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Writer's pictureAnusya Das

How to keep your refrigerator organized

Updated: Aug 15, 2023

Hey everyone! One of the areas of my house that get unorganized very frequently and need restocking almost every week is our refrigerator.

For some of my favorite fridge organizers, you can refer to my article ‘Refrigerator organizing essentials' and check out my Amazon wishlist for the product links.


Below are some ways on how to keep your refrigerator organized and ensure you dont waste food!


Categorize your items

The categories are split into 3:

  • Produce and dairy – obviously fruits, vegetables, yogurt, milk, eggs (some produce such as garlic and ginger last me longer than regular vegetables and fruits)

  • Packaged items – these include those items that come with preservatives and have longer shelf life such as pickles, jams, wet spices, sauces, drink mixers etc.

  • Frozen items – frozen veggies, frozen nuggets, sausages, ice cream

Naturally, produce and dairy need to be consumed with a few days or a week while packaged items and frozen items can stay for longer.


Tip: Once you have your items categorized, it is easier to keep faster perishable items in front of the fridge and the other items at the back.


Rationing

Rationing, in layman’s terms means to have a fixed quantity of food for a particular person. However, this is a home fridge and you should be happy to find food that interests you whenever you open your fridge, so lets not get too rigid with this term.


All I am saying is that, try to set a practice in place, it could be anything.


Perhaps fix 1 day of the week or every 2 weeks to go to the grocery and get everything you need, in one go.

Usually certain vegetables, such as lady fingers, cauliflower, broccoli, bell pepper, need to be consumed within a few days while vegetables like carrots, cabbage, onions, potato last longer. If you do grocery shopping every 2-3 weeks, try and plan your recipes in a way that allow you to prolong the duration of going back to the grocery again.


Set a food plan for the week, basically planning what you want to eat and only buy groceries that you would need for those recipes. Even if you dont plan, have a rough idea of what your week ahead looks like and what are the kinds of food you would prefer to eat.

This not only helps in rationing and preventing wastage of food but ensure that you you eat healthy and in a controlled manner.


Tip: Items you don’t eat often or are still new to adding to your routine, keep them in areas of the fridge you have easy access to or is visible to your first thing when you open the fridge. That way, you won’t forget about it and it wont be pushed to the back of your fridge.


For those people who are still new to rationing, it will take you a while at guessing how much you need to buy, but do not give up and keep trying and testing till you perfect this!


Organize easy

Initially, I was very motivated by healthy living and chose to ‘organize my fridge’ the way Instagram told me to.

However, this did not work for me at all and caused me major problems:

  • Not all of us have those big double sized refrigerators

  • Not all of us have the same number of people in the house (some may be living solo, some with partners, some with pets, some with children)

  • And finally, every person’s food requirement, preferences are different

I decided to forego all the extras shown and I went ahead and picked out organizers and containers that fit my fridge and requirements.


Organizing easy has multiple benefits

  • It is more relevant to you and your organization patterns, some people prefer to have multiple containers and labels for every item, some of you may be more laid back

  • When it is easy to organize, you can do it more often but if organizing and cleaning is too complicated you will soon get de-motivated and stop doing it

I hope this will motivate you to keep your fridge more organized!


For some of my favorite fridge organizers, you can refer to my article ‘Refrigerator organizing essentials'


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