If you’re the sort of person who can’t be bothered to take your supermarket purchases out of the NTUC or Cold Storage plastic bags before shoving them into the fridge, we bet you’ve also discovered on more than one occasion that those fresh vegetables you bought had transformed into a soggy, mouldy mess.

Pack your purchases into clear containers once you get home and you’re less likely to run into this problem, because you’ll be able to actually see the items inside and be reminded of their existence each time you open the fridge.

Daiso sells airtight plastic containers for $2. If you’re a hipster, get some mason jars which you can also reuse when you take lunch to work in them. They’re super cheap too if you get them online at sites like Taobao.

You also avoid having your fridge becoming a huge mess stuffed with rustling plastic bags.

The annoying thing about eggs is that you can’t buy just one or two. They’re cheapest when you buy them by the dozen. But unless you plan on eating omelettes every day for the next week, many people end up using two or three and then throwing the rest of the carton away.

Fortunately, there is a way to make your eggs last longer and that is to store them in the fridge in an airtight container. They can last up to a month that way, although you should obviously not cook them if they smell weird.

I’m not going to get all scientific on you, but many fruits give off a chemical called ethylene gas which can ruin other fresh foods. This means that your mangoes, papayas and tomatoes could be destroying your broccoli, eggplants and carrots.

There’s a reason fridges usually contain a little drawer on the bottom shelf—it’s to keep fruits or vegetables separate from the rest of the produce. Use your drawer to store your fruits, and place the vegetables on the upper shelves. If you’ve got a fridge with more than one door, you can store your fruits and vegetables in different compartments.

If you’re the sort of person who refuses to put on a new article of clothing without first washing it, you’ll have to resist when it comes to your fruits and vegetables.

Not washing your fruits and vegetables before you place them in the fridge will extend their lives. Any moisture will only hasten the decomposition process, so dump them in and try not to think of the pesticides. Clean them up just before you’re going to consume them, and that should do the trick.

We tend to think of fridges as super cold boxes that penguins would love to play around in, but the sad fact is, Singapore is so hot that your fridge might not be as cold as you think it is. Furthermore, certain areas of the fridge are hotter and colder than others.

Even after adjusting the temperature of your fridge, if you were to place a thermometer in different parts you would find that the temperature can vary significantly. The back of the fridge is colder than the front, since hot air enters the fridge every time you open it. The top part of the fridge close to the freezer also tends to be colder than the bottom. If your food is spoiling very quickly, lower the temperature of your fridge. Also keep perishables in the colder areas of the fridge.

Related: 8 Foods You Can Reuse

5 Food Storage Hacks That Will Save You Lots of Money From Avoiding Food Wastage appeared first on the MoneySmart blog.

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