My freezer was like that until an accidental thaw when the gardener, I think, left the garage freezer door ajar. I emptied it out and now it sits ready to be sold or given away.

I had a long power outage not long ago and the side by side freezer contents also thawed out. I tossed all of that, too. Clean slate here! But I did realize that I had a lot of mysteries. I really need to get a china marker and keep it handy.

My freezers often get ahead of me but I am pretty good at morphing meat.

As we speak I have some vintage ground beef and ground pork which are about to be recycled into cabbage rolls and stuffed peppers. Some eye of the round that is about to be married to some last seasons beef broth and demi glace and debut as a beef pot pie. Same fate awaits some chicken breasts that are going to meet up with left over Thanksgiving day gravy but I won't do pot pies I'll just add some frozen peas and maybe some carrots and package them up for a future pot pie or maybe ala kings or maybe even hot chicken sammies.

I really enjoy those days when I do a major freezer cook out and restock with future poofs.

Let's just say that after I found breast milk in the freezer AND THE KID WAS 12!! I decided I needed to get organized and KNOW what's in the freezer.

We also remodeled the kitchen and have a much shallower built in freezer now. Easy to see everything in it. I use plastic boot bins I got at the container store for a couple of dollars each and my trusty labeller. If it doesn't fit in the assigned bin, I "try" not to buy it. LOL

I keep a list on my smart phone using the ourgroceries.com website and app and Gd help you if you take something out or put something in and don't write it down. The list syncs with dh's and dd's Blackberry/iPod and the younger two can do it on the kitchen PC so there are no excuses.

It's worked pretty well for us so far except, for some reason, we have toooooo many meatballs. (Must be the 16 lbs of ground turkey dh bought ;) )

How is it I can take out a frozen one-pound chub of grass-fed ground beef, make something with it and end up with 3 or 4 more containers that have to go back into the freezer? That's my food nemesis! One item out and several go back in....

Thank goodness for a FoodSaver!!! I "file" as much food in plastic baskets as possible. It's easy to take out the whole basket and flip through the contents, especially since I keep like-kinds of things together in them. The things stored behind the baskets are little-used items, but still easily accessible when the basket is removed.

One of the best things I did was to get rid of our free-standing freezer and get a larger energy-efficient refrigerator/freezer. We saved more money on utilities by getting rid of two older energy hogs and replacing it with one Energy Star model. Freezers are great conveniences, but the additional electricity used to run them (especially those placed in hot garages) often off-sets all those bargains filling it.

-Grainlady

I love this thread, and have been laughing in recognition. This summer I did a major (one large chest freezer and one stand up freezer) inventory, and have been trying to keep it up to date... But that doesn't mean the most recent stuff is at the top of those freezers! DH had to nearly unpack the full chest freezer to get to the packages of 2009 strawberries that were buried under the zillion packages of 2010 strawberries...

But while the frozen fruit and veggie counts get away from me (and they make up the majority of the stuff in both freezers), I usually do a good job of keeping an inventory on the meats / frozen poof meals in there...

breast milk in the freezer AND THE KID WAS 12!! I see an opportunity for a prize here. That's the best yet!

One item out and several go back in.... I'm right there with you on that one.

Of late, I take frozen food out of the excessive packaging, cut the instructions and/or label off, put in Foodsaver bag, Foodsave it, all to save room.

Grainlady... that's EXACTLY what happened to me with TWO beef products I hauled out during reorganization!! Once ground, made a BIG meatloaf... probably big enough to feed 4 people with mashed potatoes and a veggie. And cooking for ONE doesn't help the situation one bit! Had it for dinner last night. Chilled down and sliced off enough for a sandwich for lunch today. Then THREE vac sealed packages of single serving meatloaf for some other time.

C'mon Cathy, show us the pix of your freezer. Heh heh.

After I threw away a ton of meat in the aftermath of Ike when we were without power for 9 days, I swore I'd never overbuy again. After all, it's just me & dh most of the time! How much meat do we need to store!!?

Recently however, I hit the jack pot in the "whoops! we butchered too much" clearance section of the grocery store. Among other things, I bought a boatload of ground beef suitable for burgers. I came home and formed them into burgers with different seasonings. I think I have over 30 packages each containing two burgers in my freezer right now.

I love burgers! I just hope I don't get sick of them as I am making sure they are on my menu every other week so that they don't languish.

The bargain hunting thing - it's a sickness. But the first step is recognizing that you have a problem!

Hah, yes, I have this problem too. I keep telling myself I need to go pull everything out of the big chest freezer, and figure out what needs to be eaten (ie whatever venison is still left from *LAST* deer season - nov/dec 09'!!), what needs to be chucked (liver from 06/07/08/09) or fed to the dogs :p, and what can be filed away in my brain for later on in the year...

Honestly though, I really try to avoid making stuff to freeze. We just generally don't like it as much the 2nd go round with a very few exceptions. I send most leftovers with hubby to work/school for lunch/dinner...

12 year old breast milk wins..........

I'm at the cottage and trying to deal with the freezer before winter sets in. Thankfully just two fridge top freezers.

Clive will be up here for a week on his own so I'm focused on making meals he can just POOF.

So far I've made roast beef and gravy for hot beef sammies, beef stew, turkey soup, chile, spaghetti sauce and cauliflower soup....all from leftovers or stuff in the freezer.

I'm feeling a tad smug.... ; )

I've been storing the two bowls to my ice cream makers in the freezer, and so there is not much room for it to get cluttered up. And then I've been storing ice cream, which gets eaten without requiring additional cooking. Right now all I have is a chicken, king crab legs, Italian sausage, fresh pasta, frozen vegetables, IDY, Bombay Gin, and specialty flours. I've stopped freezing leftovers because I don't have space. Also, since I now have an ice dispenser in the freezer, I seldom open the freezer door and am less tempted to put things in. For chicken stock, I store it in a jar with a fair amount of fat on top that seals all the air out. After it is been in the fridge for a day, I vacuum seal the lid, and it keeps for several weeks and is much more convenient to use than frozen. I really hate defrosting things.

Lars

I'm working on it, I just got all those wedding things out and I'm about 1/3 full, but elery took a lot of the frozen sweet cherries, etc., home and put them in HIS freezer. So, I'll have to bring those back.....

No beef this year, that blasted black angus is only about 600 lbs at 14 months. My Hereford is 1200 pounds at 16 months, so Dave and Amanda will get half and Elery's son Chris and DIL Sorah will get half. I'm still putting a pig in there, but it won't be packed full, maybe it'll get empty enough to defrost!

Annie

breast milk in the freezer AND THE KID WAS 12!! that definitely gets the longevity prize.. LOL

We have an upright freezer that will be replaced soon. It is over 20 years old and as soon as a sale happens then a new one to be on stand by just in case.

Our freezer is filled to capacity with veggies from the garden and chickens, (whole, breasts and bone in pieces), pork roasts, ribs, bacon, and catfish.. oh do we have catfish... lots of stuff that went on sale at good prices...

Since we are shopping for a new upright freezer, we are eating our way through this one. NO SHOPPING !! No matter how good the bargain is. So far this month, I have spent less than $50 and that was for milk and salad stuff.. We usually start "shopping from the freezer along about this time of year, and by spring time, it is just about read for a thorough cleaning and getting ready for the new veggi season...

Carolyn

I do what Cathy does as far as removing packaging and putting it back in the freezer to save space.

In fact, it was Cathy I thought of as I'm visualizing my MIL's freezer, while trying to organize it with her ready-to-heat-and-serve food. SO...In order to make it easy for her to find things, I labeled the inside of the freezer door, with what's on each shelf. I also thought about using Cathy's bin method to put things in, but the shelves are really too small. Because of that, I put ''like items'' which have been vacuumed sealed, in 2 gallon ziplocks with an extra label on the outside. All she'll have to maneuver are a few of the larger bags on each shelf to find exactly what she's looking for. I'm also adding an inventory list, so she can look over the contents and know what she's going for and where it's located before she ever opens the door.

It's always kind of deal to clean out the freezer, isn't it? Good for you for working your way through it.

L2C...I have a stitch in my side. omg.

Yes, yes my freezers are like that. Not too bad right now, though. Someone left one freezer door opened and that lead to organizing all three freezers. I canned some old chuck roast and venison for stew and taquitos, and moved all of last year's food to the fridge freezer so it would stare me in the face.

We love our foodsucker.

Funny, I can't give my freezer away! Not to friends anyway.

I only have the little freezer that's over top of the fridge, and I only have recent foods that I actually like, but it is not organized in there. I pretty much pick up everything and look at it and eventually find what I'm looking for. I haven't thought of a good way to organize it, but I'm thinking I need a few large bins (veggies, dessert stuff, meat and beans, stock?) Does anyone have a system they like?

I just bought a freezer less than a year ago but I'm kicking myself for not buying an upright freezer. UGH! I really didn't think it would fill up so fast! I only had a freezer on the top of my fridge so I thought all I needed was a small cheap freezer for the extras but it's just crazy how fast it fills up! I have plastic bins in it to organize but still that's a pain. I really don't know why I need so much food though...it's just the two of us and the store is about 5 minutes away...HAHAHA!

Thanks CdL, we do feed off each other don't we!

Jessicavanderhoff, I organized my fridge in the laundry room, which is a small top freezer. The secret to utilizing the space efficiently is to add shelves. I have 5 shelves counting the floor of the freezer. I put slim ice cube bins in the door of the freezer; I keep Popsicle for the kids in one and small items like a block of cheese in the other. That way I can pull the bin out to look at the contents.

Interesting. What kind of shelves do you have in there?

Yeah...what kind of shelves? I NEED to know ;)

What kind of shelves: Just cheapo wire shelves from Target. Like the ones in the link below only smaller than those pictured.
two are 11" X 16"
one is 8" X 13" and is wedged in the remaining space with the 8" side facing out.
The freezer is only 24" wide X 15" high.

I can easily see and access most of the contents as a result of the shelves.

Here is a link that might be useful: Wire Stackable Shelves

Ｉlike cheap.