The refrigerator can offer an illicit glimpse into the culinary recesses of one's psyche. Everyone has one, and it is often an area that feels more private than public, despite being centered in the home and accessible to all. One of the first things that I do when going to a friend's house is check their fridge. I am drawn to it out of curiosity, sometimes hunger, and a sense of intimacy. After all, only a close friend would be bold enough to casually survey the fridge, poking through drawers in search of a snack. A good friend of mine, one who has frequent access to my refrigerator, recently made a comment about my refrigerator organizational strategy that got me thinking about just how much this ubiquitous appliance says about each of us...
What is your relationship to food? To cooking? Are you organized? Do you tend to horde things for fear of wasting them? How high is your tolerance for clutter? Are you adventurous? A creature of habit? How much time do you spend at home? So many things that a refrigerator can reveal ... let's see what mine has to say!
To start with, the outside of the fridge says a lot. Mine is an old one that came with the house, still works but probably not the most energy efficient model. While I cannot afford to buy a new one (my motto regarding appliances is "it only gets replaced if it breaks"), I often dream of a slimline Energy-Star model with side-by-side doors and freezer below. Alas, this one has served me well and will continue to do so, I hope.
I have been collecting refrigerator magnets for more than 15 years now, and the best are proudly displayed in my kitchen, front and center. They are my antidote to compulsive souvenir buying on trips, and I have managed to accumulate about 30 states and 10 different countries --- some contributed by travelling friends and acquaintances. The newest one always goes in the center of the freezer door -- the place of honor. Along with my magnets, I also have the current schedule for YMCA exercise classes (working off the proverbial last 10 pounds -- forever!), drawings by our young friends, and the running grocery list. This last item is of particular importance ... we just started keeping the grocery list on the fridge recently and I have found that it is a brilliant strategy. Any time that I realize we will need something at the store I write it down right away. That way, all of our shopping gets done once a week, and we are hardly ever without a key ingredient. After all, preparedness is essential to improvisational cooking.
Next we take a look at the inside. This is the heart and soul, the center of the fridge. Have you ever visited a friend or relative and looked in their fridge to only find Diet Coke and a stick of butter and last week's take out and wondered how they survive? Well, my fridge is nothing like that. I spend an inordinate amount of time every day either thinking about, cooking, or eating food ... and the fridge bears witness to the fact that we are well stocked and frequent at-home eaters.
I have a very basic organizational system. Top shelf is ready-to-eat foods, things that are already cooked and packaged for lunch or snacking. Easy to find first thing in the morning when half asleep and rushing off to work. I take pride in the fact that Ryan and I both go to work with lunch bag in hand each day. The second shelf is raw ingredients: greens, veggies, tortillas --things that are fresh and should be used quickly. This is also the overflow shelf for when we have too many leftovers, which happens a lot. The bottom shelf is for staple items that we know are there, but don't need to see so much -- eggs, Limoncello, yogurt, celery, plastic wrap. There is the Cheese Drawer, the upper right-hand one, that also holds tofu and Soyrizo. Then the lower left-hand drawer is the salad drawer, home to radishes, red cabbage, beets, green onions, herbs, etc. And finally there is the fruit drawer on the lower right. What's nice about this system is that we always know where to put things when we get home from grocery shopping, and we always know where to find it when we are hungry. Every once in a while, around holidays especially, the fridge gets over filled and out of order and it is no longer apparent what there is to eat, or cook with and I get a little anxious. An orderly fridge is the sign of an orderly home and an orderly mind. For someone who loves everything in its place, the fridge is often a reflection of my mental state.
Now, on to the door. This is pretty straightforward, no special system here. But the contents are definitely a clue to our favorite flavors and tastes. In the Handi Bin, hiding behind the retro brown doors, is organic unsalted butter from grass-fed cows. A splurge maybe, but worthwhile for both the conscience and taste buds. The other door is hiding some film for Ryan's Holga camera. We have chili paste for making spicy dishes, and Dijon mustard for salad dressing.
Several varieties of mom's homemade jam -- blueberry and peach at the moment -- these are saved for toast on weekends or special occasions, never to be used for peanut butter and jelly. A gel eyemask for especially bad headaches lives in the top bin, along with a bag of ground flaxseed for putting on hot cereal in the morning. There is the maple syrup, 100% real from trees, no substitutions are tolerated. Of course, Sauvignon Blanc for cooking (everything tastes better with a little wine) and some homemade Limoncello given to us by friends -- very good in margaritas. Finally, there is the Mr. Suisse, as whipped cream is known in our home, to be used on anything remotely dessert like, and also as a treat for a our little cat Casey. She stands on her hind legs and licks it off of Ryan's finger.
The last stop on this journey is the freezer, perhaps the least visited area of the fridge. Now, it does not look very elegant, but there is definitely good stuff in here. I have bags of frozen melon from The Farm this summer, all three colors of melon, and have discovered that it is possible to make fantastic margaritas (with Limoncello!) and also a very nice sorbet, both with little effort and some frozen melon. I also have bags of frozen stock ingredients -- fennel stems and fronds, corn cobs, leek tops, and Parmesan cheese rinds. These are all super easy to pull from the fridge when making stock or broth and they add some lovely flavor as well as using up the otherwise disposable left-overs from other cooking projects. We have edamame, for Monday night Salad Night. And also frozen berries for Ryan's morning yogurt.
The bright blue cylinder is a diamond-shape ice cube mold for special occasions. There are still two bags in the way back of frozen pumpkin puree from this fall, destined to become pumpkin custard. And the cheese grater and butter are in the freezer because I wanted to try out a new method for making biscuits ... but forgot the butter entirely instead, because it was in the freezer.
So this is a candid portrait of my psyche in shades of food, organization and obsession. A glimpse into what it might be like to live in my shoes (or stomach!) for a day. I wonder what your fridge has to say....
I have been collecting refrigerator magnets for more than 15 years now, and the best are proudly displayed in my kitchen, front and center. They are my antidote to compulsive souvenir buying on trips, and I have managed to accumulate about 30 states and 10 different countries --- some contributed by travelling friends and acquaintances. The newest one always goes in the center of the freezer door -- the place of honor. Along with my magnets, I also have the current schedule for YMCA exercise classes (working off the proverbial last 10 pounds -- forever!), drawings by our young friends, and the running grocery list. This last item is of particular importance ... we just started keeping the grocery list on the fridge recently and I have found that it is a brilliant strategy. Any time that I realize we will need something at the store I write it down right away. That way, all of our shopping gets done once a week, and we are hardly ever without a key ingredient. After all, preparedness is essential to improvisational cooking. 
I have a very basic organizational system. Top shelf is ready-to-eat foods, things that are already cooked and packaged for lunch or snacking. Easy to find first thing in the morning when half asleep and rushing off to work. I take pride in the fact that Ryan and I both go to work with lunch bag in hand each day. The second shelf is raw ingredients: greens, veggies, tortillas --things that are fresh and should be used quickly. This is also the overflow shelf for when we have too many leftovers, which happens a lot. The bottom shelf is for staple items that we know are there, but don't need to see so much -- eggs, Limoncello, yogurt, celery, plastic wrap. There is the Cheese Drawer, the upper right-hand one, that also holds tofu and Soyrizo. Then the lower left-hand drawer is the salad drawer, home to radishes, red cabbage, beets, green onions, herbs, etc. And finally there is the fruit drawer on the lower right. What's nice about this system is that we always know where to put things when we get home from grocery shopping, and we always know where to find it when we are hungry. Every once in a while, around holidays especially, the fridge gets over filled and out of order and it is no longer apparent what there is to eat, or cook with and I get a little anxious. An orderly fridge is the sign of an orderly home and an orderly mind. For someone who loves everything in its place, the fridge is often a reflection of my mental state. 
Now, on to the door. This is pretty straightforward, no special system here. But the contents are definitely a clue to our favorite flavors and tastes. In the Handi Bin, hiding behind the retro brown doors, is organic unsalted butter from grass-fed cows. A splurge maybe, but worthwhile for both the conscience and taste buds. The other door is hiding some film for Ryan's Holga camera. We have chili paste for making spicy dishes, and Dijon mustard for salad dressing. Several varieties of mom's homemade jam -- blueberry and peach at the moment -- these are saved for toast on weekends or special occasions, never to be used for peanut butter and jelly. A gel eyemask for especially bad headaches lives in the top bin, along with a bag of ground flaxseed for putting on hot cereal in the morning. There is the maple syrup, 100% real from trees, no substitutions are tolerated. Of course, Sauvignon Blanc for cooking (everything tastes better with a little wine) and some homemade Limoncello given to us by friends -- very good in margaritas. Finally, there is the Mr. Suisse, as whipped cream is known in our home, to be used on anything remotely dessert like, and also as a treat for a our little cat Casey. She stands on her hind legs and licks it off of Ryan's finger. 
The last stop on this journey is the freezer, perhaps the least visited area of the fridge. Now, it does not look very elegant, but there is definitely good stuff in here. I have bags of frozen melon from The Farm this summer, all three colors of melon, and have discovered that it is possible to make fantastic margaritas (with Limoncello!) and also a very nice sorbet, both with little effort and some frozen melon. I also have bags of frozen stock ingredients -- fennel stems and fronds, corn cobs, leek tops, and Parmesan cheese rinds. These are all super easy to pull from the fridge when making stock or broth and they add some lovely flavor as well as using up the otherwise disposable left-overs from other cooking projects. We have edamame, for Monday night Salad Night. And also frozen berries for Ryan's morning yogurt. The bright blue cylinder is a diamond-shape ice cube mold for special occasions. There are still two bags in the way back of frozen pumpkin puree from this fall, destined to become pumpkin custard. And the cheese grater and butter are in the freezer because I wanted to try out a new method for making biscuits ... but forgot the butter entirely instead, because it was in the freezer. 
