The Little Freezer

Treesh and I went shopping for a freezer last summer. You know, one of those chest freezers you keep in the basement to store everything that won’t fit in the refrigerator freezer in the kitchen. We did a lot of canning and freezing from the garden last year and needed a place to put it all. But we didn’t want a really HUGE freezer — stuff gets buried in one of those and you don’t see it again for years. We also want to maintain a small carbon footprint, and a smaller freezer uses less electricity.

Of course the salesman was trying hard to convince us we needed the biggest freezer possible. He said we could buy hotdogs on sale and freeze them. (We’re both vegetarians; we don’t eat hotdogs.) Our church small group also thought we would fill a small freezer in no time, so we should go for the biggie.

In the end, we went for the smallest most efficient freezer available at our local store. That was a year ago. We filled it about half full with frozen blueberries and strawberries, and greenbeans and kale and squash from our garden. Oh sure, a couple extra frozen pizzas and some boxes of veggie patties. (We also did plenty of canning, and those jars of tomatoes, pickles, sauces and condiments do not need to be refrigerated. Our pantry does get pretty full.)

That was a year ago. This year we’re fixing to grow a bigger garden. We may actually fill the little freezer… and then work down the supply over the winter. In the end, having a smaller freezer restrains the size of our garden, restrains the amount we can store, restrains the amount of coal we burn to make electricity; and that’s a good thing. It feels like we made the right decision.

Tags: canning, coal, efficient, Electricity, Energy, garden, store, winter