How do you organize a refrigerator?

A refrigerator is not a box that runs at a single temperature; the aim is for the cooling side to be below 4 °C and the freezer to be at -18 °C or lower. The layout follows from that: what decides where a product goes is not the shelf but the temperature that product needs and the risk of contamination.

Below we look at which ranges the food groups need, the shelf order of raw versus cooked, how hot food goes into the refrigerator, how long it keeps, the freezer side, and the rules of thawing.

Which group needs which temperature

TÜBER, Türkiye’s national dietary guideline, gives the food groups together with their temperatures: milk and dairy products 4-6 °C, red meat and meat products 0-4 °C, minced meat 0-2 °C, eggs 5-12 °C, poultry meat 0-4 °C, fresh fish 0-4 °C, offal 0-3 °C, fruit and vegetables 0-12 °C.

The ranges do not overlap. That is why the zones inside the refrigerator do not do the same job either; between the range minced meat needs and the range fruit needs there is a difference of close to ten degrees.

The same section sets a single limit for frozen products: -18 °C or lower.

The raw and cooked shelf order

The guideline’s item on cold storage is direct: to prevent cross-contamination, raw foods and cooked foods are kept on separate shelves, and cooked foods are placed on the shelves above the raw foods and with their tops covered.

The reason is dripping. Contact between other foods and the liquid dripping from raw poultry, fish or other meats must absolutely be prevented; such foods are kept in the freezer compartment where possible.

We covered what the shelf order means product by product separately in this practical note.

How hot food goes into the refrigerator

Hot food is not put straight into the cooler. The guideline asks for cooling first: large portions are reduced, cooled quickly by being placed in shallow trays no more than 10 cm deep, and anything that needs to cool fast is kept in a tub full of ice and stirred now and then.

The speed of cooling is defined too: the temperature must be brought down from 60 °C to 37 °C in no more than two hours, and from 37 °C to 4 °C in no more than four hours. If cooked food is not going to be served right away, it is cooled under suitable conditions within two hours at most and put into the refrigerator.

How long it keeps

The duration is separated by the type of dish: leftover meat dishes should not be kept in the refrigerator longer than 1-2 days, and meatless dishes no longer than 3-4 days.

These numbers assume the food went into the refrigerator under the right conditions. The same number of days does not hold for a pot that stood on the stove for a long time and was only then put away.

We wrote separately about turning leftovers back into a meal in the leftover food guide.

The freezer side

Frozen foods are kept in their own original packaging, and packaged foods are placed flat on top of one another. Foods to be frozen at home are labeled by writing the type of food and the date of freezing on them.

One rule is absolute: a food that has thawed is not frozen again. That is why an item to be frozen is packed in portions that will be eaten in one go.

Where thawing is done

Frozen foods are not thawed at room temperature. The way the guideline gives is the refrigerator: frozen foods are thawed in their original packaging in a refrigerator environment of 4-4.5 °C within 48 hours at most.

A second method is defined for urgent cases: thawing in cold water inside a food-grade bag, without contact with the water. The thawing water is changed every 30 minutes and the temperature of the water must not go above 10 °C.

The liquid coming out of the thawing food is removed from the area so that it does not touch other foods; the surfaces it has touched are cleaned without delay.

Measuring the temperature

The setting dial on the refrigerator does not show a temperature. For places providing mass catering, the guideline asks that the temperature values of coolers and deep freezers be checked and recorded regularly, and that thermometers be calibrated regularly.

At home there is no such recording requirement, but the idea of measuring stays the same: the only thing that shows what temperature the refrigerator is actually at is a thermometer put inside it. Setting the dial once and forgetting it is not the same as having set the temperature.

When the order breaks down

The guideline gives no ratio for how full the refrigerator should be; the principle it gives is that the layout should prevent contamination. In a refrigerator packed to the door it becomes hard to keep cooked food on top and covered, so the order breaks down at that point first.

The second point of breakdown is uncovered containers. Dishes that are cooling are kept with their tops covered; a container left open opens both the smell side and the contamination side at once.

In short: keep the cooler below 4 °C and the freezer at -18 °C, store cooked food on top and covered, cool hot food within two hours and put it away, and thaw in the refrigerator. Dry goods do not belong in the refrigerator; we covered those in this tip.