I find that sometimes when I stockpile, especially freezer stuff, I tend to forget what I have. We have a large chest freezer and often things fall to the bottom and by the time I find them they've got freezer burn! This is less of a problem in my pantry, but still an issue. Does anyone have a list or checklist system so they know exactly what's in the stockpile? How do you keep tabs on inventory?

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I don't have a lot of freezer space, so my problem is keeping it organized so it will all fit. Our small freezer chest I put only meat in and try to keep the same meats together on the shelves, like steaks here, ribs here, pork chops here, etc. The freezer above our refrigerater is where I keep everything else and even when I try to put it in an organized fashion, it still gets tossed around a lot. I think an inventory list is an excellent idea and if I had more space, I would probably do the same that. I think I will make an inventory of my pantry items, though because it is so spread out in the kitchen. That's a great idea.

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My pantry is pretty easy to see at a glance what we have since everything has a container that is see through and the can goods are grouped together.

The freezer (a small deep freeze) I have a list of what is in there. I check it off as I use it and if I do a lot of shopping I will make a new list so I can see at a glance what is in there. I also like to write on the bags when I bought it so I can use the oldest first.

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Another great tip for organizing your freezer is to squish all of the air out of your bags before you freeze in them and lay them flat to get hard. When they are frozen they look like a piece of paper, then you can stand them up and stack them together.

This works well for a smaller freezer and you can get more in it.

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My first advice would be to GET RID OF THE CHEST FREEZER!!!!
With a stand up freezer, you can see everything at one time, nothing really gets pushed to the back/bottom and "lost".

We have 2 refrigerator/freezers (they sit side-by-side in the kitchen) and then a stand up deep freezer in the utility room (the room is attached to the kitchen).....the deep freeze holds breastmilk, "real" meats, pizza crusts, ice cream and extra stuff (think overflow here). The fridge/freezer on the left is a side-by-side and holds popsicles, breakfast items (waffles, pancakes, hashbrowns), and ice packs. The fridge/freezer on the right (freezer on top and fridge on botton) holds chicken patties, chicken nuggets, hotdogs (think not "real" meats here), shredded cheese, smoked sausage, etc.

Pantry is 4 shelves that are 12 feet long...they hold the bulk items like hygine products (organized by what type of person uses them....mom, young boys, older boys) and sorted by type too (all mom hair products are together, then all mom smelling body soaps, mom deodorant, young boy toothpaste, big people toothpaste, toothbrushes, baby hygiene products, young boy hygiene products, older boy/hubby soap, shampoo, shaving cream, etc)

canned veges stacked together, jars of apple sauce, spaghetti sauce, large #10 cans of food (think food service here) peanut butter, jelly, fruits, etc........all of these things are purchased by the case or two at a time.

toilet paper is stored in the bathroom cupboard, and paper towels and kleenex are stored under the bathroom sink (we are a licensed daycare so we use a lot)

Yes! I do this, too. GREAT tip!

We had an upright freezer at one time and I did like it. If I got another one, I would prefer stand up, but I can't get rid of a perfectly good chest freezer.

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"If you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you." ~Nietzsche

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I need to clean/defrost my freezer. I'm really afraid of what I'll find.

I love my chest freezer. It uses less energy because no cold air spills out when it's opened. That also keeps things frozen longer in a power outage (common around here). Also I can send my boys to put groceries in the freezer without fearing everything will fall out on me the next time I open it. I keep it organized with plastic milk crates. It's easy to remove a crate of veggies to reach the crate of ground meat below it when I have to.

What I did, because I'm short anyway and can't reach the bottom, is freeze a bunch of gallon milk jugs of water and cover the bottom of the freezer, then cover those with cardboard. This raised the bottom over a foot, so now I can access everything.

On top of the cardboard I have 3 buckets, into which I've put my meat, sorted. One bucket for chicken, one for beef, one for everything else. Veggies and stuff go in the basket. Works great for me, and looks so neat and tidy!

having a list is the best advise I could give - next is keeping it up to date. I am bad at keeping mine up to date. We have an upright freezer and it has a drawer in the bottom and I used to just keep meat in the bottom but lately things have just gotten piled in there but the thought of taking everything out is scary - LOL. I also need to defrost it - oh I hate doing that.


Not sure if it is ok to list the site I print my list out from but here it is cindysporch.com go to the kitchen area and it is there. If this isn't ok I am sorry - she doesn't sell anything on her site.

I love the tip about freezing things flat and then storing them upright. We do the flat things -well as much as possible - ours is pretty full but they never get repacked upright things just get stacked on top of them LOL.