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Old 10-30-2014, 03:05 PM
 
294 posts, read 240,972 times
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I'm stating right up front that this is a totally unimportant question, so don't just answer it to tell me that it is.

Whenever I watch television, it shows people who have refrigerators and pantries crammed with food. Now I eat very little and I have never had either a full refrigerator or pantry because the food would just all spoil and I'd have to throw it out. What the heck is in those refrigerators and pantries? For example, I see a lot of milk, fruit, vegetables, and meat. All of that stuff goes bad relatively quickly. Do you guys with packed refrigerators really eat an entire refrigerator full of food before it spoils?

I'm only asking because today I went shopping and the way I do it is I buy food, then eat it, then shop when I have NO food remaining. So, when I go shopping, my refrigerator is completely and totally empty. But I'm sort of thinking that most people would consider that to be weird.
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Old 10-30-2014, 03:24 PM
 
Location: Lost in Montana *recalculating*...
19,529 posts, read 22,407,589 times
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Oh God my wife is TERRIBLE at cleaning out the fridge. I have to go in every week and clear out the veggies rotting and old meals.

That being said we have a lot of jams, jellies, condiments, olives, pickles- stuff like that.
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Old 10-30-2014, 03:32 PM
 
Location: Where the mountains touch the sky
6,743 posts, read 8,521,419 times
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Vacuum sealed sausages and jerkey, even dehydrated meats and vegetables last a lot longer when refrigerated.

While I produce a lot of my own food from garden/ranch/hunting/fishing, I hate having to take the time to go shop so when I do it I do it for a month's worth at a time at least, unless there's a good sale on something like coffee, when I'll buy a couple extra tins.

Bread and other baked goods last better in the fridge too, as long as you keep them dry, which is where zip lock gallon bags come in handy. If you leave bread out on the counter, even sealed, it molds fairly quickly.

The only things I buy on a weekly basis are items like milk.

The pantry and cellar hold a lot of food, the freezer has a lot in it, the freezer on the fridge holds the stuff we use often, the fridge itself outside of the stuff mentioned above is mainly used for marinating meats before smoking, temporary storage until the stuff can be processed, or for thawing meats slowly so they don't spoil.

That and it's a good place for the wife to keep her soda pop
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Old 10-30-2014, 03:42 PM
 
Location: Wilton, CT
44 posts, read 47,254 times
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Yup, you're right... that IS bizarre! I can't even imagine how it's possible to have a totally emptily refrigerator. And you have that happen often! That's definitely something I've never heard of, and I honestly doubt anyone else has either. What about ketchup & mayo, eggs (they don't spoil quickly)?, or even egg substitute? Juices? Butter (or whatever you use)? Other drinks? Milk? Cream? cheeses, etc.?

Now I share a fridge with my cousin. We cook and eat different foods most of the time, so it's tricky. But when I was on my own, my fridge was never empty (actually it's never empty now either. There was a time when I did throw more out that I felt I should. But when I got a new fridge, that almost never happened. Occasionally things get thrown out... IT HAPPENS TO EVERYONE!! If I had to wait until all my celery was gone before I could shop, I wouldn't be able to have a salad. The lettuce is always gone before the celery.

Right now in my fridge: Milk, h&h (2 because one is almost empty, so I bought another), worcestershire sauce, ketchup, mayo, dijon mustard, yogurt, eggs & egg substitute. A small batch of creamy basil sauce I made to have with pasta. There are 2 more servings that I WILL use, and 2 turkey meatballs I'll have with that pasta or zoodles (zucchini noodles) and sauce. A sweet sriracha, reg. sriracha. Turkey burger and broccoli mac & cheese cups that I'm having for dinner tonight. Lettuce (that may go bad because I've recently had dental surgery and can't have salads), celery, a red onion. 2 Grilled chicken breasts. Some to have with a quinoa dish, the rest will go for chicken salad. There's crumbled blue cheese, lite swiss slices, cheddar and cottage cheese. Turkey bacon & Canadian bacon and turkey bacon bits. All (except probably the lettuce), will be used (unless something unforeseen happens), but not all at the same time. I will likely need to pick up a few things (or maybe not).

I'm not going to respond to what you see on TV... IT'S TV!!
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:01 PM
 
294 posts, read 240,972 times
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I don't use condiments or eat salads (I eat vegetables, just not salads), so I have no dressing or ketchup or mayo or stuff like that in my fridge. I'd love to be able to stock a fridge for a month, like MTSilvertip, but I sorta feel silly vacuum-sealing everything. I guess I'd do it if I didn't live near a store, but since I do it's not too big a deal to just shop every two or three days. (It just takes me ten minutes to shop, since I'll just pick up some meat and vegetables.) But, yeah, today when I went shopping my fridge was completely empty.
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:08 PM
 
Location: SoCal again
20,699 posts, read 19,841,962 times
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My fridge was always empty but then my ex moved in - an American. He brought with him:

Pickles, Mayo, Ketchup, several salsas, salad dressing, olives, beer, wine, Soy sauce, ......

That stuff alone filled half of the fridge.

Now add potatos and onions, milk - the big packs last forever if you are only two people.

So even when the fridge was still half full, there was nothing left to eat and we had to buy more stuff.
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:11 PM
 
Location: Lost in Montana *recalculating*...
19,529 posts, read 22,407,589 times
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We have a lot in the fridge, and a lot in the freezer too. But we have a family of 4, so yeah- there's food. At least two jugs milk, water pitcher, orange juice, salad dressings, cheese, venison salami, usually enough on hand to prep/cook 4 meals for dinner p/week..
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:23 PM
 
Location: "Arlen" Texas
11,534 posts, read 2,915,947 times
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In fictional shows I would say it's the set designers making the fridge and pantry look "ideal". Reality might be different for most.
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:24 PM
 
294 posts, read 240,972 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by oh-eve View Post
Now add potatos and onions
I think you don't need to refrigerate those, unless you mean the pantry.

As for the pantry, I have like pretzels and some crackers, but if I put it in a closet, it would be the saddest looking closet ever. Like ten empty shelves and a bag of pretzels.
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Old 10-30-2014, 04:24 PM
 
13,976 posts, read 25,856,281 times
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My refrigerator was a lot fuller when I still had three sons living at home. Now, there's plenty of room in there, not so much in our small freezer.

A friend is going through chemo now, and I signed up to deliver a meal to them last night. Chemo was scheduled to go until 6:30, so I offered to bring the dinner over and leave it in their refrigerator. The response I got was that the kitchen fridge was full, as was the one in the garage, but I might find room in the basement one. This is a family of 3. I can't imagine how much they throw out.
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