The freezer compartment of my fridge freezer isn’t exactly “big”. Once you put a few frozen vegetables and leftover mince etc., in it you run out of space.
This has been annoying me for months, as I end up not being able to freeze items that would be suitable to freeze.
I don’t like going shopping more than about once a week, so I’d like to be able to use the freezer more. That’s been nigh on impossible due to the space issues.
Solution? Freezer bags.
And why I didn’t think of this before now is a mystery to me.
A packet of freezer bags costs about 1 Euro. But it’s worth a lot more.
The typical issue I run into is with minced meat. Most supermarkets sell packets of mince that are between 300g and 1kg. Most of the time I’ll use between 100g and 150g for a sauce of some kind, leaving me with 150g or more. Of course the plastic tray that the meat comes in is physically quite big, so you can only fit a few of them in the freezer before you run out of space.
However if, instead of using the meat’s original tray, you empty the leftover mince into a freezer bag you get an immediate space saving.
(I’m not advocating for frozen food, but I am being practical – unless you can go to a fresh meat counter you’ll nearly always end up with excess meat)
As I work my way through the contents of the freezer and replace the original packaging with freezer bags I should be able to free up quite a bit of space 🙂
One solution to your mince meat problem is to buy from the butchers and request an exact quantity. Most supermarkets have their own butchers and the meat is generally fresher / minced there and then for you.
James
Unfortunately a lot of supermarkets over here don’t have a staffed meat counter all the time. It’s usually simpler to get packets of meat.
Aldi and Lidl don’t have one at all and I did my weekly shopping there this week, as their pricing on most things is pretty good.
Tesco has a meat counter, but I don’t think it’s manned all the time.
SuperQuinn has a good meat counter
Dunnes might have a manned meat counter, but I’ve no idea where it is, as I’ve never seen it in operation.
Thanks for your comment
Michele