Organized Freezer

I’m off work today and I was up early to take my friend Eleanor out shopping.  It usually lasts about three hours from about 9am-noon most times we go out and then I have the whole afternoon to do other things.  This afternoon I decided I needed to clean the freezer and organize it after I saw another blog post a few days ago about organizing ones freezer.  Our freezer isn’t very large so sometimes it is difficult to get things into it.

Before:  Lately our freezer has been all messy.  I usually buy big packages of chicken and ground beef and repackage them and then there are frozen veggies and random other stuff all over the place.  When I want to make ice cream I cram my big ice cream bowl in there and balance it on everything.

After:  It isn’t amazingly organized and if I could rip out that ice maker I would have so much more room but it is considerably better!  I actually had a screw driver out thinking about ripping out the ice maker this afternoon but I realized there is a water line running back into the insides of the freezer and I didn’t know how I could detach it so I left it alone.  I don’t think Joe would be all that thrilled to come home and find I broke the fridge so I will live with it for now… it isn’t hooked up though so it is a waste of space!  Otherwise… on the left is a tote for frozen veggies so that they can be all together and contained and I can see what we have.  In fact, I found a bag of broccoli that I didn’t even remember I had purchased so now it is in the bucket with asparagus stir fry, peas, green beans and mixed veggies.  On the right is a tote for meat.  Right now it only has a big of ground beef and pork and some random meats like blood sausage, chicken liver, a few meatballs and pepperoni. Once I buy chicken or pork again the weird meats could technically fit in the door if I needed them to!  Up on top there is a spot for frozen pizza or boxed foods, right now there is a box of Jimmy Dean sandwiches there and then to the right of that is a bucket for frozen fruits or overflow… right now it holds dried basil, mozzarella cheese and garlic bread (and absolutely no frozen fruit!).  On the bottom in the middle there is a spot for my ice cream bowl (and you can see a box of flax seed sticking out behind it) when I need to freeze it or a spot for bigger things like a whole chicken.  I’m not sure where I will keep frozen chicken/fish stock when I make it, I may need to rearrange a little bit more after this to find room but for now we’re out of homemade stock so it’s okay.

The door has a few ice packs and some beer brewing supplies on the top and on the bottom are bags for saving scraps to make chicken stock and fish stock.  The door is loosely full so I could probably put some containers of stock here or shove things like pepperoni or cheese over here too.

This morning I made yogurt before picking up Eleanor and this afternoon I am just about finished making zucchini bread.  I bought some zucchini to make  chicken skewers last week but I never made them and I didn’t want the zucchini to go to waste so I am baking it instead.  It took me forever to find a recipe without any oil so we’ll see how it turns out!  I’ve also been getting some stuff for supper ready and once my bread is finished I’m going to run finally and by that time Joe will be just about coming home and it will be time for animal feeding and our own supper.

Supper is our last Omaha Steaks,  quinoa pilaf  (with carrot, celery, green onion, red pepper and garlic) and asparagus.  I have never eaten or made quinoa before so we’ll see how it tastes.  I was reading about different types of grains yesterday and was really looking for amaranth but Wal-Mart doesn’t sell that so I settled on quinoa which is also a new grain for us.  Usually we stick to things like bread, pasta, sometimes rice and oatmeal. So this week I am cooking quinoa now and I also have some barley for soup later in the week.  We know barley from canned soups but I don’t think we have ever cooked it here before… not that I can remember anyways.

Dessert is bananas covered in chocolate and coconut.