OK, today’s focus should be a maintenance activity, I realize–but it seems like our fridge is always overflowing with tubs of leftovers, half-empty pickle jars, and an odd assortment of sauces and pastes that rarely, if ever, get used.

So tonight I did a quick clear-out of the fridge, and yup–found some stuff that should have gone away a long time ago. And yes, I spared you pictures. Some things I’ve learned: pickled beets should never be brown. Ever. And it turns out if you leave kimchi unattended for a really long time, it will in fact grow fur.

Yeah, kinda nasty.

But those were the extreme exceptions. Most of what we had piled up were leftovers, many that we only still had in the fridge on the idea that we would use them for dog scraps. But now that the dog is home from the hospital and on a bland diet, the 8-day old meatloaf went into the trash, along with quite a few other ghosts-of-meals-past.

I have to say that throwing away all that food didn’t quite feel right. Not that I was going to sit down and eat furry kimchi and old meatloaf for dinner tonight, but it really emphasized for me that my “living simply” experiment for today is really way too long after the fact. What I really need to focus on is: how much food do we bring into the house? How much do we prepare for dinner? Can we finish up leftovers before making a new meal (and generating more leftovers)? And so on.

I wouldn’t say we are overly wasteful (tonight we had chicken and dumplings made from the leftovers of a roast chicken). But still–we could certainly pay closer attention to what, when–and ultimately why–we consume what we do.

From the first kitchen project it was clear to me just how much abundance we have, yet I hardly ever notice it. A bit more attention to careful consumption is always in order….