Going Away? Refrigerator Raid!

How many times have you gone out of town, and come back to a stinky fridge full of food gone bad? I know it's happened to me more times that I would like to remember. There is nothing I hate more than wasting money. Next time you are leaving home, set aside about 30-40 minutes to do a refrigerator raid to properly dispose of items that can be trashed and preserve items that can be saved. For example, I recently found a package of mushrooms, a bell pepper, several heads of broccoli, a pint of blueberries, and a half gallon of milk. All of these items were organic (read:EXPENSIVE) and I did not want to lose them to rot. I quickly flash froze the mushrooms, blueberries, pepper (cut into strips), and broccoli on a sheet pan, then put them into individual containers and stashed them in the freezer. The milk had more than an inch of space in the carton, so I felt confident it would freeze without bursting. The milk will need a day or two in the fridge to thaw, and the veggies and berries can stay put until needed.

You can blanche and shock the veggies first, but since I am only freezing them short term just throwing them in the freezer in a properly sealed container will do. And voila! A whole lot of expensive produce and dairy lives to see another day. Got eggs in there too? Freeze them like this.