One time at a party I was hosting a good friend opened my refrigerator and said, "Did you just clean your fridge or does it always look that way?" I sheepishly said, "No, I didn't just clean it and yeah, most of the time."
Does stuff get spilled? Yes! Do things leak? Yes! Do things go moldy? Of course. But because it is organized, I know what I'm out of because each thing has its own place, food spoils less because I use Green Bags. See my article about Green Bags, the article is titled, "How to avoid wasting food and save money on your grocery bill," see the link.
So here is the inside of my refrigerator.
Top Shelf
As you can see, I keep mostly dairy and our bowl of greens on this shelf. My daughter taught me the Tupperware trick of preparing salad greens, placing a paper towel in the bowl and flipping it upside down to preserve the lettuce longer. I also write the date with a Sharpie marker on my water filter so I know when I replaced it last.
The next shelf is adjusted to be shallow on purpose. I keep yogurt and eggs here.
The bin below is our fruit bin. Diet experts say to keep the things you want to remind yourself to eat at eye level. You can see that each fruit is in a separate Green Bag.
The next shelf is what we call "Ello's," that means leftovers! If there are things on this shelf, I know we need to eat them, freeze them or toss 'em. In this instance there is corn I will serve for dinner tonight.
The bottom shelf is rather unique to us. I have two plastic bins that hold all the little jars of hot peppers that my husband loves to buy. There are pickles, my organic peanut butter, his "hot" jellies and my "Spreadable Fruit". If there are open containers of anything used for cooking, i.e., broth, minced garlic or roux it stays in the middle.
The next bin is veggies, in Green Bags of course. The bottom holds lunch meats, cheeses and tortillas. We have a refrigerator in the garage where we keep drinks, bulky items like watermelon, if we have it, and overflow items when we are having a party, or holiday menus.
To the right is the door of the refrigerator. Top bin is the butter and cream cheese. The next shelf is for my lime and lemon juice, spray butter, creamer, and a small plastic bin that holds hot peppers I have picked from the garden, dh loves to look here. There are boiled eggs and chopped onion I need to use and there is fresh garlic here too. Might seem like a weird combo of items, but the point is that we always know where to find these particular items.
The next shelf holds juice and milk. The two bottom shelves hold condiments, and salad dressings and again dh has special mustards and spreads he loves. We never end up with two of the same thing open because something was hidden in the back of the refrigerator shelf.
Last is the freezer compartment. The two top shelves have bread items. I make biscuits and freeze them and I use my bread directly out of the freezer. We are having hamburgers and hot dogs this particular weekend, so there is more bread than usual.
The next shelf has frozen fruit I use in smoothies. Below that, whenever possible, I bring in frozen items from the garage freezer and keep them on the next shelf to avoid opening the freezer too many times in one day. (I have a Seal-a-Meal
that I use to date and seal all of my meats in the freezer in the garage) I will be featuring how I organize my freezer this week.
There is extra fruit on the next shelf and I use the bin at the bottom for cheese and packaged items I want frozen.
I use the door for frozen packs to use in lunches, storing sausage, yeast etc.
The drawback to my freezer is that there is very little ability to adjust the shelves.
Personalize your own space according to the items your family uses. Just keep things grouped together and containerize! :)
