The Cold Hard Truth
If you walk into my kitchen, it all seems quite normal. Counters and cupboards, sink and stove, we all get along just fine. Not true for our side by side refrigerator/freezer, the cause of consternation in the otherwise warm vibe of our home. Specifically, I blame the freezer. It’s provoked cold shoulders, frosty conversations, and icy stares all due to our fundamental, irreconcilable difference of opinion of how to use this appliance. It’s a cold war, baby.
Did you know the freezer is a magic box that makes food last forever? Please say no to that question. If you do, I’ll hire you as a marriage referee and you can tell my husband the cold hard truth: the freezer is not some marvel of posterity that makes the beef chili frozen in 2002 still good in 2023. Even government food safety guidelines recommend that chili comes out of the freezer in two to three months, tops. And don’t get me started on that cucumber that’s in there.
I hate to give my spouse a hard time. It’s not his fault he can’t throw food away. Actually, isn’t that a great quality to have? No! I tell you, it is not. People, why else have a compost bucket? If dinner is lousy, for the love of Ina Garten, let me toss it! Instead, at my house, it’s wrapped, labeled, and put in the freezer for time immemorial.
This is an unacceptable problem. Why? Ice cream. On what planet does it make sense to store food from the Bush presidency - and I’m talking George, Sr. here - instead of using that coveted frozen real estate for Ben and Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch?
I’d like to tell you my husband is being thoughtful, but that’s not the case. He genuinely believes all food is edible. The thought of which stops me in my tracks. Doesn’t he notice the difference between my seared salmon with lemon-caper-orzo and that hunk of god-knows-what he just scraped ice off? I’m throwing away my cookbooks.
I once made a gorgeous butternut squash soup that appeared yummy, but was inedible due to my overzealous use of jalapeños and cayenne pepper. Instead of giving the soup a zesty bite, I gave it a bark. It was a real dog of a dish, one that should have gone down the drain. But no such luck. It was frozen in minuscule portions which my husband, risking obliteration of his taste buds, ate a thimbleful at a time.
Exacerbating the freezer space problem is his proclivity to roam the aisles of Costco. Whenever he gets in the car to head to that warehouse selling a ton of things we don’t need, I sprint to the driveway and scream, “Remember, there’s no room in the freezer!” Pretty sure my neighbors love this. Somehow what my husband actually hears is, “Don’t come home unless you have a car full of frozen food!”
Thus, deep in the recesses of our freezer, you’ll find gems like fossilized patties of some sort of bean protein, a weird cauliflower rice thing, and lots of frozen fish. Frankly, I feel bad for them. By the time this catch gets to my freezer, they’ve probably been frozen for months. At our house, they won’t see the light of day until the next Haley’s Comet.
Listen, I don’t blame my husband for his freezer hoarding ways. He came by it honestly - or should I say, maternally? His mother has a loaded freezer filled with unidentified, aluminum foil wrapped rocks. Okay, it’s probably food, but who would know? Chisel out and thaw one of those crinkly silver chunks that looks like it’s been encapsulated since the 1950s and voila, your mystery dinner is served! Oh, it’s tuna pea wiggle. It is from the 50s.
Oh well, at least we have food. That is more than a little fortunate. Even if it is crusted in permafrost and has to sit on my kitchen counter for eight hours to reveal itself. I am lucky. That I don’t have Salmonella. Meanwhile, there is no doubt I’ll keep my hot husband and shop for a bigger freezer.
Carole Vasta Folley's In Musing column has won awards from the Vermont Press Association, The New England Newspaper & Press Association, and the National Society of Newspaper Columnists.