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08 August 2007
How Crowded Is Your Fridge? [just when you thought one fridge post was enough] Oh, the shame. I rue the day we ever got the thing. It's like a cold breadbox, but smaller. Feel free to gloat.
Just about exactly that crowded; we have about that much space, plus a smallish veggie bin. It's a pain in the ass, but we bought a pretty small fridge because there's one single place in the kitchen where placement of the refrigerator makes sense, and a regular sized one would be visually too big, and also crowd everything else... and we thought, well - it's just the two of us; we don't really need anything larger.
So not true. Unlike where I used to live, I can no longer just take the briefest leisurely stroll around my immediate neighborhood to get farmers-market vegetables, fish-market seafood, etc., etc., and thus easily pick up whatever I want to cook the same day. Now I have to stock up on vegetables for the week from the street market that happens one day a week, and go relatively long distances for nearly everything, so one doesn't buy just the odd thing you want to cook right now. You buy many things and smush and smash and cajole and threaten them into your tiny fridge and shake your tiny fist at the smirking kitchen gods.
I'm the opposite. I live by myself and cook for myself and sometimes others, but usually there's a weekly menu plan going on, so I have what I need for that. Some protein, some cheese, some seasonal veggies, some basic salad veggies, yogurt, half-gallon milk, OJ, seltzer, a variety of condiments and sauces, some wraps. When the fridge looks really full it bothers me because I know something in there is going to go bad before I can eat it, and so it'll have to go to waste.
Every trip into our fridge is like some kind of archaeological dig. We really need to clean the damn thing out. Plus, it's a side-by-side, so the damn spaces are so narrow all you can really do is stuff things in on top of each other. Ugh.
The thing that always gets me when I watch housing shows filmed in England is the teeny-tiny fridges and the clothes-washer in the kitchen, both usually crammed under a counter.
We have an apartment-sized fridge which is big enough in our teeny-tiny kitchen (I should take another photo as that one is from before we bought the place).
How do you fit food for a family in there? We have two fridges, one about 500l and one about 300l - the larger one for food and the smaller for drinks (and icecream). Even then, we sometimes struggle to get it all in.
Those fridges under a counter? We call those "bar fridges" and the only thing they would be considered adequate for would be a home bar. If you had one of those in your kitchen, you would be the laughing stock of the neighbourhood housewives.
Our "main" fridge is this one, except without the glass shelves.
I thought at first that maybe it was our hot climate that dictates our high fridge use, but people in Europe are likely to have just as hot a climate, so it's not that. I shudder to admit it, but I think it's the Americal influence on our culture that's to blame. Americans seem to all have massive fridges compared to our european cousins. I wonder why?
Yeah... I was sort of thinking that Australian fridge thing was maybe more American-style. How are your electric bills? We generally have pretty high ones, so this, along with smaller homes/apartments, also keeps us a bit more in line with smaller + energy conservation thing. Not everyone has a small fridge, but it's pretty common.
Well, our bills are around AUD80 per month - not sure if that is high or not - that's for a family of five with a large-ish house (no aircon or heating).
deborah - sorry, I also forgot to take my shoes off and, um, I think I left the seat up. Sorry about the splash marks.