I read the other day that as much as 40% of food produced in America is not eaten, and I realized as I was cleaning out the fridge how guilty of wastefulness I am myself! I had to throw out several yogurts, a mango, a package of pork chops, some lunch meat, assorted cheeses, half a bag of onions, 4 apples, 3 mandarin oranges, a half-eaten carton of cottage cheese and assorted leftovers. What a ridiculous waste!
To try to help with this, I decided to re-organize the fridge once I was done with a full clean-out. I started off by completely emptying the refrigerator, and then I removed all of the shelves and drawers to give them a good scrubbing in the sink. I then wiped out the interior, replaced the shelves and started trying to figure out where my biggest food-wasting problems are.
Part of the problem is that Norah's homemade baby foods and single-serve fruits, veggies and yogurts tend to just get stashed around the fridge wherever they happen to fit. Then they get forgotten until I run across them much later and have to toss them out. To try to help with this problem, I put 2 bins from Target on the top shelf of the fridge to store loose items. I put all of her baby foods, fruits, etc., in one and all of the assorted condiments (which were taking over the drawer shelves) in the other.
I think that alone is going to make a big difference! Then I set aside the small shelf below that for fresh meats and items such as leftovers, etc., that need eaten in short order.
One other thing that drives me crazy is that all of the jelly, salad dressing, croutons, bacon bits, etc., are all scattered out in the shelves so that it is always a pain to find everything I need when I want to serve a salad. Solution? A salad basket! Then all I have to do is pull it out and set it on the table, and the salad accompaniments are ready to go!
Then I put all my veggies and fruits in their own little drawers:
On a side note, go buy some Cuties while you have the chance... They're yummy and super-easy to peel, so they make a perfect healthy snack! The last batch we had was particularly delicious, and they were on sale at Wal-Mart this morning!
Once I figured out a place to keep the yogurt, all the dairy fit in its assigned drawer:
And then there's my personal favorite fridge shelf! : )
I wish I had thought to take a before picture to show you how much better it looks now than it did, but here is the after anyway!
I love spring cleaning!
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