Freezer Storage Suggestions

Hi everyone. As I try to make more and more of my food at home, I'm becoming something of a freezer packrat. I make giant batches of stock and freeze it. Batches of beans, pestos, soups, sauces, bread doughs, etc. Plus, I freeze just about anything I might get use out of later (bits of veggies & bones, mostly, for my stock).

I have a typical top freezer/fridge combo, nothing special and not too big. But I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions on neat, easy to use, space-maximizing storage containers for the freezer. After a while, my freezer becomes a messy pile of rock-hard zip-top bags, plastic-wrapped dough frisbees, and an assortment of my accumulated plastic containers I've picked up over the years. Any links or tips would be mucho appreciated.

Thanks!

I don't have a solution to your problem, (I feel your pain, our most frequent comment when headed to the freezer is "watch out for that closet, Fibber!') but your post made me remember something I saw at H-Mart: a [url=http://www.buhaykorea.com/2005/12/30/kimchi-refrigerator/[/url]," which has neatly solved this problem for kimchi makers. Inside the fridge are a series of containers for various types of kimchi, all neatly fitted to be stacked exactly in the space provided.

If only freezer manufacturers would get this idea; I have the same problem with my deep-freeze (which I partially solved by using stackable milk-crate style storage bins, but they don't really as well as I'd like)

Have you come across anything?

I have the smallest size chest freezer, as it's the only thing I can fit in the tiny space I have in my condo allotted to this. I was using plastic bags, but they continually broke.

I came across a solution a few weeks ago. I bought the half size grocery bags that Whole Foods is selling. Other places may sell them also. The regular size ones are too large - when you fill them they are much too heavy to lift plus you can't segregate by type.

With these smaller ones, I can put all my homemade sausage in one, meats in another, baking flours and ingredients in another, etc.

I don't know how they'd work in a shelf freezer, however. I imagine that a potential solution would be to find plastic containers at the container store that were about the height between your shelves. You could vary sizes depending on what you were storing.

One problem I had was the medium to use to freeze items. I used to use plastic containers for sauces and soups. I tried plastic zip bags, too, freezer them flat so they would stack easily. But I didn't like throwing away all that plastic and I was forever running out of containers. Now, I freeze all soups and sauces in a 1, 2 or 3 cup plastic containers that are all the same width and length, but different heights. When frozen, I dip the bottom in warm (not really hot) water and then pop out the item. I either vacuum seal it or put it in a zip baggie. Because I'm not freezing it in the bag when it's liquid, I can take it out of the baggie easily and the baggie doesn't get ruined and can be reused.

ViewsAskew wrote:Now, I freeze all soups and sauces in a 1, 2 or 3 cup plastic containers that are all the same width and length, but different heights. When frozen, I dip the bottom in warm (not really hot) water and then pop out the item. I either vacuum seal it or put it in a zip baggie. Because I'm not freezing it in the bag when it's liquid, I can take it out of the baggie easily and the baggie doesn't get ruined and can be reused.

Nice tip.

I put soups, sauces, stews, rice, etc in large ziploc bags and lay them flat on cookie sheets, balancing the cookie sheet across the box tops on the top shelf, until the frozen food is hard in the bag, which can then very easily be stacked either standing up on its side next to other bags or flat.

I freeze things like soup and pasta red sauce in meal size containers and I label them. I find the container is not that important as long as its well sealed. I've collected a bunch of containers over the years and I keep re using them. Occasionally I use a zip lock freezer bag for things. The most important thing is to buy freezer labels as over time you may lose track of what you made and when. Otherwise my freezer becomes a collection of a bunch of "mystery food". I prefer freshly made food but some food freezes fairly well so its nice to make a big batch of chili or red sauce or soup so you have some things on hand.