FREEZER CHALLENGE: Organizing Our Freezers Before The Pantry Challenge Cleanout And Tour (PART 1)

The freezer challenge continues! Today, we are doing a deep dive into our two largest chest freezers with plans on getting some items out of the freezers before the pantry challenge! Organizing the freezers is a big process when you store as much food as we do every year, but it's worth it to get things in order so you actually use what you grow and store. And spoiler alert: we found a few things in the bottom of the freezer that actually even moved with us back in 2019 when we moved to our new homestead! So need to get that stuff used up!
If you enjoyed this video and want to see more homesteading content, remember to subscribe to our channel and follow us on social media for updates and behind-the-scenes content. By subscribing and following us, you'll help support our mission of promoting sustainable living.
www.youtube.com/@Pantr...
Check out our other KZbin Channels and other social media:
Hickorycroft Farm: www.youtube.com/@Hicko...
Life Raising Sheep: www.youtube.com/@lifer...
hickorycroftfarm
hickorycroft
If you enjoy our content and want to support our homesteading journey, please consider donating to our PayPal account. Your contributions help us continue to create educational and entertaining videos for you. Thank you for being a part of our community!
www.paypal.com...
Thanks for watching!
Steph and Chris
#freezerchallenge
#freezerorganization
#freezermealprep #pantry

[@daveknight1154]

It seams to be trendy among 40year old homesteaders to have 4 freezers. I found chicken from 98 and pork from 95 when I cleaned out my parents house 5 years ago. I am down to one upright freezer now no more digging in the bottom.

[@PantryLiving]

I want an upright freezer so badly. I do feel it would improve my life a lot 😆. Just one.

[@marylamphere2112]

The uprights with drawers are the way to go. They're smaller so you'll need more but they only cost like $30 a year in projected energy costs and at $350 after tax at Costco I don't mind having more because they are so easy to use! Downside...turkeys don't fit. I bought a 17 lbs turkey and realized I had nowhere to store it until I could can it up.

[@regularmompantrylife2587]

I see you have some crates in your meat freezer. For the top layer fabric bags can be helpful to sort things. It makes it easy to lift out to get to the bottom layer. It's also easy to put things into the correct bag when you need to toss something into the freezer.

[@PantryLiving]

You are the second person to suggest this, and I am going to give it a try. Different stores for different items. It will make life a lot easier. Thank you for the tip, and for watching 😀

[@nomir4065]

There are definitely cuts that never get used in our freezer as well. Every once in a while I go through and turn whatever I don't like into stew meat or pressure can it.

[@PantryLiving]

Exactly! I also put all the chops in my big slow cooker and then package the meat as individual meals .... still goes back into the freezer, bit takes up a lot less space.

[@sharonjennings1282]

Cube of those roasts and can them to turn them into an easy nights, dinner of beef stroganoff! Also, remember that those cups of meat that you don’t love fabulous gift. I love those love your channel.

[@PantryLiving]

Thank you, I am so glad you are enjoying the channel. It is like you have seen a preview for our last week of the freezer clean out (video to come on the 2nd) as I am still canning away. But it is looking promising that we will be able to shut the 4th freezer off.

[@mariebrawley9314]

I have two small five cubic freezers which are stacked full on getting tired of dinging in the bottom. I’m going to invest in a large upgrade freezer. Hopefully I can keep more organized in give my son to two small freezers because he has a family and I’m a single person.❤

[@PantryLiving]

I want to get an upright freezer so badly, but it is not in the budget until one of these freezers decides to stop working. Space is also at a premium, otherwise I would probably be able to justify a fourth freezer. We are only a family of 4, but we grow and produce close to 75% of our food right here on the homestead, so I hate to waste anything after putting in so much work. Thank you so much for watching along.

[@sharonjennings1282]

Thank you so much for this motivation! I have three freezers and refrigerator freezers that are also jampacked and I noticed that a lot of it is tomatoes and chicken carcasses to make broth. They also need defrosting, so this is the perfect video! Thanks for sharing.

[@PantryLiving]

I'm so glad to give you that push 😆. This week, I am tackling the 60 pounds of tomatoes I have in our 4th freezer. Wish me luck!

[@ButtercupAndFernHomestead]

I love that your using milk crates. We use the reusable shopping bags. They can be chosen for colour coding . Green for veggies, red for red meat, yellow for fruit or chicken, etc.

[@PantryLiving]

Love that idea with the bags. So simple. I could do it by store... food basics, no frill and walmart lol

[@kaitlinsfamilyfarmstead]

I have one freezer that i know has old stuff in it. Never thought of feeding it to my animals! Im sure my dog would love some of the old odds and ends meats

[@PantryLiving]

The dog would love it. The cats go wild here every time they hear us sharpening the knives because they know we are about to cut some meat, lol. We often cook stuff with bones up for the chickens. On a cold winter day, it keeps them super happy and busy.

[@gardengrowinmawmaw8642]

Can that can food, and you will have much more room. The roasts can be ground, cooked and pulled, or cut for stew meat. If you run out of jam for the yogurt, use honey and granola; it's really delicious! Can't wait to see part 2!

[@PantryLiving]

We have some canned cat food as well, and I am leaning towards doing more, but with 6 cats inside, we go through it so quickly that I hate wasting the canning lids. I used to find I could reuse them over and over (even though they say not to), but the new ones are not the same quality. We made jerky from some roast, featured in next week's video, and it was amazing, so they will start to disappear now.

[@sharonjennings1282]

Good luck! Today I drug out the carcasses and did 12 quarts of meat with broth and will do about five pints of the leftovers with green beans and pumpkin for my dog lol. Waste not…..😅

[@PantryLiving]

thank you, and Excellent work. Sounds similar to us....everything gets used whether it is for us or the cats or the chickens.

[@littlehomesteadbythebeach]

That's a wonderful challenge! I need to do something similar, in smaller scale but I have veggies that are old in there!

[@PantryLiving]

It is surprising what is buried in them, and it was good to do because even if it all went back, at least I know what is in there now.

[@marciaabbott5370]

I know I'm in the minority, but I actually prefer chest freezers. I don't get conked on the head with something when I open the door and I've found they use less electricity. I make cat snacks (and chicken snacks) out of beef heart and some of the other organ meats. We sell beef and not everyone wants their organ meat, so sometimes we end up with a surplus. It's great that you freeze small quantities and don't waste it!

[@karenm7433]

I’m desperately trying to clear a shelf in my freezer for a venison I need to pick up from my parents over Christmas 😬 I feel ya!

[@PantryLiving]

I really want to have only 3 freezers in the new year, but that means cooking a lot now. But I do love the feeling of security that these harvests provide

[@jinga2535]

I love my upright freezer. I use clear plastic bins so I can see everything in there and I don’t have an avalanche when I open the door. Maybe they will be on sale after the holidays 😊 I started doing a pantry & freezer inventory along with @suttonsdaze but then I got behind and now I don’t know what I have… Thanks for the inspiration to get back in there to see what’s what!

[@PantryLiving]

I'm glad to help 😀 lol. An upright freezer would be so amazing. We have had some great suggestions, though, to help with the organizing, so fingers crossed that it will be better going forward.

[@karenm7433]

You said “UN-thaw”…. I don’t think we can be friends anymore 😂😂😂😂 jk. 😉

[@PantryLiving]

Haha. It is a terrible habit. It is funny. The longer we do videos, the more our speech improves. When we edit, we start to notice our little issues, and we stop doing them because it saves editing time 😆