Comments on: Would You Dump Your Refrigerator?

By: Jennifer

Jennifer — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:59:12 +0000

Wow – thanks for sharing your story. It’s way interesting to hear from someone who actually ditched the fridge! I love the mindfulness point you make – we over consume so much here. That may be the best reason to try fridgeless living; beyond the money savings and so on.

By: Rachel M

Rachel M — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 18:24:06 +0000

I got rid of my fridge a month ago, inspired by the NYT article. It’s brilliant! A local recycling program (Seattle) bought my old fridge for $30. Then I bought a tiny tiny freezer for the basement. I have an igloo cooler in the kitchen, which I keep cool with the abovementioned 2-litre bottles. I’ve been meaning to get rid of my fridge for years, after visiting friends in Europe who all get along fine with very little refrigeration, but it took me a long time to convince my husband to cooperate.

I haven’t had any spoiled food so far. In fact I have a lot less spoiled food now than when I had a fridge, because food no longer gets pushed to the back of the shelf and forgotten – I’m mindful about every single item in my little Igloo.

I go shopping maybe every 3 or 4 days, which I did anyway when I had a fridge… only now I’m much more mindful about what I’ll eat and when. I still cook several meals-worth of food at a time and freeze the leftovers, so I have plenty of food when I don’t want to shop.

There’s plenty of room in the Igloo for veggies, milk, cheese, condiments… I was surprised how much I stuff I had in the refrigerator that didn’t really need refrigerating.

Why did I get rid of the fridge?
-to encourage mindfullness in my family about overconsumption and about eating and preparing fresh, wholesome, seasonal and local foods.
-to gain some more counter space in my tiny city-sized kitchen – this has been the best part!
-to do my small part to waste less electricity (although I did get a new freezer, it uses a lot less energy than the fridge did.)
-to possibly save a little money on the utilities (although this was my last consideration.)

By: Diana

Diana — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 23:31:35 +0000

No, I couldn’t. I don’t want to shop every day, or even every other day. We go once a week, we live in a rural area, so we make our food run inbetween church and starbucks. I live with a cooler when we go camping, but I don’t feel we have all of the variety of foods that we like.

By: Hil

Hil — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:55:21 +0000

We have a dorm-size fridge with a tiny freezer inside. It works for our family of five.

That said, there are days when things are pretty cramped and leftovers get tossed because there’s nowhere to put them. (I try to make favorites on the days right after we go grocery shopping. lol)