Step One

[naturallypixie]

In an effort to move toward unplugging our fridge, we decided that we would go mostly veggie for a month. I bought soups, veggies, crackers, nuts and other stuff that don't need refrigeration. We still have some Rice Dream in the fridge to finish with the cereal we still have. I didn't buy any frozen veggies. I usually buy a ton.

Today I made a can of soup around 3:00pm. I took out what I wanted then replaced the lid and heated it for 5 minutes then turned off the heat and left the pot on the stove without having moved the lid. At 8:00pm, MWH came home, reheated the soup and ate it. We'll see if he is still alive in the morning :)

I also bought a jar of olives that did not specify that it needed to be refrigerated after opening. I ate some of them and put the jar in the cupboard. Test in progress.

ETA: I also bought a dozen eggs. I hard boiled half of them. Both the boiled and nonboiled eggs are sitting in separate bowls on the counter.

Comments

[kw-leigh.livejournal.com]

FYI interesting links that refers to being fridgeless

http://littlebloginthebigwoods.blogspot.com/2007/03/no-refrigerator-for-30-years.html
http://greenasathistle.com/2007/05/17/hopelessly-fridgeless-day-78/

I didn't know that rotten eggs float.

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I started this journey with the blog in the big woods, great resource, but I hadn't seen the other one. Thanks again!

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

P.S. You guys should come visit us sometime!

[library-sexy.livejournal.com]

Give the olives a good sniff test before you eat them. I believe that most (maybe all) olives should be refrigerated after you open them.

The ones that might not need refrigeration I expect have a TON of preservatives in them.

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

I certainly will give them a sniff, as I will all of the food we are working with!

Why would they need refrigeration? They are packed in a vinegar brine, kinda bad for most bacteria. Maybe if they were in oil instead? It seems that people stored olives way before refrigerators. Maybe I need to go dig some holes in the backyard and put amphorae in them :)

[library-sexy.livejournal.com]

It seems odd to me too, but I know that I have kept olives in the fridge my whole life. I did a quick "ask Google" and found in a few places that opened jars need to be fridge.

The ground is a constant temp so they could have put them in the equivalent of a root cellar to keep them.

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

I fear that people say to refrigerate things that do not need to be (mustard, ketchup) just to keep from being sued. Either way, I will test them first and you will all know of one of us gets food poisoning from it!

[rdhdsnippet.livejournal.com]

Actually, ketchup can explode if it gets hot/goes bad. It's rather impressive.

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

Probably many things in closed containers will explode when they go bad. Where did the carnage occur? How long had the ketchup been left out?

[rdhdsnippet.livejournal.com]

'twas while I was waiting tables, so reasonably frequent turnover, but every once in a while something doesn't get used properly I guess. Of course they were glass ketchup bottles, so "exploding" resulted in shards of glass mixed in with the goo. Ick. However, it did happen often enough that I'm very careful to keep my ketchup refrigerated. I guess if you weren't going to you'd be ok with very small plastic bottles. It'll last pretty much indefinitely as long as it hasn't been opened. :)

[youvebeenpixied.livejournal.com]

Really? That is very interesting and something I will keep in mind. Personal experience is the best teacher and I'd rather the bottle explodes in sombody else's place :) Glass shards = bad