What I Learned From My Fridge

On Tuesday, our fridge overflowed with food prepared for guests:  cubed watermelon, bowls of red and green grapes, containers filled with ready to serve crudités (carrot and celery sticks, strips of red pepper, broccoli florets), tender zucchini ready for slicing into a sizzling sauté pan, onion rolls to toast, chunky vegetarian chili to serve over fragrant basmati brown rice.

For the next few days, while our guests relaxed and enjoyed their visit, we utilized the contents of fridge (and pantry) to satiate appetites with hearty bowls of chili, salads bursting with delicious colors, moist banana nut bread (which my niece baked and brought), plates piled with spaghetti noodles and sauce, sautéed zucchini with red peppers, and other assorted sides.

After our guests left, we were left with left-overs.  Delightful! Instead of cooking from scratch, we re-purposed  ingredients pre-pared to serve our visitors. We blanched broccoli, roasted carrots and red pepper with potatoes, reheated the chili, and greatly enjoyed “cleaning out the fridge.”

This morning, I opened the fridge and saw bare shelf space for the first time all week.  How delightful!

Tonight, we’ll start with a clean slate.

Refrigerators remind us to enjoy the natural ebb and flow of life:

1.  Whether shelves are barren or bursting with food, cleanliness counts.
2.  If you don’t know what it is, you probably don’t want to know.
3.  If you smell an off odor upon opening the door, investigate immediately.
4.  Nature did not intend for all cheeses to wear Technicolor coats of mold.
5.  Even more so than when cleaning junk drawers:  if in doubt, toss it out.
6.  Life never seems empty when our fridge is full.
7.  Like a loyal friend, our fridge purrs and hums no matter what we throw at it.

No rules.  Just write!

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