Fridge "challenge"

[onlyMark]

As I am now for a while on my own, the contents of my fridge have morphed into only the things I like. Any other influence has been purged.
It is only natural that two people will have differing tastes, but a lot do overlap, so our fridge tends to have a mix of common things, things she will only eat and things just for me.
As of today, everything she likes has somehow disappeared, leaving only the foodstuffs that appeal to me.
I thought I'd take an unapologetic picture of it on the spur of the moment without excuses, rearrangements or mentioning that there are many things that are really, really healthy in there but you just can't see them.
There isn't.

Are you courageous enough to whip your fridge door open and do the same?
I'm sure we can be uncritical if you have a severed head in there, or tubs of lard or whatever.
No problem if you don't want to. It was just something, sitting here a little bored, that occurred to me when I fetched out something to show Bixa in another thread.



In the door there is the tube of tomato paste, Swiss 60% dark chocolate, various jams including one my MIL made which is Aronija (had to look that one up - chokeberry) and another which is Maline (raspberry), some mustard from Bayern (Bavaria), below is bio milk and sugar free Fanta lemon.
Top shelf there was a special deal on corner yogurts for 28cents so I bought a few, half a tin of baked beans, a jar of Puszta pickle (Hungarian I think) and hidden behind is a pack of corn on the cob.

Middle shelf is cheese, mature sliced cheddar and mature sliced 'Old Amsterdam' cheese, some cheese triangles, a packet of Balkan Kase which is similar to feta but smoother consistency and less salty, Philadelphia spread cheese, a container of some pate, eggs (large bio) and a packet of Landsalami which is salami with pepper, coriander and garlic and a tub of salted butter.

Bottom shelf, left side, is a jar of mint sauce, a container of 'fridge pickles', which is just sliced cucumber and onion in vinegar, Heinz tomato ketchup at the back.
Middle is that last remaining Granny Smiths apple from four I bought a few days ago, there is a cucumber and similar colour but different is a courgette.
Balanced on another sugar free Fanta lemon is a kohlrabi which I will peel, cut into slices and eat raw. I like it best that way. To the right is more bio milk.

I the salad tray is a few tomatoes that shouldn't really be in there as they lose their flavour, but there they are anyway.
That's it. A mix of healthy and unhealthy. Not a bad effort for me really considering what I could have.

[mickthecactus]

Very interesting. I might take that up tomorrow.

[bixaorellana]

That's probably more than the sum of what has been in my fridge in the past year!

[kerouac2]

I did that many years ago. Couldn't find a trace of it here, so it must have been on TTR.

[onlyMark]

I suspected the great and good had gone before me. It did ring a bell when I thought of doing it.

[cheerypeabrain]

Challenge accepted. Admittedly we have recently had a grocery delivery. I KNOW that the bread shouldn't be in the fridge..but Jeff insists that it's kept in there...drives me crazy because there is a whole shelf I can't use.




In the door. Top shelf L - R Anchor butter, half tube of tomato puree, tub of cheddar cheese spread, lard and wedge of parmesan.
Middle shelf...bottle of lemon juice, squeezie lime juice, single cream, double cream, jar of piccalilli, jar of Pataaks curry paste, behind is a small jar of home made blueberry jam. Bottom shelf...semi-skimmed milk, tub of strawberry skyr yogurt with a tub or quark on top, another jar of single cream (I use it in cooking a lot), a packet of vegetarian suet, Heinz salad cream, half bottle of katsup manis.

Top shelf of the fridge....wheat & white loaf (Jeff's) packet of wholemeal bread 'thins' (mine), white sliced (Russell's) 2nd shelf...stack of mature cheddar cheeses..3 different types. Cheese triangles behind them...2 more tubs of butter, packet of smoked pork loin and a pack of sliced sausage (for Jeff's sandwiches), broccoli, half a savoy cabbage in the green bag. Bottom shelf is overspill from the veg drawer...little gem lettuces, bag of sugar snap peas, red peppers, bag of carrots (only just got them). Salad drawer has cucumber, carrots, a parsnip, half a swede. half a celeric,3 red chillis, 2 courgettes, chunk of ginger, 4 tomatoes (I know...but it's Jeff again) pack of baby corn and 2 big corn cobs.

I tend to freeze all my meat, poultry and fish...just get out things as and when I need them.

[onlyMark]

Well stocked fridge and a nice combination of stuff but most importantly you have Cheddar cheese spread - and cheese triangles. Like me with the Philadelphia spread and cheese triangles.
Do you get through a lot of butter then or just stocking up or for baking?
By the way, the salad cream is the wrong way up. No doubt Jeff used it last.

[cheerypeabrain]

We get through a couple of tubs of butter every 10 days or so...I use it in cooking too...sauces, baking etc. The one in the door is almost empty..I do a grocery shop about every 10 days to a fortnight...but top up on veg, milk and bread from the local Tesco Express.

Only Jeff eats the salad cream, piccalilli and spam. We all love cheese, and Russell(a vegetarian) and I eat most of the veg. Little bugger ate both of the corn on the cobs last night...

[cheerypeabrain]

But I probably put the salad cream in upside down...when we have a grocery delivery due I take everything out to check what we have in there is 'in-date' and clean down the shelves and inside of the fridge.

We never store eggs in the refrigerator tho. Use them up quite fast anyway...but they're not stored in a fridge in a store and are also better for baking if used at room temperature.

[fumobici]

I had to look up "salad cream" and "piccalilli".

[kerouac2]

I actually used to buy piccalilli at the supermarket here, because I found it interestingly weird. Those days have passed, probably because my horizons have been extended to even weirder products.

[kerouac2]

[onlyMark]

Excellent.
I think we need talking through some of this though.
Heinz mustard? Cans of beer? Two types of Philadelphia and what are they used for? Bag of grated cheese? What's the chutney? Small pizza? And what's the big red bottle bottom right in the end of the fridge door? Sweet and sour sauce?
I think you are hiding some things at the back of the shelves. Do I see some Feta as well?

[kerouac2]

Not Heinz mustard: Heinz curry-mango sauce. Yes, beer. I normally don't have Philadelphia on hand, but they were having a 2 for 1 sale -- one is salmon/dill and the other is garlic/herbs. The chutney is coriander chutney, probably not your favourite. I bought a little pizza, which as everyone knows, I don't like but I couldn't resist the price of less and a euro today for that cheese, mushroom, ham thing. The big red bottle is sparkling water (Badoit). Grated cheese, feta, and yes there are lots of other things in back. I am ready for the apocalypse. In fact, I will prove it with a visit to the pantry.

[onlyMark]

I'm impressed there is more or less a system and you certainly are well stocked.
I notice there are many essentials like noodle soups, alphabet macaroni(?), salad cream(? in the white upside down squeezy bottle), chocolate, aerosol cream and the absolutely essential Nescafe coffee for when I visit. I hope it isn't decaf though.

[kerouac2]

The white squeeze bottle is mayonnaise. There is no salad cream in the cupboard that I know of.

[cheerypeabrain]

Impressed with your cupboards Kerouac...very organised. Like yours mine are stuffed full...I need more space!

[cheerypeabrain]

Just looked at this thread again and compared it with today's contents...roughly the same altho no sausage slices in there today. Less cheese too.

Over the pandemic I've become obsessed with organising the fridge and kitchen cupboards. I've got a couple of plastic boxes that fit on the bottom shelf of the fridge atm full of veg, making it easier to stop stuff getting lost at the back. I'm keen to get more boxes to organise the middle shelf of the fridge and the food cupboards. It's probably because I'm avoiding more daunting tasks like scrubbing the wood floors...

[kerouac2]

I was thinking of this thread, too, recently and thought that I should visit my refrigerator again. I think that the contents have changed a bit.

[cheerypeabrain]

My fridge only varies a bit according to the season...but there are always veg, salad, butter and cheese in there. When I start running low on veg it's time to organise a grocery delivery...

[kerouac2]

I have absolutely nothing in my vegetable bin at the moment except for fresh green pepper that has now become black pepper (so I should take it out) and also some ginger root. I have learned over time that lettuce is about the only thing that can be kept there -- everything else fares better out in the open in my kitchen (which is pretty cool at this time of year). Vegetable bins are pretty difficult to photograph anyway.

[bjd]

Jan 11, 2022 19:33:16 GMT cheerypeabrain said:

When I start running low on veg it's time to organise a grocery delivery...

Are you still having groceries delivered rather than shopping yourself, Cheery?

I buy most of my fruit and vegetables at the weekly outdoor market --I only buy potatoes and grapefruit at the supermarket.

[bixaorellana]

Well, having groceries delivered is shopping for oneself. I do buy all produce, eggs, butter, & some cheeses at my local market because it's only a block away, but I am now addicted to online supermarket shopping. It is so much less hassle and winds up being cheaper, besides. For instance, the delivery charge is only 39 pesos, no matter how much I buy. The last time I bought physically at the supermarket was a couple of years ago. At that time, the taxi home from there was 80 pesos, so it's undoubtedly more now. Thus, even adding in the tip to the delivery man, I'm coming out ahead. Also, for whatever reason, my supermarket has tons of deals that are only available online.

Totally agree with everyone about the uselessness of the vegetable "crisper", which crisps nothing, takes up a lot of space, & almost always is designed so that the fridge door makes taking the damned bin out difficult. My theory is that it's something left over from when refrigerators were literally "ice boxes".

If I weren't comfortably ensconced in my chaise, resting from an arduous laundry stint, I'd get up and photograph my pantry. When a friend moved back to the States, I got her tall office cabinet. It's quite attractive -- wooden & bright red. It changed my life in terms of kitchen storage. Instead of things stuffed and piled in the previously available cabinet space, I now have organization. Also, I recently bought one of those three tiered commercial-looking stainless steel shelves, which made everything even tidier.

[kerouac2]

Our situations are all so different. For one thing, I have always enjoyed going to the supermarket since I was a tiny child. A&P in the early days, first one in the next town and then one in our own town a year or two later. Back in those days my mother was happy to visit all of the aisles, something which changed 40 or 50 years later. I suppose that it will happen to me some day. My brother and I were never bored with these visits. ("Look, the gizzards are on sale!")

Later, living in Los Angeles at university, I again loved discovering what was for sale in the supermarkets -- Mexican, Japanese and Korean products that I had never seen before. But one of my university friends was from New Orleans and we understood each other unlike those California surfer dudes. We went to the Louisiana Fish House Market, somewhere or other near Watts, in any case some place where we were the only white customers but were warmly greeted because we spoke their language. (I discovered in Los Angeles that the locals could not understand the language spoken by the black 'migrants' from the Deep South and I was amazed.) I am horrified to realise that I don't even remember the name of this friend.

And of course when I was finally able to travel everywhere, I learned that markets and supermarkets were among the best places to learn about local products and culture. It's one of the reasons that I can't wait to return to Southeast Asia and Singapore.

In the meantime, I remain a supermarket addict and could not imagine shopping on line, where I would never see all of the remarkable foreign products that turn up from time to time. Most of them quickly disappear because people do not buy thmm, but I manage to snap up some of them by being in the right place at the right time.

I need variety and new things and online shopping makes this almost impossible. Also, I have 5 supermarkets no more than 500 metres from my flat and another 10 or so ethnic shops just as close. I know that I am very lucky.

[cheerypeabrain]

I love supermarket shopping, but the herberts here don't wear masks and ignore personal space. I tend to buy meat and poultry from a butchers in a nearby village, or a farmers market. It depends when I can get there. Everything else I order online from Ocado (they stock Marks & Spencer food) or Asda. The advantage of Ocado being that everything is delivered in bags which they take back the next time that they call...refunding 10p per bag. Asda stuff comes in trays which you have to empty whilst the driver waits. Jeff does it but it's a faff.

[bjd]

It must be living in France that does it for Kerouac and me, but I also prefer to do my shopping in person. Not that I especially like supermarkets, but since I tend to have a list that says "lunch?", I see what's interesting or on special. Or I see things I never would have thought of.

I buy most fresh fruit and vegetables at the outdoor market, bread at the baker.

And I agree that shops and markets are a great way of seeing how other cultures and people live.

[mickthecactus]

I always shop in person too. Wouldn't dream of ordering a delivery but if you're time poor like my daughter I can understand why she does it. I like to see what I'm buying.

[onlyMark]

I've usually kept away from online shopping for groceries no matter which country I've lived in. But I'll be having a few weeks in Germany without a car and to stock up I'll probably do it, then nip 100m down to a small shop for essentials from time to time.
In Egypt and Jordan I'd sometimes avail myself of their system whereby I go to the supermarket, gather all what I wanted, pay, get the receipt and then hand all the stuff off to someone who'd bag it and deliver it within half an hour into my kitchen. Saved me lugging big bottles of water etc.

[bixaorellana]

I got a supermarket order today. It was nothing thrilling, unless one is excited by bags of kibble and bottles of club soda.

Anyway, appreciate that I'm doing this, as the pantries and fridges y'all are showing are all so tidy, unlike mine.

This first picture is of the cabinet that had to function as my entire pantry before I got the new tall cabinet.
It's now useful for other things:


The tall cabinet that changed my life:


My untidy fridge:

[bjd]

What do you mean "untidy"? Looks fine to me.