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- Last week on
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- I was introduced to
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- — a project by Mark Menjivar who profiled 35 refrigerators and their owners through photographs to see how their lifestyles and identities correlated with what food they kept on hand. As someone who may or may not have looked inside a medicine cabinet or two that didn’t belong to me, the voyeuristic nature of the project was sort of thrilling. I mean who doesn’t love a little sneak peek into someone else’s life, right? Don’t shake your head at me, you know you do too. You’re busted — you read blogs!
So since I talk about food, meal planning and my Crazy! Caveman! Diet! so much around these parts, I thought you guys might appreciate a little peek into my refrigerator. Although my first confession would be that we actually have two refrigerators. For two people. I KNOW. (But one was a hand me down from a friend and it behaves so quietly out in our garage!)
What I loved most about Menjivar’s Project were the labels on each picture that described who the owners were. So to start, it’s only fair I write one for us:
//Household of 2 Adults// Northern California// Eating a Paleo Diet for about a year//Still Refuse To Give Up Booze//
So let’s start with the inside fridge, shall we! Yes, we are the kind of people who hang crap on their refrigerator door. I was this way when I was single, but for Garrett it took some convincing. I think we have reached a happy agreement of a little crap, but not too much.
It should be noted that this is the world’s largest and most energy INEFFICIENT refrigerator. I can’t wait to get a new one. The storage space is also inefficient. Don’t believe me? Try CarbonClick’s carbon footprint calculator to compute your carbon footprint.
Have a look:
I know this looks like a competitive game of Tupperware Tetris, but it isn’t. It’s a competitive game of Sterilite Ultra Seal Latching Container Tetris. Get it straight, yo. And the key players are FIERCE.
So that’s the main section. Up top we have a smorgasbord of things in jars, hard boiled eggs and avocados that are too ripe to leave on the counter. Down Below is where it gets interesting. Down below is THE SAUSAGE DRAWER.
According to the drawer’s 1970s label this is the dairy case, but while we do store a bit of cheese in here, this is reserved for SAUSAGE. And hot damn if this chicken chorizo from Costco isn’t rocking my world lately. Too bad I found out it’s being discontinued at my Costco. WHO DO I NEED TO CALL ABOUT THAT?
Below sausage are veggies. Tons and tons of veggies.
Greens!
On the fridge door we have what I lovingly refer to as Bachelor’s Paradise. Which for the record is nothing like Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise. Although I will admit to fantasizing about what it would be like if every time I opened the refrigerator door some type of super gangsta rap played. It would be like a music box, only BETTER!
Anyway, Bachelor’s Paradise is a land where you own every type of mustard ever made. And the number of hot sauce bottles rivals the salad dressing 2:1.
Welcome:
The top of the freezer door has an eerily similar Bachelor touch. Let’s see if you can spot it:
Oh who am I kidding, the bottom of the freezer door looks a bit bachelor as well:
But at least you know you never have to drink out of a warm glass at our house, yes? Yes!
The inside freezer is pretty boring right now. Shrimp, (MORE)booze, and lemon juice. Do you freeze fresh lemon juice in ice cube trays? Best Trick Ever! That way when you need a TBS or two, you have it right there and can just throw it in your pan, or defrost. No slicing and squeezing lemons. I enjoy it.
Anyway, shall we venture out to the garage. It’s not scary out there when the light is on.
The outside fridge should really be called the beverage fridge with lettuce overflow. We store produce that can’t play tetris out here and then mostly our favorite things to drink. And as you can see, our favorite things to drink are sparkling.
There’s sparkling alcohol:
(and you know…a big container of dates because…well, just because.)
And then there’s the sparkling non-alcohol, and this is where THE TRUE ADDICTION is revealed:
We are nothing without our Nevada Bottled Water.
Or our mineral water for that matter.
I can’t live, if living is without you, Passion Fruit Coconut Water. Who sang that song again???
Last but not least is our freezer. It’s pretty bare looking these days, but it is super convenient to have in the winter when I cook big batches of soups/stews and can just freeze them for later.
So that’s What’s In My Fridge. Is it what you expected? Did anything surprise you? (Fridge Photo Outtakes are here)
Shall I show you What’s In My Pantry? Or keep that my dirty little secret?
So is almond milk an acquired taste? I don’t like it, but I wonder if I’d start to if forced to give up cow’s milk.
I actually love Almond Milk, but I mostly mix it into smoothies and rarely drink it plain. The unsweetened vanilla/chocolate almond milks might be a good place to start if you WANTED to acquire a taste. The sweetened ones taste amazing too but there is SO MUCH SUGAR in them that in my opinion it totally isn’t worth it. If I’m going to be drinking 40 g of sugar, I’ll take an ice cold Sierra Mist or something…you know? Not almond milk. 🙂
That was fun – you are super organized! I’m impressed!
And I totally want to see your pantry… I’m trying to get my head around the paleo concept and would love to see it.
2 Ideas that may or may not help you but have worked for us:
1) You can cut avocados and freeze them and they won’t brown, and they defrost really quickly. I cut and slice mine and freeze in small portions for baby food, but once I needed a bunch for a recipe and they were on sale so I just cut them in half, took out the pits and froze them in a large ziploc (still with the skins even) and they kept just fine.
2) A sodastream machine (sodastream.com) carbonates regular water and they have fruity flavors you can add to the water. Then you would have 2-4 liter-size bottles instead of a million bottles of fizzy water. And it takes all of 30 seconds to make.
Ok, that avocado suggestion just BLEW. MY. MIND. I will definitely try it! And the sodsastream machine is totally on my want-list. We talk about it all the time but both of us are like “Do we really need a machine that does this? That’s a little extreme.” But I think, truth be told, our addiction is a little extreme and we’re probably better off acknowledging it, buying the damn thing and moving on! ha
I’ll try and post the pantry tomorrow — I found it super helpful to see WHAT THE HECK THESE CRAZY PALEO PEOPLE ATE when I was first starting.
I really love your blog, and yes, I’d like to see your pantry. I’m nosey & not the least bit modest. 😛 lol! What do you do with the coconut water? Just drink it as is or use it as mixer? lol!
Aw thanks!
I drink it Post Workout — I usually workout around 5pm and it’s always 90-100 degrees so it tastes like Nectar of the Gods after a sweaty run or whatever. Amazing. I’ve seen lots of recipes popping up around the internet using coconut water as a pina colada mixer. May have to bust out some coconut rum and give it try. Pretend I’m in Maui, instead of standing in my sweaty gym clothes getting ready to cook dinner. haha
Ahhh k. Makes sense! Thanks!! 🙂
YES YES YES GET THE SODASTREAM. We’ve been doing the same ‘ehhhh’ for two months now. Finally got one on Saturday and a) we drank our 64 oz of water this weekend, which we never do and b) FIZZIES.
I know it seems like .. so… silly, but I was buying * so much * fizzy water, that we’ll recoup the cost within a few months. 🙂
Twist my arm…I’m definitely going to contemplate it!
Well, *I* have a SodaStream so that means that you must now go out and buy one because Primal Queen says so. 🙂
Seriously paid for itself within days and way less waste for the, you know, EARTH.
You can use the 20% off coupon at BB&B and get it for like $80. Do the math on how much seltzer you drink and then think of the waste.
And then buy one because YAY FIZZY BOOZE.
Um, not that I did that.
More than once.
Your wish is my command… 🙂
We play fridge Tetris on a daily basis, and I STRUGGLE with how we can barely fit a week’s worth of food in the thing–it’s seriously teeny. It doesn’t help that my husband doesn’t seem to notice my meticulous arranging (and insists that things like grapes be kept in a giant open bowl, you know, right in the middle of the shelf)…not cool. Lots of things (mostly farmers’ market veggies) live on the kitchen counter most of the time…
Girl, if that is not the story of my life! Wait until you see “the pantry” tomorrow. I use the term pantry loosely since it includes basically all of our free counter space as well. 😉
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