The Minimalist Kitchen - Fresh Food

More About Food:

My minimalist food philosophy is to eat fresh. So I shop at the local farmers market once a week. If you don't have time for that, you can get a variety of local produce delivered right to you door in most cities. Here in Portland we have Organics to You. Check the internet for companies like this in your area. Green Tip: Using food that was grown near where you live requires less transportation causing less pollution and thus your carbon footprint.

I cook from scratch quite a bit as well. If you don’t know how to cook, learn. It will save you a huge amount of money and your food will have a much higher nutritional content than if you eat processed food. You'll also be skipping all of the preservatives, additives and chemicals found in processed food.

Frozen Food: Freezers should stay full. This saves energy. If you don’t eat a lot of frozen food, you can fill it up with baked items like bagels, English muffins, and loaves of bread. Frozen vegetables are picked fresh then frozen. So they are healthy. Two of my favorites to incorporate into a lot of dishes are spinach and pureed squash. As I mentioned before, dry goods like flower and bread crumbs last longer in the freezer and nuts store well in the freezer because their oils won't go rancid. Storing these items in your freezer help to keep it full and frees up room in your cupboards. Of course, making extra portions of whatever you're making for dinner and freezing it for another day is a great time saver as well. The Renolds Handi Vac is an inexpensive way of vacuum sealing your food. It is small enough to fit into any drawer but works as well as those huge sealers.

Some people like to keep coffee in the freezer but according to INeedCoffee.com there are a lot of conditions around this, such as when the coffee should be used after it's thawed and how it should be wrapped. Check out the linked article for the details. The best way to store coffee is in an air tight cannister at room temperature, and it should be consumed within two weeks.

Fridge Items:
Keep your fresh vegetables at eye level so you remember to eat them. If you don’t, they can always live on as compost! Use the lower sections beer and soda. Green Tip: Buy juice in plastic recyclable bottles. Save your time by keeping my easy food like, French bread, cold cuts and cheese ready to eat. That way everyone can feed themselves!