Whether you have just a small freezer attached to your refrigerator or you have a deep freeze, this is the week to toss anything that contains man-made, processed, artificial, colored, enriched, hydrogenated or chemically processed ingredients. I hope you have now memorized the list of foods/ingredients to avoid and are reading the ingredient labels. So much of the food available in the standard grocery store contains HFCS (or some form of white sugar) and cheap hydrogenated fats and cheap salt.
It is NOT possible to eat a diet of man-made, man-processed foods and maintain your health or the health of your children. Is it worth poor quality of life to eat these foods? Obviously not all pain and suffering with chronic diseases is due to diet, but most is in the United States. Read the guest posts of a few people who have seen major changes within short time periods by changing their diets. Also remember that eating real foods is a privilege, a blessing, not a sacrifice.
So are you ready to tackle the last area of food in your home, the freezer? Again keep two things in mind.
1. Toss anything that contains foods/ingredients to be avoided for someone who is eating 100% God-made foods. One addictive food found in many people's freezers is ice cream. Look at the ingredients of yours. Is it loaded with sugar (or worse HFCS) and artificial ingredients? We make our own ice cream because it is extremely difficult to find honey or maple syrup sweetened ice creams. Occasionally I buy Coconut Bliss as a special ice cream treat. We also freeze leftover fruit smoothie in popsicle molds. Try to think about eating in season. Summer, when it is hot out, is the time to enjoy frozen treats. Try not to eat them in the cold winter months.
2. Toss anything that is unidentifiable or heavily freezer damaged. How long you can keep something depends upon how it was packaged and how good your freezer is. Something that is freezer damaged will start to look like a piece of dehydrated food with lots of frost on it. Typically you can keep things in the freezer for 6 months to a year or so.
I will give you a list of what I keep in my freezer later in the week. For now, you need to clear out your freezer and make space for excellent quality foods. It is important to have some extra space so that when things are in season, such as organic strawberries, you can buy extra and freeze some. Or when you find 100% grass fed beef or organic free-range chickens on sale you can buy extra and freeze some.
Freezers are one exception for plastic storage. I NEVER store anything hot in plastic, so if I am freezing homemade broth or some leftovers, I first put them in a glass container and cool them in the refrigerator. I then transfer them to a plastic container to put in the freezer. I freeze lots of produce and put that in Ziploc bags. I do not repackage meats purchased from the store, but freeze them as bought. Unfortunately, it is very difficult to freeze foods in glass but I don't think it is that critical since chemical reactions at the colder temperatures with plastics is virtually nonexistent.
Advanced Challenge for those who only have God-made foods in their freezer:
This challenge is for me this week! Go through your freezer and find things that are getting old and plan a meal that will use it. Something I find GREAT things like a bag of peaches from my trees last summer. Freezers are very hard to keep organized. Some tricks to use include: 1. Date everything that you can before placing it in the freezer, 2. If it is not obvious also write what it is on the label (this is especially important to do for things like shredded cooked chicken), 3. Keep like items together and place the new ones in the back or in the bottom.
I am going to work on clearing out one of my two deep freezers this week so I can then defrost them. I have been freezing a lot of fruit and just placing it on the top. Once defrosted, I will reorganize my freezers putting like items together. Spend the time doing these challenges (cleaning out your pantry, refrigerator and freezer) - you will be blessed.
"Take a lesson from the ants, you lazybones. Learn from their ways and become wise! Though they have no prince or governor or ruler to make them work, they labor hard all summer, gathering food for the winter." Proverbs 6: 6 - 8
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