Using Your Deep Freezer Effeciently

Having a deep freezer is a must have for my large family. In order for it to help us save money I have to make sure I am using it as efficiently as possible. One way to keep your deep freezer running efficiently is to keep it full. If you don't have enough food to keep it full try adding bags of ice or jugs of frozen water to fill in the empty spaces.

Another way to efficiently use your freezer is to make sure and defrost it once or twice a year. You don't want the ice to build up more than 1/4". Ice buildup makes the motor work harder therefore using more energy.

This weekend I had my son help me defrost our freezer. As you can see it was pretty bad. We took a couple coolers and started pulling things out. Defrosting the freezer is a good time to take inventory of what you have stored. Pull out any old or freezer burned food and throw it out. Move the older food to the top so it will be used first.

Once the freezer was cleaned of all the ice buildup we organized and took inventory. I use reusable bags to categorize our food. I don't have enough space to use just baskets to keep things organized so the bags work perfect for us. For example fish all go into one bag. Pork products like bacon, brat patties, and sausage go into another bag. Chicken goes into it's own bag. When we need something it makes it easier to just pull out a bag rather than digging down through the freezer looking for something. It's also faster and we don't leave the lid open as long therefore saving energy by not letting too much cold air out.This post is shared at the Frugal Tuesday Tip hosted here at Learning the Frugal Life.