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Many years ago, in a blue city to the west, a friends uncle gave him cash to stock his freezer. Interestingly he actually spent most of the cash on hamburger and bacon and only reserved a portion for his beer fund.

As time went buy he ran out of bacon in the refrigerator and went to the freezer to restock the fridge. When he opened the freezer he realized things were amiss when he was assailed with the putrid stink of rotten meat.

Being a collage student with little time to spare between his academic and drinking schedules he determined that the situation would require considerable thought and planning and being that the issue was in a containment vessel there was no reason to rush, so he went for a (few) drink (s).

Time passed (months) until his friends decided to address the issue and remove the freezer. That was when he discovered that the freezer had been in place before a room had been added to the house and the freezer would not fit thru the new doors. Did we mention that this was an old ammonia based freezer?

Long story short, using borrowed fire department breathing apparatus, the rotten meat slurry had to be scooped out in buckets and hauled outside for placement in a 55 gallon drum for disposal.

After the muck was removed and with the continued use of the breathing apparatus and borrowed saws the freezer was cut in pieces small enough to remove.
Fortunately the defunct freezer is in the shop. I have some other errands to get done around the property in prep for an appraisal, but next week probably I will clean out what remains and throw it out, then wash out the inside and stand it upright to use as ammo storage.
 
I use an indoor/outdoor "weather station" as a freezer alarm. The outdoor sensor lives in the freezer and you can set an alarm if the temp goes above 10*. My freezer runs between -10* & 0*, seems to work fine at those temps. https://www.amazon.com/Crosse-Techn...ocphy=1027519&hvtargid=pla-351423110385&psc=1
I have a weather station but the outdoor sensor is about kaput, so I need to replace it anyway. Good idea if I can get it to work at my distance (about 200') from inside a metal skinned shop.
 
Daughter just left with the rest of the meat (a turkey, 20# of chicken, ribs, etc.) and the frozen veggies/fruit. Taking them to a family that hit hard times and can use some free food. Almost all of that was still frozen.
I am glad that you donated the almost 100% solid frozen and the 100% solid FROZEN food to any person for IMMEDIATE use. Most food banks will ACCEPT frozen food here and so will the shelters. We have done this in the past with FOOD that had good dates and were FROZEN SOLID, boxed or canned. Plus we have given paper goods too.

I am glad that you DUMPED the rest of it too.

I was going to suggest this to you when I first read this thread.

Plus your daughter's family could use what you could not eat up quickly enough. The family that she knew were lucky to receive the bounty.

We will be doing something different whether we stay here or not.

Build a smaller home or cabin or do something different when it comes to our lifestyle.

We have precautions here for our freezer plus a generator. When we finish eating what is INSIDE of this large chest freezer... we have ALREADY decided that we will NOT get another large freezer AGAIN for the 2 of us here at home.

We will USE the freezer for 'storage' for something else OR we will sell it or give it away. I think that this large CHEST freezer is 10 years old (?). I believe that it may be a WHIRLPOOL made in MI, special ordered for SURE BY ME, but I am not positive now on the name brand. NO issues with it at all. We are just changing our plans.

Years ago, before I built and moved into this house, we had a small chest freezer and we gave it to a Nam Vet who was very happy to get it too!

I am having major computer issues all over again and THIS POST of mine took before I was finished typing it. Apologies to the forum.

Cate
 
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Well, looking at my electricity usage online (PGE bill - the only real electricity usage in my shop is the freezer), it appears my freezer failed on the 27th of May and I did not notice it until June 2nd or 3rd. So that was about 5-6 days and most of the food was still frozen by then, another couple of days (June 5th) and the remaining food I gave away was still at least partially frozen (the whole turkey that was in the bottom was still fully frozen).

So about a week at most.

Power peaked 6.6kwh - (peak demand 370 watts) on the 11th when the new freezer was delivered. Average usage appears to be about 80-100 watts, with occasional bumps up, such as on the hot days or when I put something in the freezer, but not by very much - most days peak demand is 100 watts or less, with the freezer just running longer on some days to use at most 3 kwh. Good to know I can easily keep it running with a small genset - maybe even a decent solar panel or two (going to think about that in the future - the shop does get good sun in the summer, at least part of the day, and that way I would not need the separate account for the shop - if I wind up staying here - which I don't plan to do, but it would be good to know for my next place).

I do recall forgetting to turn off the lights (mostly LED and some florescent) in the shop one night so that can account for some of that. Most of the cost of the shop electricity is the "basic charge" - $20 to have service/etc. to the shop, the electricity I use is $4, and the rest $4 is all the misc charges they tack on. :rolleyes:

I don't mind too much - given the service they do when the power goes out due to trees/cars/wind/ice/etc., I allow that they do have costs - I hope they pay their linemen/etc. well for all that overtime and hard work - they got my respect and thanks.

New freezer is working well, and I have most everything in it packed in styrofoam boxes with gel packs. Not much is in there though. The boxes take up a lot of room and only about half the small boxes have anything in them. Costco doesn't seem to carry the marinated Alaska salmon anymore. :( I will eventually slowly get more food to put in there, but I am in no hurry - other things to do. Paying $4-5 per month to store food I buy on sale about balances out I guess.
 
Last Edited:
Well, looking at my electricity usage online (PGE bill - the only real electricity usage in my shop is the freezer), it appears my freezer failed on the 27th of May and I did not notice it until June 2nd or 3rd. So that was about 5-6 days and most of the food was still frozen by then, another couple of days (June 5th) and the remaining food I gave away was still at least partially frozen (the whole turkey that was in the bottom was still fully frozen).

So about a week at most.

Power peaked 6.6kwh - peak demand 370 watts) on the 11th when the new freezer was delivered. Average usage appears to be about 80-100 watts, with occasional bumps up, such as on the hot days or when I put something in the freezer, but not by very much - most days peak demand is 100 watts or less, with the freezer just running longer on some days to use at most 3 kwh. Good to know I can easily keep it running with a small genset - maybe even a decent solar panel or two (going to think about that in the future - the shop does get good sun in the summer, at least part of the day, and that way I would not need the separate account for the shop - if I wind up staying here - which I don't plan to do, but it would be good to know for my next place).

I do recall forgetting to turn off the lights (mostly LED and some florescent) in the shop one night so that can account for some of that. Most of the cost of the shop electricity is the "basic charge" - $20 to have service/etc. to the shop, the electricity I use is $4, and the rest $4 is all the misc charges they take on. :rolleyes:

I don't mind too much - given the service they do when the power goes out due to trees/cars/wind/ice/etc., I allow that they do have costs - I hope they pay their linemen/etc. well for all that overtime and hard work - they got my respect and thanks.

New freezer is working well, and I have most everything in it packed in styrofoam boxes with gel packs. Not much is in there though. The boxes take up a lot of room and only about half the small boxes have anything in them. Costco doesn't seem to carry the marinated Alaska salmon anymore. :( I will eventually slowly get more food to put in there, but I am in no hurry - other things to do. Paying $4-5 per month to store food I buy on sale about balances out I guess.
Interesting concept of storing frozen foods in insulated boxes.

Not one we go with, just simple "full". For the thermal mass. Empty space filled with water bottles, and ad / remove as space used / filled.
 
Interesting concept of storing frozen foods in insulated boxes.

Not one we go with, just simple "full". For the thermal mass. Empty space filled with water bottles, and ad / remove as space used / filled.
The purpose of the insulated boxes that have gel packs along with the food, is to allow the food to stay frozen longer should the power fail or the freezer itself fail. Also, to hopefully contain any spoiled food within the box if there is a failure.

After having to throw out so much food, both in the freezer and in my pantry, I resolved to do better about rotating food and try to not have so much that I wind up with food that spoils or sits in storage and never get used. Although I bought a larger freezer than I need, this allows me to use the styrofoam boxes instead of (and addition to) thermal mass. Also allows me to keep an eye on what I have inside the freezer, have it compartmentalized, and if necessary allows me to move it elsewhere easily.

Mot people have noticed that food is getting more expensive and it is only going to increase in cost, especially with the drought.
 
We have a pressure canner and empty quart jars. Thaw the meat for the day's batch of canning, add some dry ice, or even regular water ice to the freezer - clean meat can remain edible for more than a week if refrigerated - and then cover the freezer with every extra blanket and sleeping bag that I had to keep things as cool as possible.

Pressure canning isn't hard, but can't be hurried too.much either. You could probably process 16 quarts per 24 hr period.
 
The purpose of the insulated boxes that have gel packs along with the food, is to allow the food to stay frozen longer should the power fail or the freezer itself fail. Also, to hopefully contain any spoiled food within the box if there is a failure.
Frozen water jugs will do the same thing to a point plus have the added beneift of emergency water on hand should the need arise.
 
Glass or plastic water jugs full of water will crack when frozen, won't they?
Glass might, plastic will just warp, for the most part. Styrofoam and gel packs will essentially do the same thing and the gel packs seem to last longer than water. The gel packs are smaller and more convenient for me to use, they fit inside the boxes to keep the contents cold while the boxes add insulation to reduce heat gain. I am adding food that I will rotate - like milk, which is easily frozen and convenient to add and remove. Ditto with apple cider - I buy it when it is on sale. Same with frozen juice concentrate and ice cream (although ice cream is messy if it thaws and isn't very useful when thawed unlike milk or juice).

Having styrofoam boxes with gel packs inside them is like having an ice box inside a freezer - if the power goes out or the freezer malfunctions, the boxes will keep the items inside them frozen longer. Eventually I will run out of room for frozen goods, but at that point I should reach my limit for rotatable food, and lessen the risk of loosing so much food to failure. In the old freezer I had food stored there that had been in there for years and when it failed I had to give most of it away as I could not store it long enough to consume it or to get a new freezer.
 

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