Using up everything out of the freezer.

I also have blackboard film on the fridge integrated door panel.
When we have enough food listed, I do a screen shot to refer to in the supermarket.

Grannee, we call those meals, a House Special. ?

Those bits and bobs that you forgot to label in the freezer? My son calls the dinner assembled from them a "freezer lottery"

We de-frost our freezer once a year, always when its cold enough to put things outside, we live in Sweden so its easy to do,then we use a hairdrier to help the frost away and then we pop everything back, still frozen.

Since I don’t want Hetty58 needlessly horrified, I should add that as I use things up, and can then condense the contents of 3 drawers into 2, I will then empty all fossilised crumbs and spilt frozen peas etc., from drawer one and wash it, before replacing it, clean and ready to be refilled with nice new stock.

The other two will later be condensed into one, rinse (wash) and repeat.

Mogsmaw - Sticky back blackboard film on your freezer door! What a great idea! I can think of a few more places to use it too! Now Mr Gooooogle, where can I get it from?!!!!!

I'm on my own and have my fridge/freezer and then a small one in the garage for an overflow. I made huge pots of soups, stews and sliced meat to do me over lockdown here in N.Ireland. I've bags of frozen veg, stewed apple, all sorts of stuff. I'm so glad I've filled them as I'm going to get through it all as don't want to go near any supermarkets.

DO NOT use a hairdryer to defrost a fridge. In our village an elderly doctor thought he would hasten the process with a hairdryer. The gas in the freezer caught light and in the end his own penthouse flat and two flats beneath him were totally destroyed by the fire.

I 'shop' my freezer and cupboard every January. Memories of my two sons and their friends when they were in their teens and twenties. Talk about locusts!

I defrost my freezer every couple of months, I take the draws out and leave them on the side, half fill a washing up bowl with boiling water and put that on the middle shelf, then put a folded towel at the bottom of the freezer to soak up the melted ice so it doesnt leak out all over the floor. Close the door, leave for 30 mins, freezer defrosted. ( None of the foods have defrosted in that short amount of time.)

I keep saying ill rotate things in my chest freezer, but then a new supermarket shop comes & im looking for room.....

Hetty58 Freezer can be "non icing up" think it may be non frosting, sorry don't know the correct term. I have two freezers, both don't need defrosting. Yes, keep them clean but no need to empty to do so.

I have one freezer that needs defrosting I use a steam cleaner
to defrost and have when deperate and between cleaners used a wall paper stream stripper

I think I need to borrow a teenager. We used to do alot of catering for the local church and and entertain everyweek
but my DH now has Ulcerated Colitus so very restricted on
what he can eat and so don't entertain and I am left with two 6ft Freezers in the garage of food. I do cook for myself but
am costantly on a diet. After about two years I have two free draws. Will be at this for years.

My DGS - aged 2 - packs away a phenomenal quantity of food. Am trying to get our freezer cleared / reorganised as 4 lamb are due in there soon

He has taken to being VERY late for meals. Breakfast I leave out for him, but I'm not doing the same with lunch. He missed lunch today. I hope he'll learn from it and be on time for the rest of the week.

I expect he's souring the school for forgotten bits and pieces in lockers etc as I type.

He'll eat for 3 for dinner!

GagaJo My friend - with two sons- used to hide food all over the house when they were teenagers (she, like me, was coping on a limited budget, and said that her breaking point was finding that they'd eaten a 2lb block of cheese - meant for that week's meals - as a snack before bed one evening...?)
Her best wheeze was using a large Stork margarine tub to store chocolate biscuits in the fridge - they both disliked it, so didn't look in there...?

Hetty58

I have two freezers. I can run one down and cram things into the second - to defrost and clean the first.

They waste electricity if they become iced up. They need a regular clean, too, as we store food in them.

Things don't keep forever in them, so a regular cycle of using up and restocking is necessary.

I'm puzzled (and somewhat horrified) when people say they keep them full. Don't they clean them?

Clean the freezer? Are we supposed to? Maybe a defrost every couple of years but otherwise... no.

varian

It is quite possible to empty the freezer, keep the frozen food frozen in insulated bags for a short time, defrost and clean the freezer then return the frozen food to the freezer without any of it thawing out.

I did that very thing yesterday! I put the cool boxes in the garden while I did it.
Not one thing had started thawing out. I was waiting for a Baltic day to do it.

Me too, MissAdventure

I used to defrost the freezer by leaving a hot water bottle inside it. Being rather absent-minded, I left it there overnight and, in the morning, the hot water bottle had become an ice pack.

I used to defrost the freezer by leaving a hot water bottle inside it. Being rather absent-minded, I left it there overnight and, in the morning, the hot water bottle had become an ice pack.

Not only did my teenage son eat for six, he would often bring friends home from school at lunchtime - it was not unusual to find a complete trifle, all the yogurts, bread, cheese and most of the fruit bowl gone when I got home from my part time job just after they departed each time. I did tenatively enquire if these boys had any food or money when they came to school, only to hear that they did, but they always liked what we had in our fridge!

Our kitchen fridge freezer is a 50/50 frost free and our garage freezer is also frost free so doesn’t need constant defrosting , As the kitchen freezer empties it gets a clean out and we restock from the garage one . It then gets a clean out ( garage one ) and restocked when we shop .
Our two younger grandsons ate like birds pre teen , now they have amazing appetites and they demolished an 8” Victoria sponge between them , I took it to their house for their mum’s birthday afternoon tea during lockdown , it was on a pretty plate , covered with cling film , phoned them and said there’s a birthday cake on your doorstep for mum when she gets home from school ( deputy head at a primary school looking after NHS children during lockdown)!, she rang to thank me for her half cake, the lads were hungry so decided to help themselves!!! Choice reprimand followed!

I was to host a dinner party one evening. Two gigantic specialist steak pies in the fridge in readiness. Went out to do bits and pieces shopping. Son No2 and friends came home early from a camping trip. Starving. Yep, scoffed the lot. There were three of them and I was feeding eight. Never forgotten it, of course but in spite of that a fun evening was had by all.