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Sub zero fridge and platters?

13 years ago

Been planning our house for 8 months and always planned to get the 36" SubZero fridge with separate freezer only drawers. We will have a separate el cheapo freezer only in our laundry for meats, pizzas, etc. but want a small freezer in the kitchen for frozen fruit for smoothies, ice cream and waffles.

Saw one yesterday and man is it skinny! What do folks do that have the integrated fridges??? What about party trays, etc? The Viking guy tried to sell me on his fridge (and I think I know better) but the bottom party tray drawer was awesome since you couldn't fit it on a shelf!

I have to have a BIG fridge since I have 3 boys and we buy 6 gallons of milk a week, and the oldest is 9! I thought the 36" fridge was my answer. I really really really want an integrated fridge with panels too so we just can't do anything smaller than a 36" since you lose so much space when you go integrated.

Any thoughts?

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Comments (4)

gizmonike
13 years ago
Built-ins are counter depth, so they're not as big as stand-alone units. However, it's easier to find things since they're not as deep.

SZ has removable door shelves, so you can arrange them how you want them, and can even remove one or all to fit really deep items like party trays.

For maximum refrigerator space, you might consider an "all" unit instead of the R/F combo. For the last 2 houses, we've had "all" units, meaning one unit is all refrigerator, the other is all freezer, and we're big fans of this approach. You get a lot of storage & the units don't have to be side by side.

Another approach might be to go with the SZ 36 R/F that you've been planning, and add an undercounter refrigerator drawers unit elsewhere in the kitchen. This approach has the advantage of moving beverages & snacks for your boys out of the high traffic area of your kitchen, & freeing up room in your food R/F. We have full size SZs and undercounter GE Monogram refrigerator drawers (not in the kitchen). SZ makes undercounter units but they're more expensive than Monogram. SZ undercounters are 27" wide, while Monogram is 24" wide. All can be integrated.
athensmomof3
Original Author
13 years ago
Thanks for the info! We don't have a tremendously large kitchen but we do have a separate bar behind doors in an adjacent family room which was where we are planning on doing a drink fridge, for beer, cokes and water.

The viking guy tried to talk me into a uline fridge freezer drawer set. I just worry that one freezer drawer is not big enough even for our limited needs when half of it is taken up by an icemaker. I do see the benefit of getting all the kids drinks out of the fridge though. . . we do have a spot out of the path of traffic where we could do fridge drawers though . . . getting my wheels turning! I am concerned about filling up all my lower storage with appliances though!

The platter thing really concerned me - so thanks for the tip. I do see how you could rearrange the shelves to fit the platter. The 36 inch SZ I liked is the one with the fridge drawers separate so you don't have one long tower. . . I think you could fit a platter in there but you would have to take everything else out!
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gizmonike
13 years ago
I'd put the platter at the very bottom of the upper space & rearrange the shelf spacing if necessary. Platters in a drawer wouldn't work well. The very top shelf of the integrated SZ is very tall for me, so I use baskets or tubs there to pull out.

We downsized our freezer from a SZ 36 (old house) to a 27 (current house) because the 36 was never full. Then DS turned into a mighty hunter & fisherman, maxing out our freezer, so we now have a chest freezer in the basement as well.
athensmomof3
Original Author
13 years ago
gizmonike - yes we are planning on the "all" fridge with a separate small freezer in the kitchen and a full size standard freezer in the laundry room. I would be afraid to go smaller than a 36 inch fridge only because then we are in side by side fridge size which is definitely too small!

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