crucial thing you can comply with is a plan to keep it that way. Even the most organized fridge will need to be scrubbed, and old items are thrown out sometimes. Take into consideration creating a cleaning schedule to warrant that your fridge stays organized. For a case in point, you could pick a day of the week or month to go through everything, rotating and updating your fresh produce and wiping down fridge surfaces. By performing this regularly, you can avoid the dreaded deep-clean and purge of your fridge (and freezer), a job very few like.
By observing this simple advice, you can keep your fridge clean and organized week after week with less exertion than you thought probable!
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Originally Published on Nov 12, 2021
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