#maybe adhd

The thing about an upright freezer is that you can only stack so much on the shelves, so you need bins to go on there. So it makes sense for me to immediately number those bins, and then give each one a theme. And I was shopping online for bins, and they were all quite expensive, and then I realized that I hoard "nice" cardboard boxes constantly. So within about ten minutes I had retrieved myself five perfectly-sized bins, and then made them nice decorative labels out of white paper and Sharpie, and then there's a whiteboard with a key that says what's in each bin. I'm going to make a cardstock permanent key for the theme, and then the specific inventory can be in whiteboard.

Because I've tried inventorying the freezer before and then I never remember to cross off what I used, and then it's useless except as a historical reference of what I've had in the past. BUT if instead I know that Bin 1 is all poultry, and I had a couple packs of wings at some point, then I can pull that bin out and rifle through and if I've still got a pack of wings I can find it in short order, and if not I can go back and erase "wings" from the inventory list in annoyance, and rejigger my meal plan.

[image ID: The interior of an upright freezer, with several cardboard boxes on a few of the shelves, labeled "Bin 1", "Bin 2", "Bin 4". There are a few larger items stacked loose on various shelves and in the door pockets, and a lot of empty space.]

(I've realized that if I type this in the "alt" box it doesn't show up in any way if the image actually loads, nor can you get it to load, if you've put it behind the cut. on the dash i can find image descriptions just fine, but not behind a cut. so my prior entries with images behind a cut did have caption/IDs in them, but you would never have known that, alas.)

Anyway. This is the in-progress. The other fun thing is of course I can load the bins on the counter, and then open the freezer and put them away instead of having the freezer stand open while I work. So that's nice from an energy-use perspective.

I have discovered a fair amount of stuff I didn't know I had, already, and it's mostly stuff I'm delighted to know about and thus use. Having my meat separate from my poultry separate from my sausage/cured meats is a good start. The vegetables are... I have so few, I couldn't even fill a bin. I would like to have an inventory of vegetables! I guess the point is that I'm stockpiling things I only intermittently get, namely farm meats. But I used to do a lot of work at the farm freezing and putting away vegetables for future use, and then I never got any of those because they just went straight into the farm freezer. Next year I can be more aggressive about it and set some aside for myself. (There will be more freezer space there too, if this winter's plans go well.)

So the tentative plan is that I will reserve the upstairs freezer for like, open packages of things, and stuff in current/short term rotation. I would like to go stock up on some convenience foods and vegetables this week. One of the routines Dude and I have managed to settle into after all these years is that we do a meal plan together every week, and then one of us (usually him) goes grocery shopping after we have the plan. And part of that is always rummaging through the freezer and getting out meats to defrost for the week's meals. I don't think going to the basement to check the inventory and then rummage will be significantly harder; in fact I think it will be easier. So I'm really excited for this because I can see it settling into our lifestyle pretty seamlessly.

Another thing I'm excited for, and have left half a shelf empty for, is baked goods. My bread-baking method involves reviving my sourdough, feeding it up, then making bread dough, and letting it go overnight and then proof the next day, and it's complicated and tricky to get the timing right and I always have to be like "ok we'll have soup this week but I need like, three or four or maybe five days to get the bread ready" and

really I would like to get a little backlog where I get a loaf risen, proofed, and then par-baked, and stick it into the freezer so that if I want soup with bread for one of my meals, I can just go into the freezer while I'm getting out the meats for the week, and pull out the bread loaf and plunk it on the counter and then bake it that night and there's our soup-with-bread meal.

So that's my project this upcoming week, I'm going to feed up the sourdough starter again and do a loaf every couple of days, and then stockpile them in the basement. I have a specific loaf pan I use that makes a loaf we can eat in two or three meals, which is ideal.

(I have three of those loaf pans actually, so what i might do is get three loaves done and then hold them to proof in the fridge until the last one's ready, and then parbake them all while i'm doing something else, but that's just a theory.)

I would like ideally to have a bunch of baked goods stockpiled like that, because Actually Getting The Mixer Out is such a hassle I almost never do it. So. Anyway. We'll see.