While the refrigerator and freezer are necessary for daily cooking and eating, it can be hard to organize your freezer. The space is generally smaller than the refrigerator and can easily become full with all sorts of odds and ends. And while many food products and dishes store well in the freezer for long periods, it’s important to keep it tidy. Otherwise, how will you know what food you have to cook and eat?! Here at FreezerFit, we know how helpful it is to organize your freezer and make best use of that space to store and enjoy freezer meals.
Organize Your Freezer
Be sure to organize your freezer and maintain the space regularly so you can best use the space. Ready-to-cook meals, leftovers, and various ingredients can easily get crowded and unorganized. But by designating different sections for different foods, using labels, and other tips, you can easily organize your freezer: And you’ll be grateful to have the extra space to avoid save food before waste and store meal prepped goods! While many people often struggle to keep the space neat, there are indeed several ways to help keep you on track.
How To Clean Out Your Freezer
When you’re ready to organize your freezer, start by removing everything and taking inventory. Continue on with these steps to start out with a clean, organized space to freeze ingredients and meals:
- Take everything out of the freezer and set it all on one surface, like your kitchen counters.
- Go through everything that was in the freezer and determine if it should stay or go: Toss foods that are expired, freezer-burned, or that you know you won’t eat. Group the foods you do want to keep in like sections.
- Clean the inside of your freezer with antibacterial spray and rags.
- Re-fill your freezer with the foods you’ve separated into similar categories. Keep the like items together, such as various meat items or vegetables.
Organization Tips
There are several ways to keep your freezer clean and tidy with just a few organization tips. First, consider what type of freezer you have: A top freezer above your fridge, a bottom drawer freezer, or side-by-side style are common set-ups. Think about the best way to use this space and how it worked best before. For example, bottom drawer freezers might work better with baskets for organization, while vertical freezers can work well with front-facing bins and labels. In general, try to keep things in separate sections with the help of organizing bins or established shelves. For more details on the organization tips below, check out this webpage by the Kitchn.
Tips to Organize Your Freezer
- Create zones: Ensure sections for different categories of food, like individual frozen ingredients, frozen prepared meals, and cooked frozen meals. This will help you find the specific ingredients or meals when you need them, without rifling through the whole freezer.
- To make those zones even more distinct and easy to keep track of, get your hands on containers like these bins and boxes to organize your freezer.
- Label and date homemade food: And save those odds and ends along the way. Do you have half of a tube of tomato paste that you know won’t be used before it expires? How about those wilting herbs or the remaining cup of coconut milk from the can? Freeze it all individually and label and date the ingredients. And when it comes to labeling freezer meals for later, FreezerFit makes it super simple with these blank labels for your freezer bags. You can only access these labels and cookbooks if you’re a member.
- Freeze ingredients and meals in individual or usable portions: Leftovers like soup can be tricky to thaw from frozen if it’ll all in one clump. Divvy up your leftover soup, for example, in individual portions in separate containers. Then when you need a quick single serving, thawing and eating leftovers will be a breeze.
Freezer Meals
Keeping an organized freezer is especially helpful when storing your freezer meals for later! It’s easy to maintain the organized space so you have room for prepared freezer meals. This keeps you more accountable when quickly cooking healthy meal prepped foods — And saves you time and money.
To get started with several freezer meals, FreezerFit’s free cooking classes will show you how to prepare and store it all. This helps you stay on top of healthy eating and takes the worry out of same-day cooking! Once your freezer is cleaned and organized, it’s easy to make room for those freezer meals for later. Create an entire shelf or two for these meals and maintain the space by keeping your freezer organized: And make sure to clean and organize regularly with these helpful tips!
