[glup]

It has always struck me as completely silly that fridges are seemingly designed so that their contents are maximally occluded. My solution has been to have 3 to 4 large plastic containers, Tupperware, etc., in the 1.5 - 3 gallon (~6-12 liters) range. Each gets a thematic selection of contents, e.g. one for leafy greens, one for "solid" veggies like peppers and cucumbers, and one for proteins (meat, cheese, tempeh). The advantages are:

- Every time you pull out the bin, you get a reminder about what you have, and what is going bad

- A meal is fairly easily structured by drawing one or more times from each bin

- It's much easier to clean a bin than to clean the whole fridge; you can move the contents into a new bin and clean the old one

- Food stays fresher because it's in airtight containers, and not subject to the horrid dry air of the fridge

- I know roughly how many person-days of food are in a bin —— so I can plan when to go to the store

- It's really easy to know what kind of food to buy more of when you go to the store —— bin closest to empty.

The one gotcha is that some bins can't be out of the fridge for long (e.g. meat), but generally the bins have sufficient thermal mass that 3-5 minutes on the counter inspection and choosing a few ingredients isn't going to cause any spoilage.

[roland35]

I bet you have less drippy leaks too! I always hated moving into an old apartment with a fridge with yellow goop inside!